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Dunkeld, Dunkeld Cathedral, Cross-slab
Cross Slab (Early Medieval)
Site Name Dunkeld, Dunkeld Cathedral, Cross-slab
Classification Cross Slab (Early Medieval)
Alternative Name(s) Dunkeld No. 4
Canmore ID 27159
Site Number NO04SW 1.03
NGR NO 0237 4259
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/27159
- Council Perth And Kinross
- Parish Dunkeld And Dowally
- Former Region Tayside
- Former District Perth And Kinross
- Former County Perthshire
Dunkeld 4, Perthshire, cross-slab
Measurements: H 2.1m, W 0.60m, D 0.25m
Stone type: sandstone
Place of discovery: NO 0237 4259
Present location: in the Chapter House Museum at Dunkeld Cathedral.
Evidence for discovery: Stuart recorded it in the cathedral in the mid nineteenth century.
Present condition: top and face D have been trimmed and faces B and C damaged by use as gate-post.
Description
This cross-slab is unusual for its length and cross-types. It is carved on the three remaining faces in a mixture of relief and incision. Face A has a cross carved in relief with an incised roll moulding. It has a wide short shaft on an expanded base, and the short side-arms extend to the edges of the slab and have rounded armpits. The upper arm is more than twice the length of the shaft and tapers slightly as it rises. The plain background to the cross has an incised roll-moulded edge, as does face B. Face C appears to show the shaft of a cross on an elongated base with an arched top, the base outlined by a flatband moulding and the shaft by an incised roll moulding. In the centre of the arch is carved in relief a portable cross with spiral terminals.
It may be noted that the drawing in Stuart shows the slab upside down and without the expanded base to the cross on face A; the drawing of face C is quite fanciful. The fact that the drawings show no sign of the reuse of the stone as a gatepost is thus unreliable. Allen mistook Stuart’s drawings as two stones (ECMS pt 3, 342).
Date: uncertain, possibly eleventh century.
References: Stuart 1867, pl 68; RCAHMS 1994, 97.
Compiled by A Ritchie 2016
NO04SW 1.03 0237 4259
See also NO04SW 1.04 and NO04SW 1.10 .
(Area: NO 024 426) There were reported two slabs in the churchyard of Dunkeld Cathedral, both 5'2" long by 2'1" wide, one with a cross sculptured in relief on one face; the other similar but with spiral terminations to the arms of the cross.
J Stuart 1856
Field Visit (24 February 1971)
The crosses illustrated are the two sides of the same cross slab, now preserved inside the choir of Dunkeld Cathedral in the NE corner. It measures 2.1m high by 0.6m wide and 0.25m thick. There is no trace and no local knowledge of any other cross slabs.
Information from OS (JP) 24 February 1971.
Field Visit (February 1990)
In the Chapter House Museum, there is a tapered cross-slab which is probably of 9th- or 10th-century date and has been damaged by re-use as a gate-post. On one face, it bears a cross with a short shaft curving up from a wider base, rounded armpits, and high tapered upper arm. Both the outline of the cross and its rebated background are roll-moulded. A circular marking in the base of the cross is of uncertain significance. The other face bears a tapered shaft rising from a high round-arched base whose surface is slightly sunken; at the top there is a pendant motif, possibly zoomorphic in character, in relief. The edge-mouldings are the same as those on the other face. On the side view, the moulding steps forward to reflect the cross-arm.
Information from RCAHMS (IMS) February 1990.
