Reused as a font at the west end of the church

Noted in 1822 by the brothers Lysons in a discussion of Devonshire fonts: '... one square on a square base; the latter is highly enriched, but the ornaments are much worn' (Lysons 1822, cccxxxi). Subsequently encased in wood and plaster until 1862, when parts of the lower section were restored (Jones 1891, 197–8). Plaster may have been earlier.

St Edmund King and Martyr

Some wear; the whole of the lower west-facing panel (1b D) is a reconstruction, as is part of the lower north-facing panel (1b C).

1a (upper). This block has been set upside down with the widest part at the top, presumably because it forms a useful shape for a font.
A (broad, south facing): A frontal head set on a stalk-like neck is centrally placed. The top of the head has a cap or short cropped hair, the eyes are prominent and staring, surrounded with delicate lids, the mouth is small with two teeth visible. By far the most prominent feature, however, is a pair of creatures which issue from the nostrils of the head, forming something like a grotesque moustache. Both creatures are shown in profile. Their reptilian bodies are outlined and with a median rib; the one on the left is cross-ribbed from head to tail, and the one on the right has dotted sub-triangles towards the neck. Their heads are rounded with almond-shaped eyes and two rounded ears, and their mouths are stretched open, with interlace issuing from their jaws. Interlacing strands pass over and under their bodies, filling the space between their heads with a knot with long pointed terminals, and the spaces below their bodies with similar but non-geometric knots.
B (narrow, east facing): A pair of reptilian animals, their bodies crossed at the necks. Their bodies are patterned with herringbone with a median rib, save near to the top of the necks when one is decorated with dotted subtriangles and the other with parallel grooves. Their broad heads are seen from above and have small rounded ears, long narrow snouts and almond-shaped eyes. The spaces around and between their heads are filled with simple pointed knots, and jumbled interlace fills the curves of their bodies.
C (broad, north facing): Two registers of pattern C knots and a row of what could be the beginning of another register.
D (narrow, west facing): A pair of profile winged bipeds, with their tails crossed. As with the pair on face B the lower part of each body is patterned with herringbone and the neck area is marked with dotted triangles, or sub-triangles. Their affronted heads are very similar to the animals on face A save that their jaws are even more painfully stretched, with the skin around them realistically folded. Each holds up a saluting foot, and strands issue from the mouths, passing over and under the bodies to form loose interlaced knots to fill the available space.
E (top): Hollowed out and lined with plaster.

1b (lower).
A (broad, south facing): Five rows of pattern F (figure-of-eight knots) repeated in three registers.
B (narrow, east facing): Three vertical panels divided by roll mouldings. The central panel is widest and consists of two or more serpentine creatures whose necks cross at the base and whose bodies are twisted and knotted above. Although the panel is very worn their bodies appear to have been undecorated. Their heads are now indistinct but they seem to have dotted eyes, and the jaws of the left-hand beast are grasping an interlace strand. On either side are panels of simple running knots in pattern C. On this face unlike all the rest the strands appear to be plain and not median-incised.
C (broad, north facing): Five rows of figure-of-eight knots in three registers, and diminishing slightly in size towards the top from14 to 12.5 cm (5.5 to 5 in). Two of the rows are reconstructed.
D (narrow, west facing): Entirely reconstructed and a copyof face A.

Despite the fact that there is a 5 cm (2 in) difference in width and depth between the upper and the lower stones, it seems reasonable to think of the two pieces as being part of the same monument (see Ills. 24–5). The angle mouldings have been so damaged that it is difficult to project the line of the shaft, but as Langdon said (1902, 249), 'It is extremely improbable considering the rarity of monuments of this class in Devonshire that there should be two such finely-ornamented crosses in one small out-of-the-way little country village like Dolton'; adding, why should both 'have been broken up to make the font when one would have provided the necessary material just as well'. There is indeed a congruence between the patterns on both parts which further supports this view. From some of the earliest commentators (Allen 1902, 253–6) it is common consent that the monument is part of the Wessex school of animal ornament (p. 42), and that its patterns can be paralleled in Mercian and West Saxon manuscripts of the late eighth century.

Both of the interlace patterns are found at Ramsbury, Wiltshire (Ills. 489, 501), and the figure-of-eight pattern is also found at Colyton (Ill. 6), but the paired animals are significantly different from any other surviving sculpture. Tweddle has compared the winged bipeds on face 1aD with animals in the St Petersburg Gospels, fols.12r and 16r (Tweddle et al. 1995, 38–9, fig. 12), and indeed the details of the heads are very similar to those of bipeds in eighth-century manuscripts, but the Dolton beasts have no joint spirals, as for example has Colerne (Ill. 434) — a feature which has been assumed by Tweddle as a significant indicator of date (see introduction p. 42) — and their body patterning probably owes more to the metalworking tradition of ornament. Nevertheless there are animals with painted body patterns in other manuscripts, for example in the Barberini (Rome) Gospels (Barberini Lat. 570, fol.124v: Alexander 1978, cat. 36, ill. 177), a painting which Cottrill used as a comparison with Colerne and this cross (Cottrill 1935, 147, fig. 1). It is therefore possible that the unique body ornament of the bipeds, which is formed by rounded or hollow-sided triangles (which I have called sub-triangles) with dotted centres, has been inspired by manuscript models.

The strange mask-like head on face 1aA with animals issuing from its nostrils is more difficult to parallel. As Romilly Allen said (1902, 254), 'I never remember seeing anything like this strange uncanny-looking monstrosity', although he did cite a later Romanesque parallel on a capital at Quedlinburg (ibid., fig. 11). He was probably correct also to note that '... from a decorative point of view, it belongs to the same class of designs as the human heads with foliage coming out of the mouths which are not uncommon in Norman England' (ibid., 254). Much earlier, however, in the Barberini Gospels, fol. 1, there is in the capital of the canon table arcade a mask-like face with moustache sprouting into leaves, to which are attached paired animals biting at its beard, and further down the column paired animals bite at the moustache ends of a grotesque urinating figure (Alexander 1978, ill.173). It is therefore not a major transition to arrive at the composition of the sculptured head. The strange stalklike neck which supports the Dolton head may equally have been inspired by something like the narrow vertical bands which support the two mask-like heads on the opening initial of St Mark's gospel — again in the Barberini Gospels (Alexander 1978, ill. 175). Here the oval beardless faces are quite like the Dolton sculpture, but the stone face has a sour malignancy which is striking and indeed nearer in type to the stone heads which are found in Romano-British contexts (Kendrick 1938, pls. IV and IX) and are attributed to native cult. It should also be remembered that grotesque moustached heads are a feature of migration-period Germanic metalwork, and continue on a type of early eighth-century silver penny (Series Z. 66: Gannon 2003, fig. 2.7). The inspiration therefore for this piece may not be simply a manuscript, and the carver may have drawn on longstanding local traditions to produce something as individual as the figures on the Yetminster shaft (see Ills. 157–8, and introduction, p. 59).

 What was this figure at Dolton meant to signify? An interesting suggestion was made by Kate Clarke, whose first interpretation of it was 'the Logos, under the dual aspect of which early writers laid so much stress, but I have come to think of it simply as a symbolical representation of Death' (1909, 25). As an example of such a representation she quoted Twining (1852, 140, pl. LXIX, which does not identify the manuscript cited). The drawing depicting Mors and Vita is however clearly from BL Cotton Tiberius C. VI, fol. 6v (Temple 1976, no. 98, ill. 303). The manuscript image has no stylistic or even iconographic similarity to the sculpture, although six little animals issue from around the head of the manuscript figure. Whether one considers the winged animals to be evil, benign, or just neutral, colours any interpretation of the Dolton composition. They could represent the casting out of evil spirits, be symbolic of creative power, or merely reflect a copying of decorative elements from a manuscript.

The identity of the two interlace patterns with Ramsbury carvings may indicate a relationship between the sites or merely that both were copying the same manuscript or pattern book.

Early ninth century

Lysons 1822, xx, cccxxxi; Jones 1889, 76; Browne 1891, 71–2; Jones 1891, 197–202, pls. between 200/1; Stewart 1891, 97; Allen 1894, 63; Browne 1897, 276, fig. 21; Allen 1902, 250–6, figs.1–10; Langdon 1902, 243–9; Browne 1903, 159–61, fig. 7; Browne 1906, 250–1, pl. 8; Cox and Harvey 1907, 167; Bond 1908, 105–6, 138, 153, ills. on 102, 103; Clarke 1909, 25–8; Prior and Gardner 1912, 129; Clarke 1913, 315–17; Smith 1913–14, 72; Brøndsted 1924, 126; Tyrrell-Green 1928, 23; Cottrill 1931, 27, 28; Cottrill 1935, 146, 147, 149, 151; Reed 1935, 287, pl. XXVI, fig. 2; Phillips 1937a, 224; Phillips 1937b, 293; Waterfield 1937, 177; Mee 1938, 158; Phillips 1938, 312–13, 336; Rice 1952, 128, 148; Pevsner 1954, 16, 80, pl. 14; Jope 1964, 93n, 103, 105; Cramp 1975, 186, 187; Pearce 1978, 109; Tweddle 1983, 18; Plunkett 1984, I, 180, 182, 189–90, 191, 192, 193, 195, 201, 218, 254, II, 296, 361, 365, pls. 67, 81; Tweddle 1986, 142, 144, 145, fig. 16; Todd 1987, 290; Cherry and Pevsner 1989, 38, 337, pl. 9; Cramp 1992, 150, 151; Tweddle 1992, 1147, 1156, 1157, 1158; Hicks 1993, 205; Tweddle et al. 1995, 37, 38, 39, 40, fig. 11c–d; Bailey 1996, 20; Stocker 1997, 25; Cramp 2001, 157, 158, fig. 4f; Drake 2002, 1, 32, pl. 69

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