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Birnie Parish Church
Cross Slab (Early Medieval)
Site Name Birnie Parish Church
Classification Cross Slab (Early Medieval)
Canmore ID 318370
Site Number NJ25NW 1.05
NGR NJ 20654 58718
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/318370
- Council Moray
- Parish Birnie
- Former Region Grampian
- Former District Moray
- Former County Morayshire
Birnie 2 (St Brendan), Moray, carved fragment
Measurements: 0.53m by 0.31m, D 0.10m
Stone type: sandstone
Place of discovery: NJ 2063 5873
Present location: lost
Evidence for discovery: found built into the churchyard wall in the early nineteenth century and subsequently taken into the church. Lost sometime before 1971.
Present condition: all edges were broken.
Description
This fragment was carved in relief and clearly of high quality, showing part of a roundel containing trumpet spirals, and part of an interlace design.
Date range: eighth century?
Primary references: Stuart 1856, pl 42; ECMS pt 3, 136-7.
Desk-based information compiled by A Ritchie 2018
Field Visit (20 May 1971)
Birnie parish church is as described. No further information regarding the dedication. The churchyard has been extened to the N but the line of the former oval churchyard wall can still be traced.
Surveyed at 1/2500.
The symbol stone stands against the W wall of the graveyard. It is badly weathered and the symbols are barely recognisable.
The Celtic bell and Norman font remain within the church but the whereabouts of the Class III fragments is not known.
Visited by OS (R L) 20 May 1971.
Field Visit (5 October 1976)
Rev Torrie, the minister of the kirk, confirmed the dedication of the church to St Brendan. The where-abouts of the Class III stones is not known, otherwise the church and symbol stone are as described.
Surveyed at 1:2500.
Visited by OS (J B) 5 October 1976.
Desk Based Assessment
Four Class III fragments, two of them probably from the same upright cross-slab, are preserved within the church.
Information from OS
D MacGibbon and T Ross 1896-7; J R Allen and J Anderson 1903; A D S MacDonald and L R Laing 1973
