Kirriemuir, High Street, Old Parish Church
Cross Slab (Early Medieval)
Site Name Kirriemuir, High Street, Old Parish Church
Classification Cross Slab (Early Medieval)
Alternative Name(s) Kirriemuir No.6; Bank Street; Barony Parish Churchyard
Canmore ID 318441
Site Number NO35SE 3.02
NGR NO 38644 53915
NGR Description Centred on NO 38644 53915
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/318441
- Council Angus
- Parish Kirriemuir
- Former Region Tayside
- Former District Angus
- Former County Angus
Kirriemuir 6 (St Mary), Angus, cross-slab fragment
Measurements: H 0.16m, W 0.10m
Stone type: sandstone
Place of discovery: NO 3864 5391
Present location: Meffan Museum and Gallery, Forfar
Evidence for discovery: discovered in the old parish churchyard (Barony Parish Churchyard, Bank Street), in 1995.
Present condition: broken along three out of four edges but the carving is good.
Description
This small fragment is part of the vertical edge of a cross-slab with a cross carved on both broad faces. On face A is part of a ringed cross with a roll-moulded outline. The left-hand arm is filled with median-incised interlace, and the ring has four internal incised lines. Face C shows the right arm of a plain cross with a flat-band outline and two internal arcs.
Date range: tenth century.
Primary references: DES 1995, 94; RCAHMS 2003.
Desk-based information compiled by A Ritchie 2018
Field Visit (12 September 1958)
This very small cross slab stands erect in the ground 4.0m from the NE angle of the modern parish church. It measures 0.2m square, and bears a cross with interlaced design on both sides as illustrated by Allen and Anderson (1903).
Visited by OS (JLD) 12 September 1958.
Reference (1983)
The cross-slab is now with the four others in the cemetery at NO 389 544.
RCAHMS 1983.
Excavation (1995)
NO 386 539 Preceding churchyard access improvements, an excavation carried out by Scotia Archaeology in March/April discovered one complete cross slab and a further 11 fragments. The fragments had all been re-used in the building of a wall, possibly contemporary with the present church of 1787, and all appear to have been deliberately broken.
N Atkinson 1995
