Inside St Erth's church, fastened to north-west wall of south aisle (SW 5497 3502)

First recorded in 1888 in churchyard (Langdon, Arthur and Allen, J. R. 1888, 318); removed from wall of church in 1875 during renovation (Langdon, Arthur 1896, 402). Remained in churchyard in angle of building east of porch and south of south aisle until 1998 when erected inside church (Preston-Jones and Langdon, Andrew 1998, 9–10)

St Erth

Monument broken but stable; ornament badly worn; situation very good

Rectangular cross-shaft in two pieces with part of head only, the head having been trimmed to roughly the same width as the shaft and the top broken off. The bottom of the shaft is undecorated and tapers to a rounded end which was presumably inserted into a socket or directly into the ground.

A (broad): On the cross-head is a badly worn and mutilated figure of Christ. The head and ends of the arms are missing. The feet are turned out but no other features are identifiable. There is no break between the figure and the decoration: the figure stands on top of the interlace. On both pieces of the shaft is a single panel of decoration within an incised edge-moulding. The decoration is a simple double-strand type F interlace, irregularly laid out and constructed of broad, shallow-carved bands. The pattern is not properly finished at the top.

B (narrow): No decoration is visible on the cross-arm which has been trimmed off, although part of the lower hole piercing the ring-head is visible. On the upper part of the shaft a small section of a diagonal key pattern is visible, possibly of the same type as on side D.

C (broad): There is nothing visible on the upper piece. On the lower piece, an incised edge-moulding is visible along the full length of the panel. Inside this are traces of an unidentifiable double-strand interlace pattern.

D (narrow): No decoration is visible on the cross-arm which has been trimmed off. Part of the hole of the ring-head is visible. An incised line marks the top of the panel on the shaft which contains a worn diagonal key pattern, possibly Romilly Allen's no. 926, the Welsh N2 (see Fig. 19c, p. 72).

This cross is a member of the Penwith group of pre-Norman sculpture characterised by a Crucifixion on one side of the ring-head and five bosses on the other (Chapter IX, p. 88). No bosses survive on this mutilated monument, but it has decorative features in common with other members of the group, namely the key pattern (also on Sancreed 1, Ill. 217) and the double-strand type F interlace (also on Gwinear 1, Ills. 94, 96). The poor condition of the stone makes detailed comparison difficult, but the small size of the monument and the neat Crucifixion are comparable with Gwinear 1, originally located only 7.5 km or 4.6 miles away.

With a place-name in *lann, a dedication to a Celtic saint (of possibly Irish origin: Padel 1988, 82), and a curvilinear churchyard located in a valley bottom at the lowest crossing point on the River Hayle, before it broadens to an estuary, St Erth is a site of early medieval origin. However, this cross and St Erth 2 are the only tangible remains of the pre-Norman period (Padel 1976–7; Padel 1985, 142).

Mid tenth to early eleventh century

Langdon, Arthur and Allen, J. R. 1888, 318, 323, 325 and figs.; Langdon, Arthur 1889a, 319, 339, 345, 347; Langdon, Arthur 1890–1, 36, 49, 56, 58; Langdon, Arthur 1896, 402–3, passim and figs.; Langdon, Arthur 1906, 438, 441; Hencken 1932, 271; Dexter and Dexter 1938, 261–2, 273–4 and figs.; Thomas, I. ?1950, 54, 82 [1]; Pevsner 1970, 172; Rowe, L. 1973, fig.; Appleby 1975, 113; Pearce 1978, 178; Appleby 1992, no page numbering; Langdon, Andrew 1996a, 26; Preston-Jones and Langdon, Andrew 1998, passim and figs.; Langdon, Andrew 1999, 30, no. 37, and figs.; Salter 1999, 83; Thomas, A. C. 2007, 123–4, fig. 2; Henderson, M. unpub. 1985, p. 375, entry 191, and figs.

[1] It is not certain whether the reference on p. 54 is to St Erth 1 or to St Erth 2.