Volume 6: Northern Yorkshire
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Current Display: Whitby 04 (abbey), Yorkshire North Riding
Overview
Object type: Lower part of cross-shaft [1]
Measurements: H. 42.7 cm (16.8 in) W. 30 cm (11.8 in) D. 15.1 cm (6 in)
Stone type: Medium-grained ferruginous sandstone, brownish yellow (10YR 6/6) in colour. Stone provenance probably as Whitby 1 (abbey, St Peter and St Hilda)
Plate numbers in printed volume: Ills. 903–6
Corpus volume reference: Vol 6 p. 236
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Present Location
English Heritage North Region store, Helmsley (EH 88092806)
Evidence for Discovery
See Whitby 1 (abbey, St Peter and St Hilda). This is the !part of Celtic cross shaft 1! 6" x 12" x 6" incised on 4 sides!, that was found on 1 June 1922, in the !S.W. angle (internal side) | West wall in North transept! (Whitby finds register, no. 158). Presumably this means that the shaft was found within the standing ruins of the abbey, possibly built into the west wall of the transept. But photographs and a site plan in Hood (1927, 32, ills. on 34, fig. on 66) show that excavations took place within the north transept in 1922, even though these are not shown on the plan published subsequently by Peers and Radford (1943, pl. XXXI).
Church Dedication
St Peter and St Hilda
Present Condition
Worn and broken
Description
Lower portion of a plain shaft with incised chevron patterns on all faces and a roughened section at the base.
A and C (broad) : Double stranded pair of chevrons.
B and D (narrow) : Single stranded pair of chevrons.
Discussion
This is one of the distinctive Whitby Plain Cross group, as with nos. 1–3 above (Chapter VI). The chevron incisions are probably skeuomorphs of wood decoration, as on no. 2. The rough section at the base would have been hidden by whatever setting supported these crosses.
R.C.
Date
Seventh to eighth century
References
Peers and Radford 1943, 36, no. 4; Cramp 1993, 69
Endnotes
[1] The following are general references to the Whitby stones: Hood 1927, 38, 45, 49; Kendall 1932, 9–10, 26–7, 28; Peers and Radford 1943, 33–40; Clapham 1952, 11; Wilson, D. 1964, 9; Cramp 1965b, 4; Fellows-Jensen 1972, 218; Cramp 1976a, 228; Cramp 1976b, 455–7; Rahtz 1976, 460; Cramp 1978a, 7; Bailey 1980, 81, 82; Okasha 1983, 118; Cramp 1984, 9, 79, 109, 180, 222; Higgitt 1986b, 130–1, 134, 148; Bailey and Cramp 1988, 55, 56, 85, 154; Cramp 1989, 223; Lang 1989a, 67; Lang 1990a, 2–3; Higgitt 1991, 45; Lang 1991, 24, 109, 138, 139; Cramp 1992, 8, 24, 107, 224, 252; Okasha 1992, 84; Cramp 1993, 68–9, 71; Fellows-Jensen 1995, 177; Higgitt 1995, 229–36; Rahtz 1995, 7–8; Bailey 1996a, 50–1, 111; Hawkes 1999b, 403, 410–16; Karkov 1999, 133–4; Stocker 2000, 200; Stopford 2000, 102, 104.
