EARLY CHRISTIAN ART 



rough stone walls. This moor was first enclosed in 1676. In 1791 the two stones were 

 lying on the ground beside their sockets ; they had probably been dislodged and broken at the 

 time when stone walls were run up in the early days of the enclosure. Glover's Derbyshire 

 (1829) speaks of them as still lying prostrate. At some date subsequent to this the two stone 

 pillars were replaced in their sockets and roughly secured by wooden wedges. Having again 

 become loosened they were again secured and cemented round the bases some three or four 

 years ago by the Hayfield Antiquarian Society, and they were subsequently protected by 

 an iron railing erected by Lord Howard of Glossop. The base into which these two stones 

 are socketed is not rock in situ, but a loose boulder stone 2 feet thick and measuring, though 

 somewhat irregular, 6 feet 10 inches in extreme length and 4 feet i inch in breadth. Both of 

 these pillar stones are mutilated and lacking part of their original length, and destitute of 

 the filleted heads which, judging by analogy, they once possessed. There is just 1 2 inches 

 between the circular sockets. The girth of the smaller one at the base is 4 feet n^ inches, 

 and of the larger 5 feet 7 inches ; the smaller one now stands 3 feet 9 inches above the base 

 and the larger one 2 feet 6 inches. Near by, built into one of the walls, is a piece of a pillar 

 stone 2 feet 3 inches long, the girth of which cannot be measured ; it is said to be the top 

 of the lower stone ; it corresponds in material to that stone and not to the one of lesser girth. 



These stones show a striking similarity to the Bow Stones in Lyme Park near Disley, a 

 few miles distant, just over the Cheshire border. The Bow Stones are more perfect, and 

 have the remains of fillets of Saxon work. There is also a small pillar stone with filleted head 

 in the porch of Bakewell, and a taller and more perfect example at Glutton in Cheshire. 

 There can be no doubt that the Derbyshire Picking Rods are of Saxon date. 



NoRBURY. 1 In 1902, during some alterations in Norbury church, two pre-Norman cross- 

 shafts were found built into one of the buttresses of the north wall of the chancel. Cross- 

 shaft No. I is 5 feet 3 inches high by I foot 3 inches wide at the bottom and 10 inches wide 

 at the top by 1 1^ inches thick at the bottom and 7^ inches thick at the top. The lower part 

 of the shaft is left plain, probably for insertion in the ground. On the upper part of the front 

 is a panel of ten-cord plaitwork, and on the upper part of the back a panel of interlaced work 

 composed of concentric rings and cords forming arcs of circles. On the right side at the top 

 is a figure-of-eight knot and a man holding a staff ; and on the left side an interlaced pattern 

 composed of an undulating cord with Stafford knots in each of the spandrels. 



Cross-shaft No. 2 is 3 feet 9 inches high by I foot 3 inches wide at the bottom and 

 10 inches wide at the top by I foot thick at the bottom and 7 inches thick at the top. On the 

 front is some four-cord plaitwork and the figure of a man much defaced, and on the back an 

 interlaced pattern composed of Stafford knots, having an additional cord interwoven with 

 each. On the right and left sides is an interlaced pattern composed of figure-of-eight knots. 



REPTON. S. Lysons in his Magna Britannia (v. 223) illustrates a coped stone which 

 formerly existed at Repton. It was of the hog-backed variety, with roofing tiles conventionally 

 represented on the sloping faces at the top and debased scrolls of foliage on the vertical faces below. 



SPONDON.* In the churchyard is a portion of a rectangular cross with the corners 

 rounded off; below the interlacing work on each face a double line runs round the stone, 

 meeting corresponding vertical lines on each of the four sides and thus forming crosses. There 

 is a like arrangement on a cross in the churchyard of Kirkby Malzeard, Yorks. This massive 

 fragment is much mutilated. Dr. Cox, when describing it in 1877 (Churches of Derbyshire, 

 iv. 302), says : ' When Mr. Meynell was here in 1817 the stone was by the side of the road 

 leading from Spondon to Locko, but he learnt that it had been recently removed from the 

 churchyard. From inquiries made at Spondon we learn that Mr. John Parker, surveyor of 

 highways, removed it from the churchyard about sixty years ago, but so much was said about 

 the removal and the ill-luck that would attend it that he shortly afterwards restored it to the 

 churchyard, but not to the position that it had previously occupied.' 



WILNE. The font in the church of St. Chad, at Wilne, is made out of a section of the shaft 

 of a round (or more strictly speaking, oval) pillar cross, placed upside down. The height of the 

 font is I foot 1 1 inches, the greatest diameter at the top 2 feet 2 inches, and the smallest 

 diameter 2 feet inch. The girth at the top is 6 feet 10 inches and 6 feet 5 inches at the 

 bottom. The difference between the greatest and smallest diameter at the top is 2 inches, and 

 only i inch at the bottom, so that when the pillar was in the right position it seems to have 

 become more nearly circular in section as it tapered upwards. Supposing the font to be turned 

 the reverse way up, as it was when forming part of the shaft of a pillar cross, it will be seen 



1 Journ. Derb. Arch. Soc. xrv. 97. s Ibid. viii. 178. 



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