Meigle

Meigle 28, Perthshire, cross-slab fragment

Measurements: H 0.41m, W 0.48m, D 0.05m

Stone type: sandstone

Place of discovery: NO 2872 4459

Present location: Meigle Museum.

Evidence for discovery: none but it was first recorded for ECMS in the late nineteenth century.

Present condition: broken along the top edge and damaged elsewhere. The fragment has been broken into two and the lower right corner has broken away since it was recorded in ECMS.

Description

This is the lower part of a cross-slab, with a plain flat-band moulding along the three edges and curved corners. It appears not to have had a base by which it could be inserted into the ground and yet it is small for a recumbent, and it may have been part of an architectural panel. It bears finely executed relief carving on one side only. All that survives of the cross is the lower part of the shaft, which bears traces of an outline moulding and possibly internal ornament, but any carving has been obliterated. On either side of the shaft is a panel of diagonal key pattern, and beneath the base of the shaft is a panel containing seven pairs of triple spirals.

Date: eighth century.

References: ECMS pt 3, 339-40; RCAHMS 1994, 101.

Desk-based information compiled by A Ritchie 2019.

NO24SE 25.28 2872 4459.

Meigle No.28 is a fragment of an upright cross-slab of sandstone of nearly rectangular shape but fractured at the top. 1 foot 4 inches high by 1 foot 7 inches wide by 2 inches thick, sculptured in relief on one face thus-

Front- In the middle the lower end of the shaft of a cross devoid of ornament; (on the background on the left and right of the shaft) diagonal key-pattern No 967; and (below the bottom of the shaft) spiral work No.1054.

J R Allen and J Anderson 1903