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Object type: Fragment
Measurements: H. max. 33 cm (13 in); W. max. 33 cm (33 in); D. Unknown frame in which it is set measures 12 cm (4.7 in) in depth
Stone type: Sandstone, soiled, reddish to pale buff-brown, coarse to very coarse, quartzose, occasionally granular, with sparse quartz pebbles, quartz cemented. Carboniferous, Millstone Grit Group. [G.L.]
Plate numbers in printed volume: Ill. 801
Corpus volume reference: Vol 8 p. 275
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The visible face shows two joining pieces of stone. It appears to have flat edge mouldings on two opposite sides, and may therefore represent one side of a shaft. Between these mouldings, two strands with incised outlines curve towards each other, meeting at a point, then out and in again to form one complete pointed oval, and at top and bottom, two incomplete ones. The central, complete oval encloses an inner closed pointed oval with a hollowed centre, and it seems the incomplete ones would have been the same.
Appendix A item (Stones dating from Saxo-Norman overlap period or of uncertain date)
The decoration as it stands is like no other pre-Conquest pattern, but it could possibly be an unfinished or bungled attempt at a double twist, found for example on Leeds 3 (Ill. 506) and Frickley 2 (Ills. 265, 267). Such twists, however, are usually found on the narrow faces of shafts, and here the width could imply a broad face.
