Walkhampton Church House cross: a wayside cross on the east side of Church House, 650m north east of Walkhampton village

Reasons for Designation

Wayside crosses are one of several types of Christian cross erected during the medieval period, mostly from the 9th to 15th centuries AD. In addition to serving the function of reiterating and reinforcing the Christian faith amongst those who passed the cross and of reassuring the traveller, wayside crosses often fulfilled a role as waymarkers, especially in difficult and otherwise unmarked terrain. The crosses might be on regularly used routes linking ordinary settlements or on routes having a more specifically religious function, including those providing access to religious sites for parishioners and funeral processions, or marking long-distance routes frequented on pilgrimages. Over 350 wayside crosses are known nationally, concentrated in south west England throughout Cornwall and on Dartmoor where they form the commonest type of stone cross. A small group also occurs on the North York Moors. Relatively few examples have been recorded elsewhere and these are generally confined to remote moorland locations. Outside Cornwall almost all wayside crosses take the form of a `Latin' cross, in which the cross-head itself is shaped within the projecting arms of an unenclosed cross. In Cornwall wayside crosses vary considerably in form and decoration. The commonest type includes a round, or `wheel', head on the faces of which various forms of cross or related designs were carved in relief or incised, the spaces between the cross arms possibly pierced. The design was sometimes supplemented with a relief figure of Christ and the shaft might bear decorative panels and motifs. Less common forms in Cornwall include the `Latin' cross and, much rarer, the simple slab with a low relief cross on both faces. Rare examples of wheel-head and slab-form crosses also occur within the North York Moors group. Most wayside crosses have either a simple socketed base or show no evidence for a separate base at all. Wayside crosses contribute significantly to our understanding of medieval religious customs and sculptural traditions and to our knowledge of medieval routeways and settlement patterns. All wayside crosses which survive as earth- fast monuments, except those which are extremely damaged and removed from their original locations, are considered worthy of protection.

Walkhampton Church House cross consists of the well dressed shaft of a tall medieval cross of fine quality, lacking its head and arms. The cross is now united with a socket stone which must once have formed part of another cross. Although not in situ, both the shaft and socket stone are from other recorded positions nearby.

Details

The monument includes the tall but incomplete shaft of a medieval wayside cross of moderately fine-grained granite, set into a granite socket stone on a grass verge on the east side of Walkhampton Church House. The cross and socket stone were brought together in a restoration of 1984, at which time the socket was slightly enlarged in order to accommodate the shaft. A head has been added in the 1990s. The total height of the shaft above the socket stone is 1.63m. The shaft has a nearly square base, 0.37m by 0.34m. Except for the southern corner of the shaft, where a chamfer begins 0.1m above the base, the square shaft becomes chamfered between 0.29m and 0.38m above the base. The chamfer, which is 0.1m-0.11m wide, continues to the broken-off top of the slightly tapering shaft. The top the shaft is neatly square, 0.25m by 0.25m, plus chamfers. In the centre of its top surface there is a drilled triangular hole with rounded corners, 25mm in diameter and 45mm deep. The western corner of the shaft has half the chamfer cut away to form vertical fluting between points 0.67m below the top of the shaft and 0.29m above the base. The south east face of the shaft has four holes partially plugged with lead and/or iron. From top to bottom the holes are: (1) square, 25mm by 25mm by 40mm maximum depth, partially plugged with lead; (2) circular, 70mm in diameter, filled with lead and with an iron plate fastened over it; (3) squarish, 35mm by 35mm, mostly filled with lead; (4) circular, 30mm diameter by 40mm deep, and unfilled. The socket stone, which is of a different type of granite to the shaft, has an uneven top surface, and was probably never intended to be seen. Its dimensions are 1.05m by 0.95m by 1.1m by 0.5m. Its maximum height above the turf is 0.25m. The shaft is cemented into the socket hole. The south west edge of the socket stone is 0.9m from the edge of the track passing the church house, and the monument as a whole is about 5m north west of another track which leads off at right-angles to the north east. The monument is not in situ, as both the shaft and the socket stone have been previously recorded in different positions in the near vicinity.

MAP EXTRACT The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract. It includes a 2 metre boundary around the archaeological features, considered to be essential for the monument's support and preservation.

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

24836

Legacy System:

RSM

Sources

Books and journals
Starkey, F H, Dartmoor Crosses And Some Ancient Tracks, (1989), 148
Masson Phillips, E, Report & Transactions of the Devonshire Association in Supplementary Notes On The Ancient Stone Crosses Of Devon, Vol. 111, (1979), 143

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