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Wayside cross socket stone at road junction 70m east of St Peter's Church

Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places

Overview

Heritage Category:: Scheduled Monument
List Entry Number:: 1013732
Date first listed:: 20-Dec-1995

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Scheduled Monument
List Entry Number:: 1013732
Date first listed:: 20-Dec-1995

Location

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

County:: Devon
District:: Torridge (District Authority)
Parish:: Dowland
National Grid Reference:: SS 56885 10306

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.

Despite the shaft having been removed, the socket stone at the road junction 70m east of Dowland church survives comparatively well in what is likely to be its original location. This forms one of a pair of crosses in Dowland, the other being located 6m south of Dowland church.

Details

This monument includes a socket stone for a wayside cross, situated at the southern side of a road junction between the B3217 and an unclassified road in the village of Dowland. The base of the socket stone measures 0.74m square and is 0.36m high. The stone has ribbed corner shoulders and is octagonal above. The socket hole measures 0.34m long by 0.32m wide and 0.12m deep. The metalled road surface is excluded from the scheduling where it falls within the cross's protective margin. The cross is Listed Grade II.

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:: 27304
Legacy System:: RSM

Sources

Books and journals
Masson Phillips, E M, 'Transactions of the Devonshire Association' in The Ancient Stone Crosses of Devon, Part 2, , Vol. 70, (1938), 313
Other
Devon County Sites and Monuments Register, SS51SE-010,
MPP fieldwork by H. Gerrard, (1994)

Legal

This monument is scheduled under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979 as amended as it appears to the Secretary of State to be of national importance. This entry is a copy, the original is held by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.