All three stones are placed on top of each other 'loose' on the floor of the north aisle to the west of the north door. They are too large to move comfortably, though they are evidently moved occasionally as they are regularly abraded, and photographs suggest that they are re-ordered from time to time.

As Rolleston 1. These three stones were drawn by Allen from Stevenson's photographs as if parts of a cross-shaft and presumptively parts of the shaft represented by Rolleston 1; the drawings were published in The Reliquary for July 1897 ([Allen] 1897, figs. 2–4), and much republished since Stapleton recovered the originals from the proprietors of The Reliquary (Stapleton 1903, Preface). Stapleton also reprinted Stevenson's account verbatim, along with the drawings (1903, 89–90 and plate). The photograph published, along with a brief notice, by Cornelius Brown in 1904 (Brown 1904–7, i, 23) was taken shortly after their discovery and shows the stones of Rolleston 2 piled up in front of and below the inscribed fragment, Rolleston 1, as if it were the cross-head to their shaft (ibid.). This display, in the angle between the tower east wall and the wall continuing the north arcade respond westwards, is the arrangement shown in a series of photographs in the Local Studies collection of Nottingham Central Library and in published early sources (Baylay 1913, photo by William Stevenson; Longhurst and Freckingham 1931, photo by Alfred J. Loughton: see Ills. 68–9). It seems to have been the arrangement created from the date of the stones' discovery in 1895 and presumably persisted until Rolleston 1 was removed from the wall in this location.

Holy Trinity

Moderate. Face A on all three stones is in good condition being only slightly weathered. Face B is completely re-cut, though the re-cut surfaces survive well. Face C represents the original end surface of the monument and appears considerably weathered. Face D on all three stones has been trimmed back considerably, though the outline of the original interlace decoration is clearly visible. This trimming back must have occurred before the stone was re-cut for its final reuse in the church fabric as it predates the division of the stone into three parts. Along the bottom edge of stones b and c is a narrow chamfer; since it, too, extends over two stones, this working probably also dates from this primary phase of reuse. It demonstrates an earlier phase of architectural reuse of the intact monument, evidently as a doorjamb, before it was cut into blocks and reused as walling material. This earlier use was probably contemporary with the cutting of the huge rebate that has removed so much stone on face F. Face E, by contrast, is a re-cut surface deriving from the second reuse of the stone.

Even though they have had a hard working life, the three adjoining stones at Rolleston fit together to make a fine example of the mid-Kesteven grave-cover monument type. This is second only to Hawksworth 1 in Nottinghamshire, and indeed within the entire group, in its state of completeness (Fig. 22). During its final stage of reuse it was evidently cut up to make four blocks, and of those four, one has gone missing. The missing stone was the opposite end to stone a.

A (top): Half the decoration of the 'lid' survives on stone a (Ill. 81). In all known examples of this monument type the decoration on the lid of the grave-cover is divided into three zones: a large central panel and two transverse end panels. Here therefore the decoration of two panels is represented; the third is missing. The transverse end panel is divided from the longitudinal central panel by a row of double cable moulding and was framed with further moulding of this sort along the arrises with the side panels below. The field within the panel is decorated with interlace carved in low relief and enlivened with an incised medial line. Allen's drawing shows the pattern taken by this interlace as a four-strand plait through a free ring ([Allen] 1897, fig. 4; contra Everson and Stocker 1999, fig. 9); but there has been subsequent breakage at this point, and the evidence for a free ring cannot be substantiated from the surviving remains. It is possible that the free ring was an assumption by Allen, working as he was from Stevenson's photographs. If a free ring was originally part of the design, then this would be a unit of motif viii (Everson and Stocker 1999, fig. 10).

As is typical, the central, longitudinal panel is filled by a bold double-ended cross surrounded by interlace which itself emerges from the tips of the cross-arms in a manner that is also entirely typical (Ills. 82–3). In this Rolleston example, the incised lines within the terminals of the cross are more elaborately treated than most other examples and are used to create mini 'bull's heads' within each terminal (cf. Everson and Stocker 1999, fig. 11). These bull's heads have no surviving eyes, but all five surviving examples have 'nose-bands' indicated by a pair of lightly inscribed parallel lines. The outer interstices between the cross-arms are filled with four identical units of simple running three-strand plait, and this motif continues along one of the longer central panels. The other long central panel, however, appears to have a more complex four-strand plait with 'free ends'.

B (long): This long side was completely removed (to a depth of perhaps 10 cm) when the stone was re-cut to serve as a door jamb. It retains an impressive display of crude tooling dating from that reuse.

C (end): A substantial part of this face has been broken away by mechanical damage, but the surviving part of its surface appears to represent the smoothly cut and weathered original, undecorated end of the monument.

D (long): Although considerably damaged when its surface was planed back during the phase when the stone was reused as a door jamb, this face retains enough information to permit its original decorative scheme to be reconstructed in detail. As is typical in monuments in this class, the side panel is sub-divided into three major panels (two of which survive here).

The surviving transverse 'end' panel is separated from both the end of the stone and the longitudinal central panel by runs of double cable moulding. Within, the (greatly damaged) field thus defined was clearly occupied by a unit of interlace in low relief (Ill. 78). From the outlines visible, it looks like a run of four-strand plait, which might originally have been a unit such as motif ix or xi (Everson and Stocker 1999, fig. 10). The upper part of this panel has suffered some severe mechanical damage; it also contains a crude and deep rebate of rounded section extending inwards from the arris it shares with face A as far as the centre of the panel. It is hard to see how this rebate would have functioned when the stone was reused as a door jamb so it presumably relates to a previous or a subsequent reuse.

The longitudinal panel (split between stones b and c) is of the type that is also subdivided longitudinally (Ills. 79–80). In this case the division is marked by a run of cable moulding. Above this is a deep recess before the upper run of interlace develops. This recess is so deep that, unusually, the cable moulding does not have to divert to navigate under the 'bull's head' at the centre of the stone, which unfortunately is placed right at the junction between stones b and c. No further detail of the bull's head itself has survived, but the interlace that develops from its horns in the usual manner is a run of three-strand plait. The lower of the two longitudinal divisions was also decorated with a continuous run of interlace, though evidently it was not uniform along its length. At the less damaged end, two strands appear to emerge from within the cable-moulded border and to develop into a unit of four-strand simple pattern F (Cramp 1991, fig. 23), which is clear at one end, as is a free ring closer to the centre. The lower part of this interlace run has been removed when a narrow chamfer was run along this arris of the stone when the stone was reused as a door jamb.

E (end): This face (the non-adjacent end of stone c) was created when the original stone was cut up into four approximately equally sized blocks for reuse as walling material in the fabric. It retains its tooling from this operation in excellent condition.

F (bottom): The original surface of the stone has been removed along with approximately 5 cm of its depth. This re-cutting was undertaken at a time when stones a, b and c were still joined to make a single stone. The stone has been re-cut to form a monolithic jamb with a substantial rebate at least 8 cm deep. The tooling for this re-cutting work survives in excellent condition, presumably demonstrating that this work was undertaken for an architectural feature in an internal position. Two other details amongst the recut surfaces tell us more about the feature for which the stone was reused. First, there are two sets of incised grooves accompanying square sockets (on stones a and b), which indicate where wooden door furniture was seated. Secondly, there is a large iron latch-fitting sunk into face B near its mid point, which remains sunk in its lead fixing. This fitting must have survived from that earlier phase of its reuse and just been left when the stones were divided up and used as walling material in the church fabric. The latch-fitting was inserted to such a depth that it broke through the original sculpted face of face D.

The earliest account of the Rolleston stones' discovery identifies the first reuse of these three stones as part of the jambs of a twelfth-century doorway, and A. E. Frost's careful drawing of 1903 and accompanying description in correspondence with Romilly Allen identifies the hole in stone b as for a door-catch (see Rolleston 1; BL, Add. MS 37552, ff. 202–3). Their second reuse, by the same account, was probably in the foundations of the south aisle, which was evidently created in the thirteenth century. Perhaps from the same phase of restoration came the late twelfth-century details that went into the present, reconstructed south doorway, which, as Baylay recalled, was created when the entrance to the church was moved one bay west in 1895 (Baylay 1913, 49; Pevsner and Williamson 1979, 299).

In origin, however, this relatively complete monument is clearly a member of the large mid-Kesteven group of grave-covers produced in the quarries around Ancaster, of which we have so far documented 49 examples (Everson and Stocker 1999, 36–46, fig. 9; this volume, pp. 53–61, Fig. 8). Although we cannot measure the precise original sizes of most members of the group (including Rolleston) because of later recutting, nevertheless the impression is that Rolleston 2 was a large example of the type. In particular, this is because the longitudinal side panel is so broad that the 'bull's head' in its centre does not extend down into the lower register of interlace, as it does on every other known example except East Bridgford 1 (p. 106, Ills. 23–4). Even there, this is only possible because the cable-moulded border between the two registers is omitted, which is not the case at Rolleston.

The Rolleston monument is also distinctive in having exceptionally well-detailed cross terminals on its lid. Although details of only fifteen other lids within the group are known, none of these replicates the fully-formed bull's heads in the cross-arm terminals that we see at Rolleston. In design terms, turning the incised medial lines decorating the interlace that develops from the terminals of the cross-arms into fully-formed bull's heads of the types seen on the side panels seems like an obvious step (Everson and Stocker 1999, fig. 11). But we ought to consider the iconography of the move. The meaning of the bull's heads is not known, but Rolleston is the only place in the entire group where this design motif is placed within a recognizable iconographic context — through association with the cross itself. This cover seems to confirm the link, then, that we have proposed between this distinctive Ancaster design motif and the zoomorphic motifs found decorating the terminals of a small number of grave-covers from York Minster (Everson and Stocker 1999, 42; Lang 1991, nos. 35–8). An intriguing area for future research is the link that the bull's heads may make, nowhere more explicitly than at Rolleston, between Christ and the sacred bull of Celtic and Viking mythology (Davidson 1993, 28–30, 90–2). In those traditions the bull, along with the horse, was the animal of supreme sacrifice, and some reminiscence of this might be intended when combining the bull and the cross, as at Rolleston. In a more general way, the presence of these heads might be related to the syncretism that resulted in the pre-Christian practice of 'guising' as animals during the major Christian festivals of Christmas and Easter (Ewing 2008, 36– 43). It might be argued that this is also the meaning of the transverse bars on the miniature grave-cover from Crowland in Lincolnshire, that also seem to be derived from bull's heads (Crowland 1: Everson and Stocker 1999, 146, ill. 143).

Later tenth or early eleventh century

[Allen] 1897, 181–2, figs. 2–4; Stapleton 1903, 87–90 and plate; Brown, C. 1904–7, i, 23 and plate; Stapleton 1911, 140 and plate; Cox 1912a, 7, 172; Stapleton 1912, 30 and plate; Baylay 1913, 49, 54, plate opp. 53; Hill 1916a, 202, pl. I; Guilford 1927, 161; Collingwood 1927, 138, fig. 153; Longhurst and Freckingham 1931, 10, 21–2, plate opp. 26; Mee 1938, 244; Wood 1947, 18; Pevsner 1951, 152; Jope 1964, 108; Pevsner and Williamson 1979, 299; Thorold 1984, 147; Kaye 1987, 28; Sidebottom 1994, 97–8, 99, 140, 149, 266, nos. 1–3 and plates; Everson and Stocker 1999, 36, 41, 44, 45, 157, 199, 270, figs. 9, 12; Stocker and Everson 2001, 235, figs. 12.6, 12.7; Longhurst and Freckingham 2007, 25–6, illus.

[1] The following are unpublished manuscript references to Rolleston 2: Nottinghamshire Archives Office, PR6571, p. 119; BL, Add. MS 37552, ff. 194–214, illustrations (Romilly Allen collection). The following are unpublished photographs: Nottingham Central Library, Local Studies, 'Pictorial Survey' Collection, ref. S95.3 and S95.4.