In the south aisle, on the western window sill

Found built in as a step of the tower staircase, 'last year' (Speight 1894, 223). A mid-Anglo-Saxon period cemetery has been excavated recently, some 50 metres south of the present church, on the site of the former Village Farm (now a housing development). There was some robbed-out structural evidence from within the cemetery, representing an earlier building (possibly an earlier, smaller church), which was respected by the burials. A number of chest burials were found. An increasing number of burials of this type and of broadly the mid-Anglo-Saxon period have been found in England, for example at Norton and Seaham in co. Durham, but it seems that the best parallels are in Scandinavia, indicating a date within the Anglo-Scandinavian period (Paul Johnson, Northern Archaeological Associates, pers. comm.).

All Saints

Worn smooth in places and incomplete, but in fairly good condition.

Part of a cross-shaft and a small part of the head of a cross of rectangular section. The edges are squared and there is a flat edge moulding on all faces. The carving is shallow and the upper surface is flat, the pattern formed by shallow cutting around the pattern elements.

A (broad): The lower part of the head has a terminal of a large knot, probably a Stafford Knot (simple pattern E). The panel below is framed above by a narrow horizontal plait formed from two strands which comprise the inner border of the sides of the panel, and below by a double-stranded twist into which these side borders also merge. The pattern within this unusual and interesting frame terminates at the top in a large Stafford Knot (simple pattern E) attached by a short glide to a six-cord basket plait which fills three-quarters of the panel. The glide encloses a short horizontal panel. This and the surface of the plait are now completely smooth, but could possibly have been double-stranded originally.

B (narrow): At the top, two strands crossing inside a loose ring, then feeding below into a four-cord plait which fills most of the length of the face.

C (broad): This has a panel framed in the same manner as the main panel on face A, with a horizontal twist at the top and a slightly larger one at the bottom, the strands again becoming the inner side frame of the panel. Within this space is a fine ten-cord plait, slightly squashed as it rises to fit into the top of the panel. Below is the start of a panel with a cabled inner border, within which the beginning of a large interlace terminal can be seen, with a loose pellet filling the space between the loops.

D (narrow): In many ways the most interesting face, as a simple continuous twist is embellished along the length of one of its strands with bifurcating tendrils which form pattern A-like loops, ending in pointed leaves.

The use of twists to frame panels is an interesting feature of this cross, and may have been inspired by the use of scrolling plant forms to frame panels at an earlier period in the area, for example on Otley 1, face C (Ills. 552–4), and followers such as the lowest part of the shaft Collingham 1 (Ills. 166–9), or interlace borders to panels, see for example Ilkley 3 (Ill. 361). The use of such a border can also be seen at Collingham on a cross-shaft of the late ninth century (no. 2, Ill. 170) and on a fragment of the ninth to tenth centuries (no. 4, Ills. 157–60) where it may have linked with the side frames as at Spofforth. Elaborate frames of interlace and twists are also found on the cross-base at Hartshead (Ill. 310). It thus seems to be a feature with a strong regional basis, but it is also found elsewhere in Yorkshire, for example on North Otterington 3C (Lang 2001, ill. 697), a shaft dated to the ninth to tenth centuries; in Cumbria on the Irton cross of the first half of the ninth century (Bailey and Cramp 1988, ills. 355–62); in Mercia on the south cross at Sandbach (Hawkes 2002a, figs. 3.1, 3.8); in Dumfriesshire at Closeburn (Craig 1992, I, 152, IV, pls. 11, 15). Its origins seem to lie in metalwork, early adopted widely into other arts, especially that of manuscript painting: see for example the borders of fol. 85v of the Book of Durrow (to take one of hundreds of examples), the cover of the Stonyhurst Gospels, and edges of the Gandersheim casket (Wilson 1984, ills. 12, 20, 60).

The tendril pattern on face D is also found on Barwick in Elmet 1 (Ill. 25), and Lowther 7, Westmorland (Bailey and Cramp 1988, 132, ill. 456). The cross therefore looks back to earlier Anglian sculpture but shows clear Hiberno-Norse influence, as this pattern is also found on sculptures from the Isle of Man (see Chap. V, p. 49).

Tenth century

Speight 1894, 223; Speight 1906, 192–3; Morris 1911, 483, 549; Collingwood 1912, 131; Collingwood 1915a, 240, 265, 277, 282, figs. a–d on 240; Mee 1941, 375; Pevsner 1959, 487; Pevsner 1967, 495; Bailey 1980, 218; Richards 1991, 121

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