EARLY CHRISTIAN ART 



Symbolical Figure Subjects? The following figure-subjects occur 

 upon the pre-Norman sculptured stones of Derbyshire : 



Subjects. Localities. Subjects. Localities. 



Annunciation (?). . . Bakewell, Hope. Angels Bakewell, Eyam. 



Adoration of Magi . . Wirksworth. Agnus Dei on Cross . Wirksworth. 



Flight into Egypt . . Bakewell. Saint with horn . . Bakewell, Eyam. 



Christ washing Disciples' Saint with cross . . Bakewell. 



Feet Wirksworth. Saint with book . . Bradbourne. 



Entry into Jerusalem . Bakewell. Man with staff . . Norbury. 



Crucifixion .... Bakewell, Bradbourne. St. Paul and St. Anthony Hope. 



Ascension .... Wirksworth Figure bearing cross . Hope. 



Having now classified the decorative features of the monuments, we 

 are in a position to take a survey of them as a whole, and make some 

 suggestions with regard to the relative age of the different specimens. 



The coped stone at Wirksworth stands alone, and I know of no 

 other pre-Norman sculptured stone in Great Britain with which it can 

 be compared. In Saxon or Celtic work each of the figure subjects would 

 be placed in a separate panel, but here all the figures are grouped together 

 exactly in the same way as on the early Christian sarcophagi of the third 

 and fourth centuries at Rome. The general style of the Wirksworth 

 stone is certainly more Roman than Saxon, and although probably not 

 going back as far as Roman times, it may fairly lay claim to be the 

 earliest Christian monument in Derbyshire. 



The peculiar drilled eyes and the treatment of two of the subjects, 

 the Agnus Dei on the Cross and the Ascension, may perhaps help to fix 

 the date. The drilled eyes occur elsewhere in Saxon sculpture at Chichester 

 Cathedral and Dewsbury, Yorkshire. The Agnus Dei on the Cross preceded 

 the representations of the crucified Saviour on the Cross. The symbols of 

 the Four Evangelists on the Wirksworth stone with human bodies and 

 heads of the symbolic beasts resemble those on pre-Norman sculptural 

 monuments at Ilkley, 8 Yorkshire ; Halton, 8 Lancashire ; and Kirriemuir* 

 and Inchbrayock, 6 Forfarshire. The practice of surrounding the figure 

 of Christ with an aureole supported by two or four angels (as at Wirks- 

 worth) was introduced into Christian art about the sixth century. Taking 

 all these things into consideration, I think we cannot be far wrong in 

 assigning a date to the Wirksworth stone somewhere towards the end of 

 the seventh century. 



Next in order of age come the crosses at Bakewell, Bradbourne, and 

 Eyam, which with the cross-shaft at Sheffield obviously form a group of 

 common origin and the same period. There is nothing whatever 

 Scandinavian in the decorative features of this group, and the foliage and 

 interlaced work may be traced to a Byzantine source. Consequently the 

 group in question belongs to the pre- Viking age, and probably, for reasons 

 we have already given, to the time of Offa (i.e., the latter half of the 

 eighth century). 



In analysing the interlaced work on the monuments of a particular 

 geographical area, it will be found that the commoner patterns are of but 



1 For explanations, see J. R. Allen, Christian Symbolism. 



9 Journ. Brit. Arch. Assac. xxxviii. 156. 3 Ibid. xlii. 328. 



* Allen and Anderson, Early Christian Monuments of Scotland, 227. * Ibid. 254. 



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