The Shure, Cross Kirk

Cross Kirk and Burial-ground, Quendale. The mound which marks the site of this church lies 350 yds. E. of the house of Quendale and 300 yds. above high-water mark. Let into the top of it is a tombstone bearing a much weathered inscription, which can be partially restored as follows: WITHE[?IN] / [?SIDE] IS THE / [BJURIA[L] PLACE OF / ANE WORTHY GENT/LEMAN [LAWRENCE] / [STEWART]........ / ....... WHO / [?DEPAIRTED] FROM / TIME TO ETERNITY / THE 2[8] DAY OF JULY /1703 AND OF HIS / AGE THE 77 YEAR / CURACAROLI / [STEWARTI] FILII / EIUS NATU MAXIMI / NUNC DE BIGTOUN . . . The word ‘BIGTOUN’ is followed by three or possibly four lines which are illegible except for the word ‘PLACET’ which appears doubtfully in the second half of the first of them.

On the genealogy of the Stew arts of Bigton, see Grant's Zetland Family Histories (1). The date there given for Laurence Stewart's death does not tally with that on the stone, but Sir Francis Grant thinks that it was reported to him only orally. There seems to be no other documentary evidence extant. Hitherto the stone has been incorrectly supposed to be memorial to Robert Bruce of Sumburgh, the fourth of that name (2).

Today the nearest sand-hill is 250 yds. away. But about 1700 the church was ‘surrounded by banks of sand two or three yards distant from the walls’ (3). The constant shifting of these produced increasing inconvenience and ultimately led to the abandonment of the building circa 1790 (4). The stones were subsequently carried off by the proprietor of Quendale and used to build a steading (5).

RCAHMS 1946, visited 22 August 1930.

(1) pp. 320-2.

(2) PSAS, Xli (1906-7), p. 180 .

(3) Rev. James Kay, in the privately printed collection of papers entitled Description of ye Countrey of Zetland, p. 34. A copy of this is in the Library of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. Sibbald (Description, p. 17), misunderstanding his informant, says that the church was ‘two or three paces distant from the Water’.

(4) See Mill's Diary, passim.

(5) Trans. of the Scottish Ecclesiological Society, iii, Pt. iii (1911-12), p. 281.

Tombstones, Jarlshof. Within the small museum-building at Jarlshof there are preserved three tombstones (en.1), removed from the site of the Cross Kirk, Quendale (HU31SE 4). On their original position see RCAHMS 1946 No. 1137, Note 2.

(1) This is a slab of red sandstone, measuring 5 ft. 7 in. long and tapering from 2 ft. 6 in. at the top to 2 ft. 2 in. at the bottom. It is divided into three panel-spaces, in the uppermost of which is a coat of arms reversed, a peculiarity obviously due to the work having been done by an illiterate carver, who placed his copy face downwards on the stone and then proceeded to transfer the outlines and the flanking initials to it mechanically. When properly placed, the shield is parted per pale and charged: Dexter, a cross engrailed between a heart in sinister chief and a bugle or hunting horn (?) in dexter base; sinister, on a chevron, a head (?) erased, and in base what may have been two heads erased. The reversed initials M Sand B S are presumably for Malcolm Sinclair of Quendale, and his wife Barbara Sutherland of Forss (But the arms registered in 1738 for Sutherland of Forss are: Gules, three mullets within a bordure or). The second panel contains the inscription, the arrangement of which supplies further proof of the illiteracy of the workman. The lines are in their proper order, but each of them is placed upside down. One has, therefore, to stand at the head of the stone, look towards the foot, and read from the bottom upwards: HIC DORMIT / PIVS AC [BON]VS / VIR MALCOLMVS / SINCLAIR DE QUE /NDALE QUI OBIIT / 6 IANVARII 1618 / AETATIS SVAE 73 (‘Here sleeps a devout and good man, Malcolm Sinclair of Quendale, who died 6th January, 1618, in the 73rd year of his age’). In the bottom panel is a skull with crossbones.

(2) A similar slab measures 6 ft. 9 in. by 2 ft. 6 in., but is badly broken and worn. Round the margin is incised an inscription, which reads: HIC IACET VIR ILLVS/TRIS IACOBVS SINCLARVS DE QVENDALL DE NOBILI-[SSIM/A C]OMITVM FAMILIA / ORMVDVS* QVI OBIIT IAN 29 1636 ANNO (A)ETATIS 56 (‘Here lies a man of distinction, James Sinclair of Quendale, a scion of the most noble family of the Earls, who died 29th January,1636, in the 56th year of his age’). Within the margin three panels contain respectively from top to bottom: (a) A shield, parted per pale and charged: Dexter, a cross engrailed; sinister, defaced; the whole flanked by the initials I S and B S for James Sinclair and Barbara Stewart, daughter of James Stewart of Graemsay; (b) an elegiac couplet: IVSTITI[(A)E] FA/VTOR VER(A)E / PIETATI[SA]LV/MNVS PACIC** / AMA(N)S INOP /VM DULCE / PATRO[CI-] NI/VM (‘A friend of justice, a man who cherished true piety and ensued peace, a much loved champion of the poor’); (c) a skull with crossbones, over which is MENTO (sic) MORI.

*Presumably a mistake for ORIVNDVS.

** For PACIS.

(3) This is a large slab of yellowish sandstone measuring 8 ft. 2 in. by 4 ft. 4 in. by 6t in. to 9 in. It is an elaborately carved memorial of Barbara Sinclair, wife of Hector Bruce of Muness. The central portion, flanked by scroll-work, contains, within an oval border of vine ornament, a much-worn Latin inscription: OSSA CINERES /QUAE SELECTISSIMAE DOMINAE /DNAE BARBARAE SINCLARAE / CLARO STEMMATE ORIGINE FILIAE / QUIPPE NATU MAXIMAE DOMINI IOHANNIS / SINCLARI A QUENDAL EXIMIA VIRTUTE / PRAEDITAE NECNON HONORANDI DOMINI / HECTORIS BRUSSI A MOUNES UXORIS / AMANTISSIMAE ATQUE CHARISSIMAE LIBE /RORUM OPTIMAE SPEI MATRIS BEATISSIMAE/ QUAE NON SINE SUMMO OMNIUM LUCTU OBIIT /22 MENS IS MAIl ANNO 1675 AETATIS SUAE / 38(?) HIC IN SPEM BEATAE RESURRECTIONIS /REQUIESCUNT IN PACE. Then follows the elegiac couplet: CASTA PIA ET PRUDENS HUMILIS FORMOSASERENACONIUGE N(U)NC CHRISTO FRUITUR ILLA SUO (en.2)

(‘Here, in the hope of a blessed resurrection, rest in peace the bones and ashes of one of the best of women, Mistress Barbara Sinclair sprung from a famous stock, as being the eldest daughter of Master John Sinclair of Quendale; graced with exemplary virtue; also the most devoted and dearly loved wife of the worthy Master Hector Bruce of Muness and the thrice-happy mother of a family of the richest promise, who died amid grief profound and universal on the 22nd of the month of May in the year 1675, the 38th of her age’.

‘Pure in heart, devout and prudent, meek, fair to look upon and tranquil-minded, she has now entered into the joy of Christ, her true spouse’).

The lower part is filled with carving showing a cherub's head surrounded by foliaceous scrollwork, while the top displays the marshalled coats of Bruce and Sinclair with an angel supporter on either flank. The dexter shield bears: Quarterly, 1st and 4th, a saltire and chief, on the chief a mullet; 2nd and 3rd, a lion rampant crowned, for Gray (en.3). The shield has helm (affrontee, barred) and mantling, over which, for crest, is a demi-lion rampant, crowned, issuing out of a ducal coronet, and holding in its forepaws what appears to be a sceptre. Below the arms is a scroll inscribed: BRUSSE V MOUNES. The sinister shield, bears: Quarterly, 1st and 4th, a cross engrailed; 2nd and 3rd, three hearts; at fess point, a mullet. The shield is helmed and mantled like its neighbour and, for crest, shows a demi-figure of a woman brandishing a sword in her right hand and issuing out of a ducal coronet. Below is a scroll inscribed: SAINT CLAIR V QU[E]NDAL.

HISTORICAL NOTE. Malcolm Sinclair was presented to the Vicarage of Dunrossness in 1575 and was continued in 1601 (en.4). The date of the death of James, who was his son, is wrongly given on the second stone. The Register of Testaments for Orkney and Shetland proves that he survived until 25th December 1637. Barbara was James's granddaughter, her father being John, his second son.

RCAHMS 1946, visited 22 August 1935.

En.1 Described and discussed fully in PSAS, lxvii (1932-3), pp. 53-61.

En.2 With the single difference that the penultimate word is 'Anna' and not 'illa', this couplet occurs also at St. Andrews on the tombstone of Anne or Anna Halyburton, who was the wife of Waiter Comrie, minister of St. Leonards, and who died in 1653. It is built into the wall of St. Regulus Tower. A common source is possible. If, however, there has been direct borrowing, which is perhaps more likely, it may not be altogether a coincidence that William Neven of Windhouse (see No. RCAHMS 1946 1713), who must have known the Muness family, was a student at St. Salvator's College in 1675, the year of the death of the lady here commemorated. He may have composed the epitaph on Barbara Bruce. The style of the design itself, combined with the use of v to express ‘of’, suggests that the stone was carved in the Low Countries.

En. 3 Cf. RCAHMS 1946 p. 131, footnote.

En. 4 Mill's Diary, p. lxvi.