Accessibility

Font Size

100% 150% 200%

Background Colour

Default Contrast
Close Reset

Dail A' Bhaite

Cross Slab (Early Medieval)

Site Name Dail A' Bhaite

Classification Cross Slab (Early Medieval)

Canmore ID 6929

Site Number NC86SW 5

NGR NC 8310 6494

Datum OSGB36 - NGR

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/6929

Ordnance Survey licence number AC0000807262. All rights reserved.
Canmore Disclaimer. © Copyright and database right 2024.

Toggle Aerial | View on large map

Digital Images

Administrative Areas

  • Council Highland
  • Parish Farr
  • Former Region Highland
  • Former District Sutherland
  • Former County Sutherland

Early Medieval Carved Stones Project

Dail a’ Bhaile, Strathy, Sutherland, cross-slab

Measurements: H 1.39m, W 0.53m, D 0.20m

Stone type: sandstone

Place of discovery: NC 8310 6494

Present location: in situ.

Evidence for discovery: first recorded in 1900 (Munro 1900).

Present condition: weathered.

Description

An irregularly shaped slab now lying prone is carved in both false relief and incision with two crosses. The main cross is an incised outline cross with ball terminals to the arms and the shaft, and a central circle in the cross-head. This is itself outlined by a deep groove, giving the impression of relief carving. Beside the shaft on the left-hand side is a simple sunken equal-armed cross. Although there is some indication of the equal-armed cross on the drawing in Munro (1900, fig 1), it is not mentioned in the text, nor in ECMS (1903) or RCAHMS (1911), and there may be a possibility that it was added or ‘improved’ later in the twentieth century.

Date: early medieval.

References: Munro 1900; ECMS pt 3, 55 (Strathy); RCAHMS 1911, no 260.

Compiled by A Ritchie 2016

Archaeology Notes

NC86SW 5 8310 6494.

(NC 8310 6493) Cross Slab (NR)

OS 6" map (1962)

A recumbent slab lying in open moorland and bearing an incised cross of a type otherwise unknown in Scotland and Ireland, the only known parallels being in County Durham, Radnorshire and Carmarthenshire. It lies NE-SW and is irregularly shaped of roughly hewn local sandstone and measures 4ft 6inches by 1ft 9 inches by 8 inches thick and is sculptured on one face only. The latin cross has rounded ends to shaft and arms with

circular depressions in the middle of each. Parallel incised lines are cut down the sides of the shaft and arms.

RCAHMS 1911

The cross-slab is as described but it covers a cist-like structure now filled with small stones.

Visited by OS (WDJ) 1960

The cross-slab lies in a hollow. There is no evidence of a cist-like structure and likewise of any significant stones.

Visited by OS (AA) 1972

No change to latest field report. The absence of the stones in the photograph (1960) seems explained by a small marker cairn just by the cross-slab.

Visited by OS (JM) 1977

References

MyCanmore Image Contributions


Contribute an Image

MyCanmore Text Contributions