Volume 8: Western Yorkshire

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Current Display: Leeds 3, West Riding of Yorkshire Forward button Back button
Overview
Present Location
As Leeds 2. Accession number LEEDM.D.1973.337
Evidence for Discovery
See Leeds 1. First mentioned by Haigh (1856–7, 521).
Church Dedication
St Peter
Present Condition
Incomplete on all faces and some damage, but in fairly good condition.
Description

Part of a small cross-shaft, almost square in section. The rounded edge mouldings are very battered, but on faces A and C show clearly that they were carved to represent a series of baluster shafts or columns with rounded capitals and bases. The carving is not deep but the background surface is dressed smooth and the carving is delicately modelled and confidently handled. All faces have vertical inner roll mouldings, but only face A shows evidence for a panelled style of organisation.

A (broad): Divided by inner roll mouldings into two narrow panels. (i) Most of the upper panel is missing. There is only a rounded lower terminal, perhaps of a plant-scroll as there appears to be a small pointed leaf in each lower corner. (ii) The lower panel has a fine-stranded interlace, showing two registers of simple pattern F with outside strands.

B (narrow): Within the roll mouldings the remaining face has a fine-stranded double twist.

C (broad): Two volutes of a simple plant-scroll, each terminating in a tri-lobed flower. There are no bindings on the slender stem. A round bud fills the surviving spandrel; and the upper volute has a complex drop leaf — a long pointed leaf between a round bud and a smaller pointed leaf.

D (narrow): An even finer version of the scroll on face C, with three volutes each ending in a tri-lobed flower. The lowest spandrel produces the same round bud as on C, and the drop leaf from the upper volute is almost identical to that on C. The drop leaf from the central volute produces one curved frond-like leaf and another long leaf of less determinate form.

Discussion

The use of plant-scroll on two, perhaps three, faces; the indications of a panelled layout on face A; the overall layout and the square section, all suggest that this is an early piece. The twist on face D is paralleled, though in a more rounded style, at Jarrow 22, co. Durham, which has been dated late seventh to early eighth century (Cramp 1984, 115–17, pls. 99.527–8, 100.529–34). A somewhat later example is on Urswick 1, Lancashire (Bailey and Cramp 1988, 148–50, ill. 566), dated to the ninth century, while at North Otterington, in northern Yorkshire, a stone with the same twist is dated late ninth to tenth century (Lang 2001, 186, no. 3, ills. 694–7). The pattern is also found at Frickley in the West Riding, on stones which are clearly attempting to follow earlier Anglian patterns in plant-scroll as well as in interlace (see Frickley 2 and 3, Ills. 265, 267, 273). The pattern is unusual but clearly relates to early Anglian traditions.

Date
Eighth to ninth century
References
Haigh 1856–7, 521, no. 2; Collingwood 1912, 130; Collingwood 1915a, 210, 266, 268, 272, figs. a–d on 210; Collingwood 1915b, 272, 285, 290–1, figs. a–d on 289 (Leeds III), pls. (I) 3, (II) 3A, (III) 3B, (IV) 3C; Brøndsted 1924, 62n; Collingwood 1927, 109; McGuire and Clark 1987, 24–5, no. 3, fig. 25; Bailey and Cramp 1988, 149
Endnotes
[1] The following are general references to the Leeds stones: Pettigrew 1864, 308–9, 310–11; Bogg 1904, 75–6; MacMichael 1906, 363; Morris 1911, 46; Collingwood 1915a, 209–10, 292; Collingwood 1915b, 267–9, 271–2, 338; Collingwood 1927, 109; Faull 1981, 218; McGuire and Clark 1987, 5–9, 31–2, 42–5; Ryder 1993, 165.

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