Easby Cross
Encyclopedia
The Easby Cross is an Anglo-Saxon
Anglo-Saxon art
Anglo-Saxon art covers art produced within the Anglo-Saxon period of English history, beginning with the Migration period style that the Anglo-Saxons brought with them from the continent in the 5th century, and ending in 1066 with the Norman Conquest of a large Anglo-Saxon nation-state whose...

 sandstone
Sandstone
Sandstone is a sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized minerals or rock grains.Most sandstone is composed of quartz and/or feldspar because these are the most common minerals in the Earth's crust. Like sand, sandstone may be any colour, but the most common colours are tan, brown, yellow,...

 standing cross
High cross
A high cross or standing cross is a free-standing Christian cross made of stone and often richly decorated. There was a unique Early Medieval tradition in Ireland and Britain of raising large sculpted stone crosses, usually outdoors...

 of 800–820, now in the Victoria and Albert Museum
Victoria and Albert Museum
The Victoria and Albert Museum , set in the Brompton district of The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, London, England, is the world's largest museum of decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 4.5 million objects...

, London. It originally came from Easby
Easby, Richmondshire
Easby is a hamlet and civil parish in the Richmondshire district of North Yorkshire, England. Situated near Richmond its main attraction is the nearby Easby Abbey, which is in ruins as it was one of many dissolved by Henry VIII as part of the reformation...

 near Richmond
Richmond, North Yorkshire
Richmond is a market town and civil parish on the River Swale in North Yorkshire, England and is the administrative centre of the district of Richmondshire. It is situated on the edge of the Yorkshire Dales National Park, and serves as the Park's main tourist centre...

  in the Richmondshire
Richmondshire
Richmondshire is a local government district of North Yorkshire, England. It covers a large northern area of the Yorkshire Dales including Swaledale and Arkengarthdale, Wensleydale and Coverdale, with the prominent Scots' Dyke and Scotch Corner along the centre. Teesdale lies to the north...

 district of North Yorkshire
North Yorkshire
North Yorkshire is a non-metropolitan or shire county located in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England, and a ceremonial county primarily in that region but partly in North East England. Created in 1974 by the Local Government Act 1972 it covers an area of , making it the largest...

, where a plaster replica is kept in the church. Easby was then in the Kingdom of Northumbria. The width of the long faces at the bottom of the lowest fragment is 31 cm, with a depth of 18 cm, and the whole cross would originally have been up to three metres high.

Four fragments of the cross survive, which have been fitted into a reconstruction in the museum. Three of these were used, probably in the late 12th century, in the rebuilding of Easby Church, from where they were recovered in the 20th century. All had one face visible in the wall surface; two were on exterior faces of the church, and one on the interior. The fragment with Christ in Majesty
Christ in Majesty
Christ in Majesty, or Christ in Glory, in Latin Majestas Domini, is the Western Christian image of Christ seated on a throne as ruler of the world, always seen frontally in the centre of the composition, and often flanked by other sacred figures, whose membership changes over time and according to...

on the main face was recovered from a field wall nearby before 1869, and kept by the landowner until sold to the V&A in 1931. Both types of reuse are very typical of the fate of broken crosses. Some of the sections show that repairs had already been made with molten lead before the cross was broken up, so it may have been unstable or otherwise damaged. Unusually for Anglo-Saxon crosses, the stone is not local: "the medium-grained deltaic sandstone matches stone traditionally produced in the Aislaby quarries of Eskdale
Eskdale
-United Kingdom:*Eskdale, Cumbria, England*Eskdale, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland*Eskdale, North Yorkshire, England*Eskdale , Cumberland, England, former constituency-United States:...

 near Whitby
Whitby
Whitby is a seaside town, port and civil parish in the Scarborough borough of North Yorkshire, England. Situated on the east coast of Yorkshire at the mouth of the River Esk, Whitby has a combined maritime, mineral and tourist heritage, and is home to the ruins of Whitby Abbey where Caedmon, the...

", which are nearly 60 miles away. This quarry had been used for the 7th century Whitby Abbey
Whitby Abbey
Whitby Abbey is a ruined Benedictine abbey overlooking the North Sea on the East Cliff above Whitby in North Yorkshire, England. It was disestablished during the Dissolution of the Monasteries under the auspices of Henry VIII...

 and other sculptures in Yorkshire; the stone sections could have been transported by pack horse, perhaps most likely after carving.

The front face is carved with figurative reliefs. Those that survive show Christ in Majesty with two angels, and below that panel the halo of a figure now lost. Below the Christ panel there were three pyramidal groups of haloed head and shoulder reliefs of apostles in arched compartments. There were two groups of three and one of six, but the face of the topmost figure is now missing, and a modern filler section has been inserted. The cross head is missing its arms, which extended to about 90 cm across. The front face shows a bust of Christ blessing and holding a book, and the rear another Christ in Majesty. The style of the figures has been related to contemporary continental Carolingian art
Carolingian art
Carolingian art comes from the Frankish Empire in the period of roughly 120 years from about AD 780 to 900 — during the reign of Charlemagne and his immediate heirs — popularly known as the Carolingian Renaissance. The art was produced by and for the court circle and a group of...

, "underlying the apparent naturalism, there is a carefully planned logic to the overlapping elements which is as rigidly defined as an interlace sequence".

The rear face contains a continuous vine scroll "inhabited" with beasts, an early appearance of this motif in Anglo-Saxon art. The scroll is the type known as "medallion scroll". Ernst Kitzinger
Ernst Kitzinger
Ernst Kitzinger was a German-American historian of late antique, early medieval, and Byzantine art.-Biography:...

 thought the form of the scroll related to early Carolingian art, though it may have been derived more from Late Antique examples. The two much narrower side faces contain panels of interlace and vine scroll that alternate apparently rather randomly, as the two sides do not match. The corners have rope-work running the whole length of the faces, which the modern filler sections imitate.

The cross dates from the period when Alcuin of York and other Anglo-Saxons held important positions in the court of Charlemagne
Charlemagne
Charlemagne was King of the Franks from 768 and Emperor of the Romans from 800 to his death in 814. He expanded the Frankish kingdom into an empire that incorporated much of Western and Central Europe. During his reign, he conquered Italy and was crowned by Pope Leo III on 25 December 800...

, and remained in contact with the Northumbrian monasteries. It is one of the finest surviving Anglo-Saxon crosses, and the best of a group of Northumbrian crosses including those from Otley
Otley
-Transport:The main roads through the town are the A660 to the south east, which connects Otley to Bramhope, Adel and Leeds city centre, and the A65 to the west, which goes to Ilkley and Skipton. The A6038 heads to Guiseley, Shipley and Bradford, connecting with the A65...

, with similar busts of apostles or saints in arched compartments (but singly), Rothbury
Rothbury
Rothbury is a town and civil parish in Northumberland, England. It is located on the River Coquet, northwest of Morpeth and north-northwest of Newcastle upon Tyne...

, Ilkley
Ilkley
Ilkley is a spa town and civil parish in West Yorkshire, in the north of England. Ilkley civil parish includes the adjacent village of Ben Rhydding and is a ward within the metropolitan borough of Bradford. Approximately north of Bradford, the town lies mainly on the south bank of the River Wharfe...

 and Lowther
Lowther
The name Lowther can mean:*CFS Lowther, military installation on Highway 11 near Opasatika, Ontario, Canada*Lowther baronets, which see for a list*Lowther Hall Anglican Grammar School*Lowther Stakes, a horse race*Pat Lowther Award-Places:...

. It has similarities to the earlier Ruthwell Cross
Ruthwell Cross
The Ruthwell Cross is a stone Anglo-Saxon cross probably dating from the 8th century, when Ruthwell was part of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Northumbria; it is now in Scotland. Anglo-Saxon crosses are closely related to the contemporary Irish high crosses, and both are part of the Insular art tradition...

 and Bewcastle Cross
Bewcastle Cross
The Bewcastle Cross is an Anglo-Saxon high cross still in its original position in the churchyard of Bewcastle, near Carlisle, Cumbria, England. The cross probably dates from the 7th or early 8th century and features reliefs and inscriptions in the runic alphabet...

, from western Northumbria, which are larger and have more ambitious decorative programmes, but also mix interlace with inhabited vine-scrolls. With an approximate date of 800–820, the cross was erected just as the golden age of Northumbrian art was coming to an end with the devastating Viking raids which began with the attack on Lindisfarne
Lindisfarne
Lindisfarne is a tidal island off the north-east coast of England. It is also known as Holy Island and constitutes a civil parish in Northumberland...

in 793.

The cross is now displayed at the start of the recently re-arranged Medieval galleries (in at the front door, right down stairs).
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