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Object type: Socket-stone [1]
Measurements: H. 84 cm (33 in); W. (at base) 142 > 68.5 cm (56 > 27 in); D. 137 > 68 cm (54 > 26.5 in)
Stone type: Light grey (N7), pebbly, poorly sorted, clast-supported, quartz sandstone. The sub-angular to sub-rounded clasts range from 0.2 to 5.0 mm, but are mostly in the range 0.5 to 1.5 mm; scattered clasts of white feldspar and a few flakes of white mica. ?Pendle Grit Formation, Millstone Grit, Carboniferous
Plate numbers in printed volume: Ills. 464, 501-2
Corpus volume reference: Vol 9 p. 193
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The monolithic socket-stone has three steps, the risers having sloping faces.
Cross forms with three-step bases occur early in Christian art on the continent in both the eastern and western Mediterranean worlds; and coinage, metalwork, and wood carving on the St Cuthbert's coffin show that the type was well established in England by the seventh century (Bailey 1989, 241–2; Richardson and Scarry 1990, fig. 12; Fisher 2005, 86, 88). There are, however, no convincing pre-Viking examples in stone sculpture from Anglo-Saxon England; only in the tenth century does the form seem to be exploited in this medium (e.g. Bailey and Cramp 1988, ills. 292–5). By contrast, elsewhere in the Insular world such sockets were being produced by, at latest, the ninth century, in northern and western Scotland and, to a more limited extent, in Ireland (Fisher 2001, 16–17, 135, figs. on 54–5; id. 2005, 86; Harbison 1992, ii, figs. 7, 150). For further examples from the region see Heysham 10 and Walton on the Hill 3 (Ills. 528–9, 657–8).
