Appendix B item (stones wrongly associated with pre-Conquest period)

Cross-head on display in Tewkesbury Town Museum, found in 1966 on the site of the former chapel during demolition of farm buildings. The cross, carved from oolitic limestone, consists of a central circular plate with three short straight arms, the fourth being broken off. There is decoration on one face. The back is lost, probably as a result of splitting the stone lengthwise. The circular plate has a border of basket-weave interlace, woven around large, evenly-spaced pellets. The centre of the head is decorated with seven interlocking and half-overlapping arch shapes, double-outlined with pelleting along the centre line. The short arms carry floral or geometric motifs, including what looks like a fleur-de-lis. Although standing crosses from the century after the Conquest are not common in Gloucestershire, all the decorative elements of this cross-head point to a twelfth-century rather than Anglo-Saxon date. In particular, the seven overlapping central arch shapes are closely related to the overlapping blind arcading found on many Norman buildings including nearby Tewkesbury Abbey.