1a, standing in churchyard to south of church (on line of chancel arch), set in an undecorated rectangular stone base which may be original. 1b, loose in churchyard, lying against 1a

1a, no direct evidence. It is shown in its present location in a Nattes drawing of the church dated 1793 (LCL, Banks Folios, vol. 1, f. 173), and may therefore be in its original position. 1b, said to have been found in the south or east wall of the churchyard 'some 20 years ago', i.e. in the 1960s.

St Cuthbert

The west face of 1a is completely eroded by weathering; the other faces are heavily weathered and lichen encrusted. The top of the stump is heavily weathered. 1b is weathered on its decorated surfaces. The base has a very uneven upper surface, that has lost several millimetres overall through spalling and weathering; on its south side as much as 15–20 mm is gone.

1a and 1b are two non-conjoining pieces probably from the same major cross-shaft of rectangular section.

Stone 1a.

A (broad): The west face is completely eroded, except for surviving hints of borders that suggest it was decorated in a manner similar to the other faces.

B (narrow): The south face has borders that peter out some 30 cm (12 in) above the base: they are too worn to tell whether they were originally cabled. Within them, the vertical field is divided into panels by an inner border: both panels have vestiges of cabling on the borders between them. (i) The upper panel has a four-strand plait, two of whose strands link to form a closed loop while the other two continue to form a cross-over within a free ring. This could be a figure-of-eight motif based on the 'Carrick bend' (e.g. simple pattern F – Cramp 1991, fig. 23). (ii) The lower, horizontal panel is filled with a motif of two free rings with interwoven running strands.

C (broad): The east face has similar outer borders also terminating about 30cm (12 in) above the base, and inner borders dividing the face into panels. (i) In the upper panel, a vertical central area is missing through weathering: to either side are two areas of identical simple dense plait. It is uncertain whether this represents two bands of four-strand plait on either side of a central shaft, or the two edges of a continuous mat of interlace that originally filled the panel. (ii) The lower panel is filled with a horizontal run of simple four-strand plait.

D (narrow): The north face is identical in layout to B and C, with outer borders terminating at a similar height and inner borders defining two panels. There may be traces of cabling on both borders. (i) The interlace filling the upper panel is identical to that on face B. (ii) The lower transverse panel is deeper than those on the other legible faces, so that its lower edge coincides with the lower ends of the outer borders. It is filled with a simple four-strand interlace.

E (top): The shaft has the remains of six dowel holes in its upper surface, presumably indicating a repair or alteration to the monument.

F (bottom): The lower end sits 12 cm (4.75 in) inside the socket of the base.

Stone 1b.

Parts of two decorated faces survive, and an original dressed end that suggests this is a fragment of a section of a composite rather than monolithic shaft.

A (broad): Decorated with a cabled border along the two original edges: the other edges are broken. The central panel, filled with a simple four-strand running plait, is further elaborated by two more contrasting borders. The inner is a smaller finer cabled roll, and the intermediate border is a fine raised diaper or diamond pattern.

B (narrow): Has the same triple border, but the central panel is filled with an interlace pattern of finer strands whose complete form does not survive.

The base has no original upper surface surviving. Its sides are buried. The socket hole measures approximately 52 × 40 cm (20.5 × 15.75 in).

Despite the obvious difference in the arrangement of borders between the two stones, their similarity of stone type, the fact that they both seem to come from a major shaft, their similar organisation of decoration in bordered panels, and their dimensional compatibility, all argue that 1b is most likely to be an upper part of the shaft of which 1a is the lowest section. With the re-classification here of so many stones hitherto thought of as pieces of cross-shaft as grave-covers of the mid-Kesteven type, this Brattleby shaft is left as one of very few crosses of major dimension in the county. The fragment, Ruskington 1 (Ill. 325), may be part of a similar shaft, a suggestion somewhat strengthened by their shared and distinctive deployment of a border of fine raised diaper or diamond pattern. The base, Bardney 2 (Ills. 11–14), also implies a major shaft, though one rather more rectangular in cross-section and perhaps of early date. Otherwise in the later pre-Conquest period, its principal comparison in respect of scale is the Crowle 1 shaft (Ills. 145–9); since both the South Kesteven group of shafts and other pieces at Colsterworth, Harmston, Lincoln St Mark and Lincoln St Mary-le-Wigford, for example, are markedly smaller. They are effectively elaborate grave-markers, whereas this, from its size and the existence of a socketed base, may have been a churchyard cross.

In decoration, however, this shaft as it survives lacks that feature that distinguishes the handful of major later pre-Conquest crosses in the East Midlands – including Crowle 1, for example, and also Stapleford, Notting-hamshire, Asfordby and Rothley, Leicestershire, Nassington, Northamptonshire, and the Derbyshire group of Bakewell, Eyam, Bradbourne etc. – which is figure sculpture. On 1a particularly, both the organisation of the decoration and a number of its details bear comparison with the grave-covers of mid-Kesteven type, as Butler's (1961, 20) comparison with the 'cross' fragment at Kneesall, Nottinghamshire (and recte part of a mid-Kesteven cover, see Fig. 9) underlines. In organisation it is the double border and especially the double border between panels, the panelled arrangement itself, and the consistent deployment of transverse panels at the bottom of each side that combine to give this impression. The interlace pattern filling the transverse panel at the bottom of face D is motif type ix in the mid-Kesteven range (Fig. 10), as found on the Coleby Hall cover, and that filling the transverse panel at the bottom of face C is only an extension of this, perhaps paralleled at Lincoln St Mary-le-Wigford 2. The interlace in the panel at the bottom of face B is a linked pair of motif type ii, single instances of which occur on covers at Aisthorpe, Eagle, Hougham and Kirkby Laythorpe, and a similar double example apparently at Corringham (see Fig. 9). The interlace of the upper panels on faces B and D appears to be effectively a combination of pattern types ii and v (as on covers at Aisthorpe, Normanton and Rowston) or vi (as at Burton Pedwardine2 and East Bridgeford, Nottinghamshire), in a pattern that may be represented on the cover (no. 2) at Toft next Newton, for example. The interlace on face A of stone 1b, too, is again motif type v on the covers, or an elongated version. The fill of the upper panel on face C, by contrast, if it was a continuous mat of interlace relates more to the infill of the Calvary mound on the cover at Ewerby, or on shafts at Bicker (no. 1) and North Witham. All this indicates how closely integrated this Brattleby shaft was with the tradition of sculpture production in the county in the later pre-Conquest period, and particularly with the products of central Kesteven to which its stone type links it. In itself, this may show no more than that it drew upon the range of contemporary decorative ideas. The border of diaper or lozenges on fragment 1b is more distinctive, and along with monument form and stone type is shared with Ruskington 1 (Ill. 325).

This may point to a less common but nevertheless standard shaft type in production alongside the mid-Kesteven covers. Where a similar motif occurs on a series of Irish metal-work items, including the arm of a bronze cross in the British Museum, it is said by Françoise Henry to be of distinctively ninth- and tenth-century occurrence (1967, 123–4, pl. 55).

The Brattleby shaft has an additional and very special importance, matched in the county only by the marker, Lincoln St Mark 18, excavated in situ at St Mark's church (Ills. 263–4), and rather more doubtfully by Hackthorn 2 (Ills. 190–4). Its position in relation to the church, its orientation, the presence of an apparently original base, the severe weathering of its west face, the heavy weathering of the exposed top of the reduced shaft, and the relatively early evidence for its being in its present position (and certainly before the major rebuilding of the church of St Cuthbert in 1858 ((—) 1859–60b, xx) all combine to suggest that it stands in its original location. The dowel holes in its top are also evidence of its having been broken and repaired, witnessing a level of respectful care evidenced also on the Elloe Stone, Moulton, where long-term stability of site was also an important factor. It is unclear on what evidence, if any, Davies gave the contradictory opinion that the shaft was 'at a later period placed on the above base' (1914–15, 136).

Later tenth or early eleventh century

Stone 1a: Davies 1914–15, 136; Davies 1926, 8, pl. IV; Butler 1961, 20; Butler 1963–4, 110; Pevsner and Harris 1964, 197; Taylor and Taylor 1965, 715; Pevsner et al. 1989, 184; Stocker with Everson 1990, 98. Stone 1b: Webster and Cherry 1973, 145