PRE-NORMAN CROSS-SHAFTS FOUND AT NORBURY. 99 



No. 2 is a cross-shaft of sandstone, 3 ft. 9 ins. high by 



10 ins. wide at the top and i ft. 3 ins. wide at the bottom, 



by 7 ins. thick at the top and i ft. thick at the bottom, 

 sculptured in relief on four faces, thus : — 



Front. — Portion of .1 single panel, much defaced, containing at the 

 top a piece of four-cord plaitwork with double-beaded cords ; and below 

 the figure of a man with his hands upraised in the ancient attitude of 

 prayer. 



Back. — Portion of a single panel containing interlaced work, with 

 double-beaded cords, composed of Stafford knots, having an additional 

 cord interwoven with each, placed with the points of the knots facing 

 outwards and repeated in two vertical rows. 



Eight and Left Sides. — Portions of single panels containing interlaced 

 work, with double-beaded cords, formed by repeating figure-of-eight knots. 

 On the angles of the shaft there is a peculiar hollow cable moulding. 



Only two kinds of decoration are made use of on the two 

 Norbury cross-shafts, namely, interlaced work and figure 

 subjects. The most elementary form of interlaced work is 

 the simple plait. On shaft No. i there are plaits of ten and 

 three cords, and on shaft Xo. 2 a plait of four cords. It 

 is very unusual, either on the Celtic or Anglo-Saxon sculptured 

 stones, to find so large a surface entirely covered with plait- 

 work as on the panel on the front of shaft No. i. The only 

 other instances I have come across of anything like such a 

 large panel of plaitwork are on the Maen Achwyfan* in 

 Flintshire, on a cross at Stonegravet in Yorkshire, and on 

 a cross-shaft at St. Neot| in Cornwall. In the case of the 

 Stonegrave cross, figures of men are introduced amongst the 

 plaitwork, thus somewhat relieving the sameness of the pattern. 

 In fact, plaitwork used thus in broad masses belongs rather 

 to the Roman art of the first four or five centuries a.d. than 

 to Celtic or Anglo-Saxon art; not, of course, on that account 

 I wish to suggest anything like so early a date for the Norbury 

 stones. 



* Archixologia Cambrensis, ser. v., vol. viii., p. 76. 



t Bishop G. F. Browne's Theodore and Wil frith, p. 231. 



+ A. G, Langdon's Old Cornish Crosses, p. 406. 



