Reused as head of niche in east wall of chancel, north of reredos

None; first recorded in André 1898

St Mary

Broken, but carving well preserved

It is rectangular and decorated with a semicircular border composed of four narrow roll mouldings. To the right this extends slightly beyond the lower margin of the panel. Here the outer moulding unites with that of the remnant of a second similar border. Within the semicircular field the lower margin of the panel is chamfered. The field is decorated with two thick half-round stems which develop from near the lower ends of the border. They curl up and back on themselves and are linked by a collar where they touch. Each terminates in a pair of expanding, pointed-ended leaves separated from the stem by a collar. The other ends of the stems emerge from the far side of the border. To the right the stem is linked by a collar to another emerging from the adjacent border before being carried over the head of the main field. From here it develops three short upward-pointing branches. The first of these bifurcates, the bifurcations are square ended. The other stems terminate in trefoil leaves. The main stem then divides into two interlacing subsidiaries which reunite before joining the stem emerging from the border to the left. This runs straight up and off the edge of the stone. A subsidiary branch, emerging from the point of junction of the two stems runs down off the lower edge of the stone. To the right the stem emerging from the fragmentary border is carried off to the right. From it develops a short, upward-pointing stem whose end is defaced.

It is evident that this fragment and Sompting nos. 10 and 11 all derive from the same feature. As the remains of five arch heads survive, this feature must originally have been more than 500 cm in length. Close examination of the pieces reveals that the junctions of the arch heads were originally carried down to form piers. Moreover, in each case the careful confinement of the plant ornament to the tympanum suggests that it did not extend down between each pair of piers. Instead the piers must have flanked niches, or possibly separate sculptured panels. The fragments must, therefore, be reconstructed as either a frieze or blind arcade. Alternatively, the pieces may have formed part of a free-standing screen. This, perhaps, is less likely as Sompting no. 11 has the arch carved only on the lower half of a larger stone, the upper part of which is only roughly dressed. If this were a frieze or blind arcade then the upper part could have been plastered, but if the fragments formed part of a screen it is difficult to see how this could have been disguised, particularly as the other fragments lack such a feature.

As with the string-course fragments Sompting nos. 1–8, the best parallels for the form of the arch heads and their decoration are provided by late pre-Conquest manuscripts, notably the Trinity Gospels, dated to the second quarter of the eleventh century (Temple 1976, no. 65), and Warsaw, Bibl. Narodowa MS I. 3311, dated to about the year 1000 (ibid., no. 92, figs. 51–5, ills. 281–4). For further discussion see also Chap. VII.

Eleventh century

André 1898, 18; Crouch 1910, pl. 39; Clapham 1935a, 407 - 8, pl. VIIIA; Nairn and Pevsner 1965, 331; Taylor and Taylor 1965 - 78, ii, 562; Kirby 1978, 165; Tweddle 1986b, i, 80, 183 - 5, ii, 464 - 5, iii, figs. 3, 28, pl. 88a