Archaeology Notes
Date 1964
Event ID 686800
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Archaeology Notes
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/686800
NO24SE 25.01 2872 4459.
No. 1 The cross is enriched by seven linked panels of interlace, the arms are hollowed at the intersections and each hollow is spanned by a raised quarter circle, recalling the 'ring of glory' of No 2.
The background to the cross contains beasts only, real and fabulous. At the top, two snouted boar-like animals; on the left, a beast with goat's horns, a snouted beast with long spiral body, and a sea-horse and hippocamp facing one another; on the right, a pair of interlaced sea-horses and a horned animal with a long tail ending in open jaws which bite a snouted serpent.
The back of the slab is treated as a single field for sculpture. The upper half has six symbols - fish, beast-head, triquetra, 'elephant', serpent and Z-rod, mirror-and-comb; the lower half, a kneeling camel, five horsemen and a hound, an angel and a beast with coiled body. This seems to be a re-used prehistoric monument.
The base or socket bears 'cup-marks' such as are found upon Standing Stones of the Bronze Age (approximately 2000 BC-approximately 500 BC). As these are invisible a plaster cast of the cup-marked area has been made; it stands against the wall nearby (No.A4).
S Cruden 1964.
