Gosforth Cross
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Description
Title: The Victoria history of the county of Cumberland Identifier: cu31924092925936 Year: https://www.flickr.com/search/?tags=bookyear1901">1901 (https://www.flickr.com/search/?tags=bookdecade1900">1900s) Authors: https://www.flickr.com/search/?tags=bookauthorWilson_James_Vicar_of_Dalston">Wilson, James, Vicar of Dalston Subjects: https://www.flickr.com/search/?tags=booksubjectNatural_history">Natural history Publisher: https://www.flickr.com/search/?tags=bookpublisherWestminster_A_Constable_and_company_limited_">Westminster [A. Constable and company, limited] Contributing Library: https://www.flickr.com/search/?tags=bookcontributorCornell_University_Library">Cornell University Library Digitizing Sponsor: https://www.flickr.com/search/?tags=booksponsorMSN">MSN View Book Page: https://archive.org/stream/cu31924092925936/#page/n355/mode/1up" rel="noreferrer nofollow">Book Viewer About This Book: https://archive.org/details/cu31924092925936" rel="noreferrer nofollow">Catalog Entry View All Images: https://www.flickr.com/search/?tags=bookidcu31924092925936">All Images From Book Click here to https://archive.org/stream/cu31924092925936/#page/n355/mode/1up" rel="noreferrer nofollow">view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book. Text Appearing Before Image: A HISTORY OF CUMBERLAND Irish-Scandinavians were so fond. Mr. Calverley with much reason compared the descriptions in the Edda of Hel, the abode of the dead, and its walls wattled, not with withes like the houses of the living, but with snakes. This heathen idea, grafted upon the Christian faith, flowered into the pretty and favourite device which we shall see often repeated, and find here in the little figure standing on the head of the great serpent—the seed of the woman bruising the serpent's head, triumphing over death and proclaiming the hope of life to come. A fragment of similar workmanship built into the church of Hutton-in-the-Forest shows that there must have been other crosses of this type in the neighbour- hood ; and the sundial and base in the churchyard may possibly be the original lower part of the same monument, as appears to be the case elsewhere. At Penrith is the Plague stone, evidently the socket of an ancient cross, though known only as the basin which during times of plague people filled with vine- gar and put their money in to disinfect it, at the same time taking up the goods which country folk from outside had laid by the stone, themselves retiring to a safe distance. We must now traverse the county to Gosforth and view the most famous and beautiful examples of the round-shafted cross and its associated monuments. We must treat them briefly, but they have been de- scribed at length by Mr. Calverley in Rarly Sculptured Crosses of the Diocese of Carlisle and by Dr. C. A. Parker in his book on T'he Ancient Crosses at Gosforth, Cumberland. There are at Gosforth the remains of three crosses and two hogbacks ; one little cross-head built into the porch is probably not pre-Norman. The style and execution and the 'literary subject' of this famous group are very similar ; if the three crosses and two hogbacks were not carved by the same hand, they represent the work of the same age and race. They cannot be twelfth century, because the hogbacks were built into the foundations of the twelfth century church ; nor can they be Anglian, because they are quite unlike the work we know to be Anglian, and because two of the crosses illustrate verses from the Edda, which is a series of poems made by Scandinavian skalds under Irish and English influence in the tenth century. The sculp- tures do not merely reflect general ideas com- mon to all Teutonic heathendom, but they show, carved in stone, pictures obviously intended to embody the very words of the Norse songs. 266 Text Appearing After Image: Gosforth Cross. Note About Images Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original work. -
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Link: https://www.flickr.com/photos/126377022@N07/20177823904/
Resource type: Image
Added by: Simon Cotterill
Last modified: 3 years, 9 months ago
Viewed: 446 times
Picture Taken: 1901-01-01T00:00:00 -
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