Cemented against internal north wall of church tower, above nos. 3 and 4

First recorded in 1887 as built into the west wall of the porch (Browne 1887a, 10); see also Halton (St Wilfrid) 3. Removed from the porch and placed in its present position as the upper element of a composite shaft with Halton St Wilfrid 4 in 1890/91 (Calverley 1899a, 184–5, 192).

St Wilfrid

Face C has been cut away together with adjacent parts of faces B and D.

A (broad): The two remaining panels on this face are flanked laterally by a cable moulding. (i) The upper panel, now incomplete, is set within an inner border (which may have carried pellet decoration) and shows the lower half of a (?seated) figure. The knees are well marked and a line of drapery falls between them. Further drapery falls over the figure's right arm; his left hand holds a book through drapery which falls away to the right of his knee. Feet are visible below the drapery. The right hand grasps a double rod, seemingly joined at the base. This scene is separated from the panel below by a flat horizontal moulding. (ii) The lower panel is given an inner arched frame with pelleted decoration and slab capitals. It contains the upper part of a forward-facing haloed figure, a moulding running around the shoulders. The hair is classically curled and the details on the flat-carved face are well marked: brows, raised pupils and nose. The clothing is represented by a series of ridged mouldings, including a V-shaped raised collar. Below is the top of a rectangular object, with a narrow horizontal moulding marking its upper border, which passes over the moulding outlining the figure.

B (narrow): The fragmentary remains of two panels survive along with the left-hand cable-moulding border. Both panels had inner frames, the upper one rectangular, the lower arched. (i) In the upper frame are fragments of a central-stemmed (bush or tree) scroll with two curving side shoots. (ii) Below is a panel of knotwork which Collingwood (1927a, fig. 92 g) plausibly restored as two parallel runs of half pattern A.

C (broad): Lost

D (narrow): Only the right-hand side of a single panel survives, bordered laterally by the cable moulding and an inner border. Ornament consists of contoured serpentine decoration entangled in thin knotwork.

The use of cable mouldings and pelleted decoration on the arch is common to all of the surviving Halton shafts; the presence of single slab capitals is discussed under Halton St Wilfrid 3 above, p. 186. If Collingwood's reconstruction of the interlace ornament on face B is correct then it also occurs on nos. 1 and 6 from the same site. The fragmentary remains of a central-stemmed bush vine on the panel above (if such it be) poses problems. It can be matched in an Anglian context at Northallerton (Lang 2001, ill. 663), but most of the other parallels all seem to be work of the later Viking period — witness Cawthorne, Rastrick and Kirby Grindalythe in Yorkshire or Lowther and Workington in Cumbria (Coatsworth 2008, ills. 811, 626–7; Lang 1991, ill. 506; Bailey and Cramp 1988, ills. 452, 587.)

The combination of scenes and their figures on face A almost exactly repeats that of Halton St Wilfrid 3 (Ill. 451); the iconography is presumably identical to that discussed above (pp. 186–7). It is difficult to establish whether these two shafts are contemporary carvings or, if not, which is the earlier. The figure carving on Halton 3 seems better proportioned, but the classical curls of Halton 5 are more ambitious than anything surviving on the other shaft — and indeed anything else in the north-west. In this detail the hair is closer to styles seen at Auckland St Andrew, Rothbury, Hoddom, Collingham, Little Ouseburn or Easby (Collingwood 1927a, fig. 88; Cramp 1970, Taf. 47; id. 1984, pls. 3.5–6, 214.1221; Lang 2000, 114; Coatsworth 2008, ills. 167–8, 534). In all of these Lang rightly saw Carolingian models as making an impact (Lang 2000, 111).

Ninth century

Browne 1887a, 10, pl. IV, fig. 5; Allen 1894, 25; Allen 1895, 161; Calverley 1899a, 190, 197; Taylor, H. 1903, 88–9, pl. facing 87; Garstang 1906, 267; Taylor, H. 1906, 379–81, pl. facing 379; Ditchfield 1909, 118–19, pl. facing 114; Collingwood 1916–18, 45–6, fig. 21 (f, g); Collingwood 1927a, 74–5, fig. 92 (f, g); ?Collingwood 1929, 22; Collingwood 1932, 53; Cramp 1970, 62, Taf. 48 (2); Taylor, H. M. 1970d, 288; Edwards, B. 1978a, 60; Bailey and Cramp 1988, 82; Lang 1990a, 14; Kenyon 1991, 103; Lang 1991, 140; Hawkes 2003d, 365

[1] The following are general references to the Halton stones: Allen 1894, 4, 8; Taylor, H. 1898, 42; Ditchfield 1909, 118–19; Curwen 1925, 30; Fellows-Jensen 1985, 402, 405; Noble 1999, 16; Blair 2005, 216, 309, 310, 463; Newman, R. M. 2006, 102. The following are unpublished manuscript references: BL Add. MS 37550, items 602–13, 735; BL Add. MS 37551, items 66–71; Manchester Public Library, Hibbert Ware S. MSS: Msf 091 H21, vol. 5, 38; ibid., vol. 6, 40.