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The Repton Stone

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Martin Biddle  and
Birthe Kjølbye-Biddle
Martin Biddle
Affiliation:
Christ Church, Oxford
Birthe Kjølbye-Biddle
Affiliation:
Oxford, England
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Extract

In August 1979 a large sculptured stone was discovered, broken and upside down in a pit immediately outside the eastern window of the Anglo-Saxon crypt of the church of St Wystan at Repton in Derbyshire (pl. V). The scenes depicted on the two surviving faces of the stone are without direct parallel in Anglo-Saxon sculpture and have so far eluded definitive interpretation. The purpose of the present article is to place on record a detailed description of the stone, and some preliminary thoughts on its date and possible significance, in the hope that wider discussion may lead to a more satisfactory understanding of what must be, on any judgement, one of the more important surviving examples of pre-Conquest sculpture.

Type
Research Article
Information
Anglo-Saxon England , Volume 14 , December 1985 , pp. 233 - 292
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1985

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References

1 D., and Lysons, S., Magna Britannia v, Derbyshire (London, 1817), p. ccxviii.Google Scholar

2 Taylor, H. M. and Taylor, Joan, Anglo-Saxon Architecture 11 (Cambridge, 1965), 510–16Google Scholar; cf. Ibid. 111 (Cambridge, 1978), 1083; Taylor, H. M., ‘Repton Reconsidered: a Study in Structural Criticism’, England Before the Conquest, ed. Clemoes, P. and Hughes, K. (Cambridge, 1971), pp. 351–89Google Scholar. See also Radford, C. A. R., ‘Repton, the Church of St Wystan’, ArchJ 118 (1961), 241–3Google Scholar, and his review of Taylor, , Anglo-Saxon Architecture 111 in AntJ 60 (1980), 130–1Google Scholar; Gilbert, E. C., ‘St Wystan's Repton’, Cahiers archéologiques 17 (1967), 83–102Google Scholar, and ‘Wystan's, S.Church, Repton; its Date and Significance’, Cahiers archéologiques 22 (1972), 237–9Google Scholar. Fernie, E. C., The Architecture of the Anglo-Saxons (London, 1983), pp. 116–21Google Scholar, takes no account of the archaeological evidence.

3 Taylor, H. M., Repton Studies 1 (1977)Google Scholar, 2 (1979), 3 (1983); idem, St Wystan's Church, Repton: a Guide and History (Repton, 1979); Biddle, Martin, ‘Archaeology, Architecture and the Cult of Saints in Anglo-Saxon England’, The Anglo-Saxon Church: Papers on History, Architecture and Archaeology in Honour of Dr H. M. Taylor, ed. Morris, R., CBA Research Report (London, 1985)Google Scholar, in press; Biddle, Martin, Kjølbye-Biddle, Birthe, Grierson, Philip, Harvey, Yvonne, Metcalf, Michael, Northover, P. J. and Pagan, Hugh, ‘Coins of the Anglo-Saxon Period from Repton, Derbyshire’, Anglo-Saxon Monetary History, ed. Blackburn, M. A. S. (Leicester, 1985)Google Scholar, in press; Biddle, Martin and Kjølbye-Biddle, Birthe, ‘Repton 1974–84: a Preliminary Report’, AntJ 66 (1986)Google Scholar, in preparation.

4 Biddle, Martin and Kjølbye-Biddle, Birthe, ‘Repton 1984’, Bull. of the CBA Churches Committee 21 (Winter 1984), 6–8Google Scholar. The work of 1974 84 has been supported by the British Academy, the Society of Antiquaries, the Avenue Trust, the Centre for Field Research (‘Earthwatch’), the BBC, The Observer and Mr Roger Boissier. Permission to excavate beside the church in the grounds of Repton School has been generously granted by the Governors and Headmaster (Mr John Gammel, succeeded by Mr David Jewell), and every facility has been made available by the school, by the successive vicars of Repton (Canon F. J. H. Lisemore, the Reverend M. A. L. David and the Reverend Julian Barker) and by the Parochial Church Council.

5 Colgrave, Bertram, Felix's Life of Saint Guthlac (Cambridge, 1956), pp. 2–4 and 84–7.Google Scholar

6 As first suggested by Dornier, Ann, ‘The Anglo-Saxon Monastery at Breedon-on-the-Hill, Leicestershire’, Mercian Studies, ed. Ann, Dornier (Leicester, 1977), pp. 155–68, at 158Google Scholar, on the basis of a grant, datable 675 X 692, by Friduricus to Abbot Hædda of 31 manentes called Hrepingas; see Sawyer, P. H., Anglo-Saxon Charters: an Annotated List and Bibliography, Hist, R.. Soc. Guides and Handbooks 8 (London, 1968)Google Scholar, no. 1805. This suggestion depends on the identification of Hrepingas as referring to Repton, on which see Rumble, Alexander, ‘Hrepingas Reconsidered’, Mercian Studies, ed. Dornier, pp. 169–72.Google Scholar

7 Two of the Saxon Chronicles Parallel, ed. Plummer, Charles (Oxford, 1892–9Google Scholar), 1, 72–3 (s.a. 874) (text); The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: a Revised Translation, ed. D. Whitelock et al. (London, 1961; rev. 1965), p. 48Google Scholar (translation). In this part of the Chronicle, the annals begin in the autumn of the previous year, so that ‘874’ begins in autumn 873 by our reckoning. Thus, the Viking army went to Repton in the autumn of 873 and left, as recorded in the annal for 875, in the autumn of 874. We are grateful to Dr Simon Keynes for discussing these dates. The disruption of religious life can be inferred from the incorporation of the church in the defences of the Viking camp (see above, p. 234 and n. 4), and does not depend on the assertion of Pseudo-lngulf that the monastery was destroyed by the Danes, (Rerum Anglicarum Scriptores post Bedam praecipui, ed. Savile, H. (London, 1596)Google Scholar, 495r).

8 Rollason, D. W., The Mildrith Legend: a Study in Early Medieval Hagiography in England, Stud. in the Early Hist. of Britain (Leicester, 1982), pp. 26, 77, 81 and 93Google Scholar. The description of the burial of Merewalh at Repton is in the prologue to the Vita beatae ac Deo Dilectae Virginis Mildburgae (London, British Library, Add. 34633, fol. 209)Google Scholar, which was written between 963 and 1101, perhaps in 1080 X 1081 as Rollason suggests (Ibid. p. 26). We are grateful to Dr Rollason for providing us with his transcript of this text, the significance and reliability of which regarding Repton requires fuller consideration than is possible here. For doubts concerning the relationship of Merewalh to the house of Penda, see Stenton, F. M., ‘Pre-Conquest Herefordshire’, Preparatory to Anglo-Saxon England, ed. Stenton, D. M. (Oxford, 1970), pp. 193–202, at 194–5.Google Scholar

9 Two Chronicles, ed. Plummer 1, 48–9 (s.a. 755).

10 As recorded in all surviving versions of the passio of his grandson Wystan (see below, n. 11).

11 Chronicon Abbatiae de Evesham ad Annum 1418, ed. W. D. Macray, Rolls Ser. (London, 1863), p. 331Google Scholar. For the versions of Wystan's passio, see Rollason, D. W., ‘The Cults of Murdered Royal Saints in Anglo-Saxon England’, ASE 11 (1983), 1–22, at 5–9.Google Scholar

12 Rollason, D. W., The Search for Wigstan, Vaughan Paper 27 (Leicester, 1981), 10–12.Google Scholar

13 Liebermann, F., Die Heiligen Englands (Hanover, 1889), pp. 11–12Google Scholar (no. 16); Rollason, D. W., ‘Lists of Saints' Resting-Places in Anglo-Saxon England’, ASE 7 (1978), 61–93, at 63–4 and 89.Google Scholar

14 Sawyer, , Anglo-Saxon Charters, no. 1624Google Scholar. It seems almost always to have been assumed that the donor, an Abbess Cynewaru, was abbess of Repton; see, e.g., Stenton, F. M., ‘Medeshamstede and its Colonies’, Preparatory to Anglo-Saxon England, ed. Stenton, pp. 179–92, at 184Google Scholar, n. 3. While probable, there appears to be no explicit contemporary evidence that this is so.

15 The royal abbess Ecgburg sent to Guthlac (ob. 714) ‘sarcofagum plumbeum linteumque’ (Colgrave, , Life of Guthlac, pp. 146–7 and 191Google Scholar; cf. pp. 154–7, 162–3 and 194). If Ecgburg was abbess of Repton, this may be an early indication of the monastery's access to sources of lead, but the identification is an interlineation in the early thirteenth-century ‘F’ manuscript of the Liber Eliensis, ‘probably inserted in response to a marginal note cuius loci?’ in the late-twelfth-century ‘E’ manuscript; see Liber Eliensis, ed. E. O. Blake, Camden 3rd ser. 92 (London, 1962), xxiii–xxiv and 19.Google Scholar

16 Sawyer, , Anglo-Saxon Charters, no. 197Google Scholar; Birch, W. deG., Cartularium Saxonicum, 3 vols. (London, 1885–1893), no. 454Google Scholar; Hart, C. R., The Early Charters of Northern England and the North Midlands (Leicester, 1975), no. 34 (pp. 68–9)Google Scholar. The holding of a royal council on this occasion at Repton was apparently accepted by Sir Stenton, Frank (Anglo-Saxon England, 3rd ed. (Oxford, 1971), map on p. 201)Google Scholar, as it had been by Haddan, A. W. and Stubbs, W. (Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents Relating to Great Britain and Ireland 111 (Oxford, 1871), 633).Google Scholar

17 Chronicon Abbatiae de Evesham, cd. Macray, pp. 83 and 331–2.

18 See Martin Biddle et al., ‘Coins of the Anglo-Saxon Period from Repton’ (cited above, n. 3).

19 Domesday Book, ed. Abraham Farley (London, 1783) 1, 272V.Google Scholar

20 See Dugdale, W., Monasticon Anglicanum, ed. Caley, J., Ellis, H. and Bandinel, B. vi (London, 1830) no. 1 (p. 598)Google Scholar, and Jeayes, I. H., Derbyshire Charters (London, 1906), no. 531 (p. 68)Google Scholar; translated Macdonald, Alec, A Short History of Repton (London, 1929), pp. 40–1.Google Scholar

21 See Colvin, Howard, ‘Calke Priory’, Derbyshire Archaeol. Jnl 102 (1982), 102–5, at 104.Google Scholar

22 Chronicon Abbatiae de Evesham, ed. Macray, pp. 336–7. The event took place in the time of Randulf, abbot of Evesham 1214–29; see Knowles, D., Brooke, C. N. L., and London, Vera C. M., The Heads of Religious Houses: England and Wales 940–1216 (Cambridge, 1972), p. 48.Google Scholar

23 For the problems and results of these investigations, see Taylor, , Repton Studies 1–2.Google Scholar

24 The steps are shown in Taylor, ‘Repton Reconsidered’, figs. 15, 18 and 24, and are discussed on pp. 359–60, 372, 382. In Taylor, , Repton Studies 1Google Scholar, the original entrance is still assumed, in figs. 1 and 3–5, to have been to the east. In Taylor, , Repton Studies 2, p. 2Google Scholar (para. 2.3) and passim, the evidence of the archaeological and structural analysis showing that there was no original entrance stairway on this side is taken fully into consideration.

25 Taylor, , Repton Studies 2, figs. 1–4Google Scholar. For the date given here, see Biddle, ‘Archaeology, Architecture and the Cult of Saints’, in press.

26 For details, see below, nn. 34–8.

27 The full evidence can only be set out when the excavations still in progress on the north side of the crypt have been completed.

28 ‘Charcoal burials’ are now known from many sites. At the Old Minster, Winchester, where they first occur in the ninth century, the latest examples belong to the late eleventh century. The later examples, like that at Repton, tend to have thinner beds of charcoal than was normally the case in the earlier burials.

29 We are grateful to Mr J. G. Hurst for examining and commenting upon this sherd.

30 Cramp, Rosemary, General Introduction and County Durham and Northumberland, 2 pts, Brit. Acad. Corpus of Anglo-Saxon Stone Sculpture in England 1 (Oxford, 1984), xiii.Google Scholar

31 Ibid. p. xiv and fig. 1b.

32 Ibid. p. xxii and fig. 8a–b.

33 Ibid. p. xxiv and fig. 9b.

34 The main piece is Recorded Find 1165. The five fragments which fit to it are: d, e, f and g, all recorded as RF 1159, which fit to faces A and B; and h, recorded as RF 1165, which fits to faces B and C.

35 These five fragments are: a (RF 1147), b (RF 1151), c (RF 1153), k (RF 1150) and / (RF 1157)

36 These three fragments are: i (RF 1184), j (RF 1152) and m (RF 1162).

37 These three fragments are: n (RF 1154), p (RF 1157) and s (RF 1158).

38 These four fragments are: o (RF 1156), q (RF 1158), t (RF 1184) and, with two holes, r (RF 1158).

39 Dowel holes are often present in the top of cross-shafts (e.g. St. Alkmund, Derby, Derby Museum 1–1872; see Radford, C. A. R., ‘The Church of St Alkmund, Derby’, Derbyshire Archaeol. Jnl 96 (1976), 48–51Google Scholar, pls. 6–7), but are rarely mentioned in the literature. We have not been able to find examples of composite dowelled crossheads in the literature, but where so little attention has been paid to the stone cross qua object, as distinct from a vehicle for decoration, this silence may mean little. For tenons and mortices, see, however, Bailey, R. N., Viking Age Sculpture (London, 1980), pp. 238–56Google Scholar, esp. 242, and, for a classic example of how to describe and publish the constructional details of stone crosses, Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland, Argyll: an Inventory of the Monuments 4, lona (Edinburgh, 1982), pp. 179–241.Google Scholar

40 Cramp, , General Introduction, p. xxii.Google Scholar

41 See, e.g., the diagrams of walking, trotting and cantering in Gordon, Sally, The Rider's Handbook (London and New York, 1978), pp. 20, 25 and 40Google Scholar. The movement of the horse is a classic problem in art; see Étienne Marey, Jules, Movement, trans. Pritchard, Eric (London, 1895), pp. 8–12 and 186–210.Google Scholar

42 On the breast and neck some of these lines may represent straps, as other lines certainly do; see below.

43 The erosion extends over the break, showing that the stone was broken and then eroded before being buried. This may have happened after the cross was felled, but it could also have occurred if the stone had been broken or defaced but left standing for some time until finally demolished.

44 Compare, e.g., the Holy Dove flying upwards with spread wings on the reverse of pennies of the Agnus Dei type of Æthelred II, struck c. 1009 (North, J. J., English Hammered Coinage 1, Early Anglo-Saxon to Henry 111 c. 600–1272 (London, 1980)Google Scholar, no. 776), or the raven(?) in a similar pose on York pennies of Anlaf Guthfrithsson of c. 939–40 (Ibid. no. 537).

45 Unsatisfactory terms, on which see Davidson, H. R. Ellis, The Sword in Anglo-Saxon England: its Archaeology and Literature (Oxford, 1962), pp. 40–2.Google Scholar

46 Cramp, , General Introduction, p. xliii.Google Scholar

47 See above, p. 243 and n. 43.

48 See above, n. 35.

49 Comparable projections occur on the tallest and shortest of the three shafts at Ilkley Church (Yorks.), but it seems perhaps unlikely that they were intended as tenons to be morticed into the lower arm of a crosshead as suggested Collingwood, W. G., Northumbrian Crosses of the Pre-Norman Age (London, 1927)Google Scholar, figs. 61 and 63.

50 The shaft might have been a monolith, but we suspect that this sandstone has insufficient strength to allow for the quarrying, carriage and erection of so long a piece.

51 See below, pp. 257 and 274.

52 See above, pp. 237–8.

53 See above, p. 234, and nn. 3 and 4. The rampart was later thrown back into its ditch and all traces of it removed.

54 For the sequence of the crypt and an interpretation of its changing function, see Biddle, ‘Archaeology, Architecture and the Cult of Saints’, in press.

55 Taylor, St Wystan's Church, Repton, cover illustration and note inside cover. See also Lysons, , Magna Britannia v, cxxiiiGoogle Scholar, and Bigsby, R., History and Topographical Description of Repton (London, 1854), p. 249Google Scholar and fig. 27. See also Lang, J. T., ‘The Hogback: a Viking Colonial Monument’, ASSAH 3 (1984), 85–176, at 160.Google Scholar

56 E.g. Chester-le-Street 1A (Cramp, , County Durham and Northumberland, p. 54Google Scholar and pl. 20.102); Gainford 4A (Ibid. p. 82 and pl. 61.290); Gosforth (Collingwood, , Northumbrian Crosses), fig. 184 (pp. 155–7)Google Scholar; Hart 1A (Cramp, , County Durham and Northumberland, p. 93Google Scholar and pl. 79.394); Sockburn 3A (Ibid. p. 136 and pl. 130.710); Sockburn 14 (Ibid. pp. 140–1 and pl. 139.745); Tynemouth 1 (Ibid. p. 226 and pl. 224.1263).

57 Friesen, Otto v., ‘Möjbro-stenen’, Fornvännen 44 (1949), 287–309Google Scholar; Stenberger, Mårten, Det forntida Sverige (Stockholm, 1964), pp. 557–8Google Scholar, fig. 232; Jansson, Sven B. F., The Runes of Sweden (London, 1962), pp. 8–9Google Scholar and pl. 3.

58 For a general corpus of the Scandinavian bracteates, see Mackeprang, M. B., De Nordiska Guldbrakteater, Jysk Arkeologisk Selskabs Skrifter 2 (Aarhus, 1952)Google Scholar. This includes the English finds, on which see also Sonia Chadwick Hawkes and Pollard, Mark, ‘The Gold Bracteates from Sixth-Century Anglo-Saxon Graves in Kent, in the Light of a New Find from Finglesham’, FS 15 (1981), 316–70Google Scholar, esp. 352–63 and the useful bibliography (366–9). For bracteates in general, see the many articles of Hauck, Karl, esp. ‘Götterglaube im Spiegel der goldenen Brakteaten’, Sachsen und Angelsachsen, Ausstellung des Helms-Museums (Hamburg, 1978), pp. 185–218Google Scholar (with excellent illustrations), ‘Brakteatenikonologie’, Reallexicon der Germanischen Altertumskunde, founded by J. Hoops III (Berlin and New York, 1977), 361–401Google Scholar and ‘Die Ikonographie der C-Brakeaten’, Archäologisches Korrespondenzblatt 6 (1976), 235–42Google Scholar. For a list of the articles by Karl Hauck now being published by him under the general title ‘Zur lkonologie der Goldbrakteaten’, see FS 17 (1983), 510–11Google Scholar. See also the Ikonographisches Katalog der Goldbrakteaten now in preparation under his direction.

59 For Vendel and Valsgärde, see most conveniently, with up-to-date bibliographies, Vendel Period Studies, ed. J. P. Lamm and H.-Å. Nordström, Museum of National Antiquities Studies 2 (Stockholm, 1983)Google Scholar. For the Sutton Hoo helmet, see Bruce-Mitford, Rupert et al. , The Sutton Hoo Ship-Burial 11 (London, 1978), 138–226Google Scholar; the rider with fallen warrior (Design 2 of those which are capable of reconstruction, p. 149 and fig. 110) is presented on pp. 190–7 and discussed in relation to the Valsgärde 7 helmet pp. 216–18 and figs. 163–4. For K. Hauck's reconsideration of the meaning of the ‘rider and fallen warrior’ scene, see ‘Zum zweiten Band der Sutton-Hoo-Edition’, FS 16 (1982), 319–62Google Scholar, esp. 346–7.

60 Holmqvist, Wilhelm, Kunstprobleme der Merowingerzeit (Stockholm, 1939), pp. 110–28Google Scholar and pls. xx–xxv; Almgren, Bertil, ‘Romerska drag in nordisk figurkonst’, Tor 1 (1948), 81–103Google Scholar; Holmqvist, Wilhelm, ‘Ryttaren från Möjbro’, Fornvännen 47 (1952), 241–62Google Scholar; Hauck, Karl, ‘Ikonographie der C-Brakteaten’; and ‘Bildforschung als historische Sachforschung. Zur vorchristlichen Ikonographie der figuralen Helmprogramme aus der Vendelzeit’, Ges-chichtsschreibung und Geistiges Leben im Mittelalter, Festschrift Heinz Löwe, ed. Hauck, K. and Mordek, H. (Cologne and Vienna,1978), pp. 27–70.Google Scholar

61 Bruns, Gerda, Staatskameen des 4. Jahrhunderts nach Christi Geburt, Winckelmannsprogramm der archäologischen Gesellschaft 104 (Berlin, 1948), 19–22Google Scholar and Abb. 14. See also Age of Spirituality: Late Antique and Early Christian Art, Third to Seventh Century, ed. Kurt Weitzmann (New York, 1979), p. 83Google Scholar (no. 71) and colour plate II; also the large-scale colour reproduction in Bandinelli, Ranuccio Bianchi, Rome: the Late Empire. Roman Art AD 200–400 (London, 1971), ill. 329.Google Scholar

62 Vierck, H., ‘Religion, Rang und Herrschaft im Spiegel der Tracht’, Sachsen und Angelsachsen (see above, n. 58), pp. 271–83Google Scholar, esp. pp. 278–82 (Abb. 20 and 21). For the Szilágy–Somlyó (Hungary) medallion, see Bruns, , Staatskammeen, Abb. 16.Google Scholar

63 Delbrueck, R., Die Consulardiptychen und verwandte Denkmäler (Berlin, 1929), pp. 188–96Google Scholar and no. 48; large-scale reproduction in The Dark Ages, ed. David Talbot Rice (London, 1965), p. 85Google Scholar (and see p. 84); discussed further Beckwith, John, The Art of Constantinople, 2nd ed. (London, 1968), pp. 38–40Google Scholar and fig. 49. See also Age of Spirituality, ed. Weitzmann, pp. 33–5 (no. 28).

64 Beckwith, , Art of Constantinople, p. 10Google Scholar and fig. 6; Wealth of the Roman World AD 300–700, ed. J. P. C. Kent and K. S. Painter (London, 1977), no. 11.Google Scholar (p. 25).

65 See most conveniently Anderson, A. Scott, Roman Military Tombstones, Shire Archaeology 19 (Princes Risborough, 1984), 17–19Google Scholar and pls. 14–24, and, for a full discussion, Toynbee, J. M. C., Art in Britain under the Romans (Oxford, 1964), pp. 189–94Google Scholar and pl. XLVII. See also Todd, Malcolm, ‘A Relief of a Romano-British Warrior-God’, Britannia 2 (1971), 238CrossRefGoogle Scholar and pl. XXXIIIA, for an unprovenanced and undated sculpture showing a horse moving right with the rider turned to front holding a spear in his left hand and a small round shield in his right. Is this relief Romano-British or later?

66 E.g. the adventus coinage of London, John Casey, ‘Constantine the Great in Britain—the Evidence of the Coinage of the London Mint, AD 312–314’, Collectanea Londiniensia. Stud. in London Archaeology and Hist. presented to Ralph Merrifield, ed. Joanna Bird, Hugh Chapman and John Clark, London and Middlesex Archaeol. Soc., Special Paper 2 (London, 1978), pp. 181–93; and see Carson, R. A. G., Hill, P. V. and Kent, J. P. C., Late Roman Bronze Coinage (London, 1960)Google Scholar, passim.

67 E.g. the tombstone of Flavinus found in 1881 in the foundations of a porch outside the south transept of Hexham Abbey and presumably taken from the Roman site at Corbridge; see Scott Anderson, Roman Military Tombstones, pl. 17 and caption.

68 For the Anglo-Saxon liking for cameos, see Dodwell, C. R., Anglo-Saxon Art: a New Perspective (Manchester, 1982), pp. 108–10Google Scholar and fig. 25. The Genoels–Elderen ivory diptych of supposed eighth-century Northumbrian workmanship bears witness not only to the Mediterranean heritage but more specifically to the use of models ‘which are surely Italo-Byzantine’; see Beck, John with, Ivory Carvings in Early Medieval England (London, 1972), pp. 20–2Google Scholar and figs. 14 and 15, and see p. 111, n. 21. Such ivory models must therefore have been actually present in early Northumbria. For other small-scale carving, see the extraordinary, but now lost or mislaid, chalcedony (?)cameo plaque engraved in low relief with a winged figure of late classical or Byzantine character (probably a Victory) found in mound 3 at Sutton Hoo in 1938 (Rupert Bruce-Mitford, , The Sutton Hoo Ship-Burial 1 (London, 1975), 101 and 112–13Google Scholar and fig. 64). This may have been from a version of the crowning of the emperor by two Victories, as Professor Bernard Ashmole suggested (Ibid. p. 112) or from a simpler scene of a victory sacrificing. See Grainger, Guy and Henig, Martin, ‘A Bone Casket and a Relief Plaque from Mound 3 at Sutton Hoo’, MA 27 (1983), 136–41Google Scholar. For silks, see now the survey in Dodwell, , Anglo-Saxon Art, pp. 129–69Google Scholar, and Budny, Mildred and Tweddle, Dominic, ‘The Maaseik Embroideries’, ASE 13 (1984), 65–96Google Scholar, esp. 72–3 on the ‘David’ silk. Curtains, some of which were decorated with hunting scenes and horsemen, were important in the liturgical arrangements of the church down to the tenth century: see the important survey by Gervers, Veronika, ‘An Early Christian Curtain in the Royal Ontario Museum’, Studies in Textile History in Memory of Harold B. Burnham, ed. Gervers, Veronika (Toronto, 1984), pp. 56–81.Google Scholar For silver bowls, see Bruce-Mitford, Rupert, The Sutton Hoo Ship-Burial 111, pt i (London, 1983), 1–201Google Scholar; and cf. the Coptic bronze vessels, Ibid. 111, pt ii (London, 1983), 732–52, with a survey of their importation into Europe in general, which provide another example of the presence of manufactured goods from the east Mediterranean.

69 See above, n. 63.

70 See appendix.

71 For the range of mouldings employed, see Cramp, General Introduction, p. xxiv and fig. 9, and cf. County Durham and Northumberland, passim, and Collingwood, Northumbrian Crosses, passim.

72 Davis, R. H. C., ‘The Medieval Warhorse’, Horses in Economic History, ed. Thompson, F. M. L., Agricultural Hist. Soc. (Reading, 1983), pp. 4–20Google Scholar, esp. 13.

73 Ibid. pp. 7–9 and 13–15.

74 For this and subsequent references to the Belgrade cameo, we have used the excellent reproduction in Bandinelli, Rome: the Late Empire, ill. 329. See also above, n. 61.

75 For this and subsequent references to the Kertch dish, we have used the illustration in Delbrueck, Consulardiptychen, Abb. 26. See also above, n. 64.

76 For this and subsequent references we have used the illustration in Delbrueck, Consulardiptychen, Tafelband no. 48. See also above, n. 63.

77 Delbrueck, Richard, Spätantike Kaiserporträts (Berlin and Leipzig, 1933), pp. 147–51Google Scholar (Abb. 45–7), at p. 149. The musculature of the Kertch horse is indicated by a series of tangential curves and circles on the legs (including the inside of the legs) and on the chest, while that of the Repton horse is apparently indicated by straight or gently curved lines which suggest (but supposedly cannot be intended to indicate) folds in the skin.

78 For this and subsequent references to the Szilágy–Somlyó medallion, we have used the illustration in Bruns, Staatskameen, Abb. 16.

79 See, e.g., Anderson, Scott, Roman Military Tombstones, pls. 21 and 22Google Scholar; The Bayeux Tapestry, ed. Sir Frank Stenton (London, 1957)Google Scholar, passim (the bits are not discussed by Sir James Mann, pp. 56–69). On bits in antiquity, see Littauer, Mary Aiken, ‘Bits and Pieces’, Antiquity 43 (1969), 289–300CrossRefGoogle Scholar, with bibliography. Useful equestrian rather than scholarly accounts may be found in Taylor, Louis, Bits: their History, Use and Misuse (North Hollywood, 1966–1977)Google Scholar, and Tuke, Diana R., Bit by Bit: a Guide to Equine Bits, 2nd ed. (New York, 1978).Google Scholar

80 Lindenschmit, Ludwig, Tracht und Bewaffnung des römischen Heeres während der Kaiserzeit (Braunschweig, 1882)Google Scholar, Taf. VII, 3 and Taf. VIII, 1 and 2.

81 Ibid. Taf. VII, 3, shows that the lower end of the reins (forward of the large ring which interrupts the reins) is attached to a small ring at the end of what seems to be the cheekpiece of a curb bit. If this latter ring were larger, the similarity to the Repton ring would be very close. A bit ring like that on the Repton Stone may be shown on cross-shaft 3A at Sockburn; see Cramp, , County Durham and Northumberland, p. 136Google Scholar and pl. 130.710.

82 Engelstad, Helen, Refil, Bunad, Tjeld, Middelalderens Billedtepper i Norge (Oslo, 1952)Google Scholar, colour plates 1 and 2 (pp. 56 and 60); reproduced in Bayeux Tapestry, ed. Stenton, fig. 24 (but not with sufficient clarity). Mag. Søren Nancke-Krogh kindly tells us of a rider relief of c. 1200 on the foot of the font by Master Sigraf in Bro church on Gotland, where the rider holds high the reins at the top of which there is a ring (letter of 12 December 1983). The font from Tingstad now in the Statens Historiska Museum in Stockholm shows two similar scenes: Andersson, Aron, L'art Scandinave (La Pierre-qui-Vire, 1968), 11, p. 136Google Scholar, pl. 101. Reins knotted or fastened together to form loops through which the rider's sword arm passes are vividly depicted in a fourteenth-century manual of Mamluk horsemanship, where the riders also carry small round targets: Smith, G. Rex, Medieval Muslim Horsemanship (London, 1979)Google Scholar, esp. ill. 11.

83 Zarnecki, George, Later English Romanesque Sculpture 1140–1210 (London, 1953), pp. 12–13 and 55Google Scholar and pl. 31.

84 On the Bayeux Tapestry, the ring-like confusion which might be caused by the artist when the reins and the jesses (the leather straps attached to a hawk's legs by which it was restrained) were held in the same hand is well seen on pl. 15 (cf. Bayeaux Tapestry, ed. Stenton, pls. 2 (and colour pl. II), 5, 10 and 17). The possibility of confusion appears even more clearly in an illumination of the triumphant Christian warrior from the Gerona Beatus of 975 (134v), where it is certainly a loop of the reins which appears above the raised right hand in which they are grasped; see Williams, John, Early Spanish Manuscript Illumination (New York, 1977), p. 99Google Scholar and pl. 30. A terminal ring is clearly shown, however, on the reins of a falconer on a late-ninth-century silver plaque from Staré Město, nr. Uh. Hradiště, Czechoslovakia; see Poulik, Josef, ‘Nález kostela z doby řísě velkomoravské v trati “Špitálky” ve Starém Městé’, Památky Archeologické 46 (1955), 307–51Google Scholar (at 328 and 332–6) and Obr. 19.5 and 20; for another illustration, see The Dark Ages, ed. Talbot Rice, p. 145 (ill. 14). The Staré Město rider offers in many respects a striking parallel to the Repton figure, a similarity which must be due to independent derivation from a late Roman or Byzantine source such as the Kertch dish, where (as on both the Repton Stone and the Staré Město plaque) the upper part of the rider is turned through ninety degrees to stare directly at the viewer.

85 E.g., Bayeux Tapestry, ed. Stenton, pls. 12, 21, 23, 46, 54–7, and passim, and cf. figs. 24, 26 and 31. For the comparable deep, framed Vendel saddle, see Arrhenius, Birgit, ‘The Chronology of the Vendel Graves’, Vendel Period Studies, ed. Lamm and Nordström, pp. 39–70Google Scholar (esp. 63–4) and figs. 13–15.

86 Robinson, H. Russell, The Armour of Imperial Rome (London, 1975), pp. 194–6Google Scholar (‘The Roman Saddle’, with further references).

87 Scott Anderson, Roman Military Tombstones, pls. 14–24. Some of these (e.g. pls. 14, 20–2 and 24) show the horns, two in front and two behind, on to which the rider could tie his equipment, which are illustrated and discussed by Robinson, Armour of Imperial Rome. These do not appear on the imperial saddles of the Belgrade cameo, Kertch dish or Barberini diptych, or on the Repton Stone.

88 Anderson, Scott, Roman Military Tombstones, pl. 18Google Scholar; cf. Collingwood, R. G. and Wright, R. P., The Roman Inscriptions of Britain 1, Inscriptions on Stone (Oxford, 1965)Google Scholar, no. 108 (pp. 32–3) and pl. III.

89 Cramp, , County Durham and Northumberland, pp. 140–1Google Scholar and pl. 139.745–6; and see the pertinent comments by Bailey, , Viking Age Sculpture, pp. 234–5Google Scholar and fig. 69.

90 In this instance, see the interpretative drawings in Vierck, ‘Religion, Rang und Herrschaft’, Abb. 20,4 (cf. Abb. 20,5).

91 Anderson, Scott, Roman Military Tombstones, pls. 21–2 and 24.Google Scholar

92 Beckwith, Art of Constantinople, fig. 126 (enlarged detail in The Dark Ages, ed. Talbot Rice, p. 116); and cf. rider textiles Ibid., p. 124.

93 Bayeux Tapestry, ed. Stenton, pls. 1, 2 (and colour plate II), 12 (and colour plate III), 17, 20, 21 (Duke William's horse with decorated chest-strap), 26 (Duke William's horse with decorated chest strap) and many other examples. In pls. 21 and 26, as in the others, the strap comes from under the lower front corner of the saddle and does not cross over it as an independent element as on the Repton Stone.

94 See above, pp. 254–5.

95 As distinct from the ‘crinkly band’ (above, pp. 244–5), for which see below, p. 263.

96 See Bruce-Mitford, , Sutton Hoo Ship-Burial 11, 358–60Google Scholar, for an important discussion of these faces and their style.

97 For the moustache, see, e.g., Sockburn 3A (Cramp, , County Durham and Northumberland), p. 136Google Scholar and pl. 130.710, and cf. here pl. XII a, on which see below, pp. 277–84. The closely cut hair and well-defined fringe can be seen on the late-eighth- or early-ninth-century Anglo-Saxon ivory panel (now in the Victoria and Albert Museum) which is carved with the earliest known representation in the west of the Last Judgement; see Beckwith, , Ivory Carvings, pp. 22–4Google Scholar (cat. no. 4) and ills. 1 and 16. The pointed oval of the face can be seen on carved stones of very different Anglo-Saxon dates; see, e.g., Aycliffe 13A and 13C (Cramp, , County Durham and Northumberland, p. 47Google Scholar and pl. 14.61 and 63); Durham 5A (Ibid. pp. 68–9 and pl. 43.205); Durham 12.A (Ibid. pp. 73–4 and pl. 51.241); Elwick Hall 1A (Ibid. p. 76 and pl. 52.245); Gainford 1A (Ibid. p. 80 and pl. 57.278); Gainford 3A (Ibid. p. 81 and pl. 61.286) and others (Ibid.). See also the cross-shaft at Brailsford (Derbyshire) (Kendrick, T. D., Late Saxon and Viking Art (London, 1949), pls. XLVI.2 and XLVII.2)Google Scholar. Moustaches and pointed oval faces can be seen on the Franks Casket, but the representation of the hair is quite different; see Beckwith, , Ivory Carvings, pp. 14–18Google Scholar (cat. no. 1) and ills. 3–7, esp. 4 and 6 (front and back panels).

98 Bruce-Mitford, , Sutton Hoo Ship-Burial 11, 369–70.Google Scholar

99 Delbrueck, Consulardiptychen, nos. 1, 2, 4, 6, 7, 9–14, 16–18, 20, 21, 22, 32–4, 40, 41, 43 and 48 (the Barberini diptych). The ‘tight’ hair-style on brow and temples seen in the Repton Stone may reflect hair-styles on late imperial portraits such as those in Delbrueck, Spätantike Kaiserporträts, Taf. 52–4, 61, 76–84, 90–3, 102–4, 109–10, 112 and 114–20.

100 Ibid. Taf. 1–22.

101 Ibid. Taf. 26–39, 46–51 and 58–61. When the hair was worn longer, as on the bronze head of Constantius II now in the Palazzo dei Conservatori in Rome (Ibid. Taf. 52–4) or on a private bust of the same type (Ibid. Taf. 61), the ears are almost hidden; cf. the heads of Gratian, Theodosius II and Marcianus(?) (Ibid. Taf. 90, 114–15 and 116–20, respectively).

102 The head of the emperor on the east side of the base of the obelisk in the Hippodrome in Constantinople, its features defaced much as on the Repton Stone, demonstrates in a striking if accidental way the survival of the distinguishing elements of this style of imperial portrait; see Delbrueck, Spätantike Kaiserporträts, Taf. 87 (cf. Abb. 66). See also Müller-Wiener, W., Bildlexikon zur Topographie Istanbuls (Tübingen, 1977), pp. 64–71Google Scholar, with bibliography (p. 71).

103 Blunt, C. E., ‘The Coinage of Offa’, Anglo-Saxon Coins, ed. Dolley, R. H. M. (London, 1961), pp. 39–62Google Scholar (esp. pp. 41–2), pls. iv–vii, and, for the date, pp. 53–4. For the occurrence of the diadem on subsequent Anglo-Saxon coins, see, e.g., the illustrations in North, English Hammered Coins, passim.

104 Elisabeth Crowfoot and Hawkes, Sonia Chadwick, ‘Early Anglo-Saxon Gold Braids’, MA 11 (1967), 42–86Google Scholar, esp. 58–66 (‘The Wearing of the Braids and the vitta auro exornata’, and ‘Social Considerations’).

105 Ibid. pp. 66–72. See also Crowfoot, Elisabeth, ‘Early Anglo-Saxon Gold Braids: Addenda and Corrigenda’, MA 13 (1969), 209–10Google Scholar; and, for examples of the ninth-century, Biddle, Martin, ‘Excavations at Winchester 1968: Seventh Interim Report’, AntJ 49 (1969), 295–329CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 322, and Elisabeth Crowfoot in Biddle, Martin, The Crafts, Industry, and Daily Life of Medieval Winchester, Winchester Studies 7.2 (Oxford, forthcoming), cat. nos. 1009–16.Google Scholar

106 See above, p. 245.

107 On this problem, see the discussion by Sir James Mann, Bayeux Tapestry, ed. Stenton, pp. 60–3.

108 For Roman scale armour (lorica squamata), see Robinson, Armour of Imperial Rome, pp. 153–61.

109 Beckwith, Art of Constantinople, figs. 98 (upper), 122 and 126 (cf. above, n. 92). For lamellar armour, see Robinson, Armour of Imperial Rome, pp. 162–3 and, for a useful discussion and illustration of Byzantine armours in general, Heath, Ian, Byzantine Armies 886–1118 (London, 1979).Google Scholar

110 Anderson, Scott, Roman Military Tombstones, pl. 15Google Scholar (from Colchester) (cf. pl. 14 (from Bonn)). For Roman mail armour (lorica bamata), see Robinson, , Armour of Imperial Rome, pp. 164–73.Google Scholar

111 Bruce-Mitford, , Sutton Hoo Ship-Burial 11, 232–9Google Scholar. For an important discussion of the mail shirt in Beowulf, see Brady, Caroline, ‘“Weapons” in Beowulf: an Analysis of the Nominal Compounds and an Evaluation of the Poet's Use of Them’, ASE 8 (1979), 79–141Google Scholar, esp. 110–24 (‘Byrnies (and arms generally)’). For the mail coats worn by both Anglo-Saxons and Normans four centuries later at Hastings, see Bayeux Tapestry, ed. Stenton, pp. 60–3 and plates passim.

112 The lack of any sign of the Repton mail shirt below the waist may be significant in relation to the distinction between short (cf. licsyrce) and long (cf. leoðsyrce) mail shirts and reflect the description syrce, ‘shirt’, rather than a word suggesting a long garment; see Brady, , ‘“Weapons” in Beowulf’, pp. 113–15.Google Scholar

113 For a discussion of the nature and development of imperial dress, see Alföldi, Andreas, Die monarchische Repräsentation im römischen Kaiserreiche (Darmstadt, 1970), pp. 121–86Google Scholar, esp. 161–86.

114 Bruns, , Staatskameen, pp. 19–20.Google Scholar

115 Merrifield, Ralph, London: City of the Romans (London, 1983), pp. 200–1Google Scholar and fig. 49; best reproduction in Bandinelli, , Rome: the Late Empire, ill. 187.Google Scholar

116 Beckwith, , Ivory Carvings, pp. 14–18Google Scholar (Cat. no. 1), and ills. 3–7.

117 Zarnecki, , Later English Romanesque Sculpture, pp. 12–13Google Scholar and pls. 31–3. For Ruardean, see Verey, David, Gloucestershire 11, The Vale and the Forest of Dean, The Buildings of England (Harmondsworth, 1970), pl. 12.Google Scholar

118 Krautheimer, Richard, Rome: Profile of a City, 312–1308 (Princeton, NJ, 1980), pp. 192–5 and 199Google Scholar and figs. 152–4; Nash, Ernest, Pictorial Dictionary of Ancient Rome (repr. New York, 1981) 1, 391–2Google Scholar and figs. 478–9.

119 The folds of the emperor's clothes do not in fact seem to provide a precise source for the heavy pleats of the Romanesque sculptures, for which some other prototype of later, perhaps fourth-century, date might seem more appropriate. Yet the distortions of artistic licence can work extraordinary changes, as Giovanni da Modena's fifteenth-century drawing of the statue shows; see Krautheimer, Rome, fig. 152 (and cf. fig. 154).

120 Delbrueck, , Consulardiptychen, pp. 378 and 191.Google Scholar

121 Karl der Grosse. Werk und Wirkung, ed. W. Braunfels (Aachen, 1965), Cat. no. 29 a and b (pp. 42–3Google Scholar) and Abb. 13. Other illustrations are Elbern, Victor H., Das erste Jahrtausend, Tafelband, pp. 48–9Google Scholar (cat. no. 196), and The Dark Ages, ed. Talbot Rice, p. 272.

122 Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, lat. 4404, iv; Porcher, Jean, ‘La Peinture provinciale’, Karolingische Kunst, ed. Braunfels, Wolfgang and Schnitzler, Hermann, Lebenswerk, Karl der Grosse und Nachleben 3 (Düsseldorf, 1965), pp. 54–73Google Scholar and Taf. XXVII.

123 Einhard, , Vita Karoli Magni, cap. 23 (ed. Holder-Egger, O.), MGH, Script, rer. Ger. 25 (Hannover and Leipzig, 1911; repr. 1947), 27–8.Google Scholar

124 Alföldi, ‘Monarchische Repräsentation’, pp. 175 and 178–80.

125 Ibid. pp. 167–8, 175–7 and 184.

126 E.g., the Brinsop and Stretton Sugwas figures (see above, n. 117).

127 Alföldi, A., ‘The Spear as an Embodiment of Sovereignty in Rome’, American Jnl of Archaeology 63 (1959), 1–27CrossRefGoogle Scholar; cf. Alföldi, ‘Monarchische Repräsentation’, pp. xi and 185–6.

128 See above, n. 59.

129 See above, n. 97.

130 Beckwith, , Ivory Carvings, ills. 3 and 7.Google Scholar

131 See above, n. 59.

132 Bruce-Mitford, , Sutton Hoo Ship-burial 11, 15–18 and 94–6Google Scholar and table 2 (p. 17).

133 Edwards, Ifor and Blair, Claude, ‘Welsh Bucklers’, AntJ 62 (1982), 74–115CrossRefGoogle Scholar, esp. appendix 4 (pp. 100–10).

134 Toynbee, , Art in Britain under the Romans, p. 119Google Scholar and pl. XXXI d.

135 Wilson, David M. and Klindt-Jensen, Ole, Viking Art (London, 1966), pl. VcGoogle Scholar; on the date, cf. Nylén, Erik, Bildstenar (Visby, 1978), p. 179Google Scholar (nr. 194).

136 Close-Brooks, Joanna and Stevenson, Robert B. K., Dark Age Sculpture (Edinburgh, 1982), p. 32.Google Scholar

137 Henry, Françoise, Irish Art in the Early Christian Period, 2nd ed. (London, 1947), p. 100Google Scholar and pl. 36.

138 Bailey, , Viking Age Sculpture, pp. 209–13Google Scholar and pl. 14.

139 In 1979 a round wooden shield with iron fittings, 600 mm in diameter, was found in a context of 1225–75 at the Nieuwendijk in Amsterdam (information kindly provided by Mr Jan M. Baart). Although of late date, this unique find provides evidence for a tradition of small shields of the target type earlier than the late medieval Welsh bucklers referred to above n. 133. In the Byzantine empire, the military manual known as the Tactica, written c. 903 by the emperor Leo VI (886–912), specifies the use of small targets c. 300 mm (c. 12 in.) in diameter for use by kataphractoi; see Heath, , Byzantine Armies, p. 35Google Scholar. While of no direct influence in the west, this precept at least establishes the supposed value of such small shields in mounted warfare.

140 Böhner, Kurt, Die fränkischen Altertümer des Trierer Landes 1 (Berlin, 1958), 130–45Google Scholar; and, for typically English developments of the type, see Evison, V. in Hurst, J. G., ‘The Kitchen Area of Northolt Manor, Middlesex’, MA 5 (1961), 211–99, at 226–30.Google Scholar

141 Musty, John, ‘The Excavation of Two Barrows, one of Saxon Date, at Ford, Laverstock, near Salisbury, Wiltshire’, Anl J 49 (1969), 98–117, at p. 106Google Scholar, with appendix 1 by Vera I. Evison (pp. 114–16).

142 Christlein, Rainer, Die Alamannen. Archäologie eines lebendigen Volkes 2nd ed. (Stuttgart and Aalen, 1979), pp. 73–4Google Scholar, taf. 15 and Abb. 49.

143 Vendel graves IX and XIV: Stolpe, Hjalmar and Arne, T. J., La Nécropole de Vendel (Stockholm, 1927), pp. 34–5Google Scholar and pls. XXIV.2 and L (grave IX); p. 52 and pls. XIV.5 and LIII (grave XIV).

144 Bailey, Richard N., ‘The Chronology of Viking-Age Sculpture in Northumbria’, Anglo-Saxon and Viking Age Sculpture and its Context: papers from the Collingwood Symposium on Insular Sculpture from 800–1066, BAR Brit. ser. 49 (Oxford, 1978), 173–203Google Scholar, esp. 181 and pls. 9.2 and 9.4 and fig. 9.3.

145 Paulsen, Peter, Alamannische Adelsgräber von Niederstotzingen (Stuttgart, 1967), pp. 101–2Google Scholar and Abb. 52 and 60.2; cf. Christlein, , Alamannen, p. 73Google Scholar and Abb. 36, who suggests that the seax remained on the left side only until c. 700.

146 For detailed studies of weapon sets (Waffenkombinationen) and their historical and social significance, see Steuer, Heiko, ‘Zur Bewaffnung und Sozialstruktur der Merowingerzeit. Ein Beitrag zur Forschungsmethode’, Nachrichten aus Niedersachsens Urgeschichte 37 (1968), 18–87Google Scholar, esp. 60–8 and Abb. 2, 3 and 5; Heiko Steuer and Martin Last, ‘Zur Interpretationen der beigabenführenden Gräber des achten Jahrkunderts im Gebiet rechts des Rheins’, Ibid. 38 (1969), 25–88, esp. 76–7; and Steuer, Heiko, ‘Historische Phasen der Bewaffnung nach Aussagen der archäologischen Quellen Mittel- und Nordeuropas im ersten Jahrtausend n. Chr.’, FS 4 (1970), 348–83Google Scholar, esp. 359–62, 365–6 and 369 and fig. 3 (p. 380). These studies demonstrate the intricate local and chronological variations in weapon-sets. Sword-seax combinations (Waffenkombinationen Ia and Ib) are sixth-century and later, except in Frankish and Saxon areas, and sword–seax combinations in rider graves (Waffenkombination IV) are eighth-century except in Alamannic areas, where they are seen from the early seventh century (e.g. at Niederstotzingen (see above, n. 145) in the period 600–30, where graves 1, 3a (a rider grave), 3b, 3c, 6 (a rider grave), 9 (a rider grave), and 12b/c all contained both a broad two-edged sword and a seax, as well as bits) and in the Frankish regions, where they first appear slightly later; see Steuer, ‘Zur Bewaffnung’, pp. 60–8, esp. Abb. 2 and 5. This is a pattern entirely consistent with the first appearance of sword–seax combinations in England after the end of the seventh century.

147 Evison (Hurst, ‘Northolt Manor’, pp. 226–30) provides a valuable discussion and listing; updated in Musty, ‘Two Barrows’, pp. 114–16. See also Sonia Chadwick Hawkes, ‘The Dating and Social Significance of the Burials in the Polhill Cemetery’, in Philp, Brian, Excavations in West Kent 1960–70 (Dover, 1973), pp. 186–201Google Scholar, at 188–90 (‘The Seaxes’).

148 The item in the Sutton Hoo ship-burial originally identified as a scramasax (inv. 97) has now been recognized as a spearhead; see Bruce-Mitford, , Sutton Hoo Ship-burial 11, 241.Google Scholar

149 See above, n. 146, and cf. Brown, G. Baldwin, The Arts in Early England 111 (London, 1915), 225–31Google Scholar, and Davidson, Ellis, Sword in Anglo-Saxon England, pp. 59 and 64–6.Google Scholar

150 See above, n. 68. The entries for the individual pieces in Delbrueck, Consulardiptychen, show that the sixty or so surviving pieces were (where their origin is known) preserved in cathedrals or monasteries and usually transformed to ecclesiastical purposes or coverted to book covers. The three diptychs which were given by King Berengar from his palace chapel in Monza to the cathedral (Ibid. p. 179 and nos. 43 and 63) show how they could migrate from royal to ecclesiastical treasures. Delbrueck estimated that there must originally have been 20,000 consular diptychs (sensu stricto) alone, and hundreds of thousands if all types were included (Ibid. p. 10).

151 However much mutated, the Repton rider suggests the adventus of the emperor on the field of battle (Alföldi's ‘adventus des Kaisers in der Schlacht’, the type of the Belgrade cameo; see above, p. 255) rather than the peaceful reception of the victorious emperor on his arrival (the ‘adventus des Kaisers in die Stadt’; the type of the Kertch dish and Barberini diptych). For the concept and early development of the adventus image, see Koeppel, Gerhard, ‘Profectio und Adventus’, Bonner Jahrbücher 169 (1969), 130–94Google Scholar; for its later development, see MacCormack, Sabine G., Art and Ceremony in Late Antiquity (Berkeley, Los Angeles and London, 1981), pp. 17–89Google Scholar. See also Brilliant, Richard, ‘Scenic Representations’, Age of Spirituality, ed. Weitzmann, pp. 60–5.Google Scholar

152 Of these St Michael is by far the most likely. His cult was widespread in England, and his frequent association with high places would suit a representation at the top of a cross-shaft; see Farmer, D. H., Oxford Dictionary of Saints (Oxford, 1979)Google Scholar, s.n. For an Old English text (Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 41, pp. 402–17) describing the fight of St Michael with the apocalyptic dragon, see Hildegard L. C. Tristram, ‘Vier altenglische Predigten aus der heterodoxen Tradition’, Inaugural diss. zur Erlangung der Doktorwürde der Philosophischen Fakultät, Albert-Ludwig Universität (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1970), p. 152, lines 15–17. We owe this reference to Professor J. E. Cross. St Theodore was an eastern military saint (Farmer, Saints, s.n.) whose representation on horseback spearing a dragon was already common on floor and ceiling tiles in Carthage and its neighbourhood by the fifth century; see Merlin, A. and Poinssot, L., Guide du Musée Alaoui (Musée du Bardo), fasc. 1, Musée antique, 4th ed. (Tunis, 1950), pp. 10–11Google Scholar, and the displays and explanatory notices in the Bardo Museum, passage between Rooms V and VI. At an early stage in the investigation of the Repton Stone, Mr Lucian Hughes, a Repton volunteer and one of our students at the University of Pennsylvania, suggested the possibility that the rider was St George and that the serpent face (B) represented the dragon devouring his daily ration of two children. This ingenious suggestion was fully researched by ourselves assisted by Mr Hughes. The development of the George legend (Farmer, Saints, s.n.) is extremely complex, and its early history seems not to have been worked on iconographically at a scholarly level. As far as the texts go we conclude that the dragon story did not circulate in the Greek east before the eleventh century or the Latin west before the twelfth. We are most grateful to Professor J. E. Cross for confirming that the dragon story was not available to the Anglo-Saxons (letter of 1 October 1980): for further references to studies of the legend of St George, see Cross, J. E., ‘Ælfric's “Life of St George”’, N&Q 24 (1977), 195–6.Google Scholar

153 Colgrave, , Life of Guthlac, pp. 3–4, 76–9Google Scholar (ch. x) and 80–5 (chs. xvi–xx).

154 See above, nn. 11–12.

155 Felix believed that Guthlac's name meant ‘belli munus, quia ille cum vitiis bellando munera aeternae beatitudinis cum triumphali infula perennis vitae percepisset’ (Colgrave, ), Life of Guthlac, pp. 78–9Google Scholar (ch. x). The reference to the victor's diadem (triumphali infula) is striking but may imply no more than a general (if highly significant) reference to the imagery of triumph known to Felix. This imagery appears again in ch. xxvii (pp. 90–1), where Felix describes Guthlac militem Christi in terms of Ephesians vi. 11–17.

156 Ibid. pp. 82–3 (ch. xix).

157 This is the probable conclusion to be derived from the short reigns of his father and grandfathers: only twenty-eight years (if our dates are reliable) intervened between the accession of his older grandfather Ceowulf (reigned 821–3) and his own death in 849; see Rollason, , Search for Saint Wigstan, pp. 10–11.Google Scholar

158 Yet even Guthlac was only about forty when he died in 714: his age can be derived from Colgrave, , Life of Guthlac, pp. 2–6 and 193Google Scholar (cf. pp. 82–3 (ch. xix) and 90–1 (ch. xxvii)).

159 For cross-faces filled with an animal above and an interlace panel below, see Gainford 2c (Cramp, , County Durham and Northumberland, pp. 80–1Google Scholar and pl. 60.284), Gainford 5A (Ibid. pp. 82–3 and pl. 62.294–5) and Sockburn 1B (Ibid. p. 135 and pl. 128.702); for cross-faces left blank below, see Gainford 1, 2 and 5 (Ibid. pp. 80–3 and pls. 57–60.278–85 and 62–4.294–8), and Sockburn 8 (Ibid. pp. 138–9 and pl. 135.730–2).

160 Gainford 2C (Cramp, , County Durham and Northumberland, p. 81Google Scholar and pl. 60.284).

161 See below, appendix.

162 Powell, T. G. E., The Celts, 2nd ed. (London, 1980), pp. 163–6 and 216–17Google Scholar and ills. 109–111, 113 and 115–18; Chadwick, Nora, The Celts (Harmondsworth, 1970), pp. 157–60Google Scholar; Ross, Anne, ‘The Human Head in Insular Celtic Religion’, Proc. of the Soc. of Ants, of Scotland 91 (1957–1958), 10–43Google Scholar, Pagan Celtic Britain (London and New York, 1967), pp. 61–126 and 144Google Scholar and pls. 16–41, and Everyday Life of the Pagan Celts (London, 1970; repr. 1972), pp. 92–6, 192–5, 201–7 and 257–60Google Scholar; Bandinelli, , Rome: the Late Empire, pp. 134–40Google Scholar and ills. 125–8; and Toynbee, Art in Britain under the Romans, pp. 429–31 and pls. XCVIII b, XCVIII c and XCIX.

163 Henry, Irish Art, pls. 4a, 4b, 21, 36, 37a, 43a and 67. Cf. also the head of the narrow side of the Killadeas stone, Co. Fermanagh (not illustrated by Henry; we are grateful to Dr S. M. Alexander for providing us with a photograph of this stone); and see Dorothy Lowry-Corry, ‘A Newly Discovered Statue at the Church on White Island, County Fermanagh’, Ulster Jnl of Archaeology 22 (1959), 59–66 and pls. VI and VIII. For the so-called ‘Book of Bobbio’, see Alexander, J. J. G., Insular Manuscripts from the 6th to the 9th Century, A Survey of Manuscripts Illuminated in the British Isles 1 (London, 1978), 80–1Google Scholar (cat. no. 61) and pls. 277–80, esp. pl. 278 (fol. 129), left and right panels.

164 See above, pp. 266–7. For the ‘garter-hooks’ which presumably fastened these bindings and are frequently found on Anglo-Saxon sites, see, e.g., the two nielloed silver-hooked tags with Trewhiddle-style ornament found beneath the knees of a ninth-century burial in Old Minster, Winchester (Biddle, Martin, ‘Excavations at Winchester 1964: Third Interim Report’, AntJ 45 (1965), 230–64, at 256 and 263–4)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For a long series of stratigraphically dated ‘garter-hooks’, see Biddle, , Crafts, Industry, and Daily Life of Medieval Winchester, cat. nos. 1407–28.Google Scholar

165 E.g. on the early Celtic Gundestrup Cauldron where the warriors are wearing bracae; see Klindt-Jensen, Ole, Gundestrupkedelen (Copenhagen, 1961)Google Scholar, esp. figs. 10–12, 33, 39 and 40; and cf. Powell, , The Celts, pp. 193–4Google Scholar and ills. 132 and 134, and, on the Torslunda B die, Bruce-Mitford, , Sutton Hoo Ship-burial 11Google Scholar, fig. 136c, and Hauck, ‘Bildforschung’, Taf. X and Abb. 14. We are grateful to Mrs Leslie Webster for drawing our attention to the significance of the Torslunda die in this context.

166 For confronted human figures, see, e.g., Henry, Françoise, The Book of Kells (London, 1974), pl. 29Google Scholar (34r: the ‘beard-pullers’ in the I of XPI); and cf. Bain, George, Celtic Art: the Methods of Construction (Glasgow, 1951), p. 115Google Scholar and pl. 14, and cf. p. 114 and pl. 12 (the Clonmacnoise Stone). There are many examples of confronted (or affronted) beasts; for the permutations, see Cramp, , General Introduction, p. xlviGoogle Scholar, and cf. Rothbury 1cD (Cramp, , County Durham and Northumberland, pp. 217–21Google Scholar, fig. 20 and pls. 214.1223 and 215.1224), Tynemouth 1A (at base) and 1B (Ibid. p. 226 and pls. 224.1263 and 225.1264). See also the Rome (or Barberini) Gospels (Alexander, , Insular Manuscripts, pp. 61–2Google Scholar) (cat. no. 36) and pl. 173 (the upper section reproduced here as pl. XII a).

167 Esp. on eleventh- and twelfth- century capitals in both England and France; see Zarnecki, George, ‘Romanesque Sculpture in Normandy and England in the Eleventh Century’, Proc. of the Battle Conference on Anglo-Norman Studies 1 (1978), 168–89, at 172Google Scholar; and cf., e.g., a capital in the parish church of St Peter, Northampton (Royal Commission on Historical Monuments, An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in the County of Northampton v, Archaeological Sites and Churches in Northampton (London, 1985), pl. 15Google Scholar, top right).

168 Bandinelli, , Rome: the Late Empire, p. 164Google Scholar and ills. 155–7.

169 E.g. at Chauvigny; see Oursel, Raymond, Haut-Poitou roman (La Pierre-qui-Vire, 1975)Google Scholar, Chauvigny, pl. 70; and cf. Zarnecki, ‘Romanesque Sculpture’, p. 187. We are grateful to Dr Tania Dickinson for originally drawing our attention to this capital.

170 Oursel, Raymond, Bourgogne romane, 5th ed. (La Pierre-qui-Vire, 1968)Google Scholar, Paray-le-Monial, pl. 57. We are grateful to Dr J. T. Lang for drawing our attention to this and the Chauvigny capital and for his helpful correspondence.

171 Alexander, , Insular Manuscripts, pp. 61–2Google Scholar (cat. no. 36), pl. 173. We are most grateful to Mrs Elly Miller for making available to us her photograph of Rome, Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica, Barberini lat. 570, fol. 1, from which the enlarged detail in pl. XII a is reproduced. The head and confronted animals on this column are related to the left and right panels of fol. 129 of the ‘Book of Bobbio’, an Irish manuscript of (?)the first half of the ninth century which has been cited above as an example of the Celtic tendency to place a head high on a manuscript panel. A striking example of this occurs on Barberini lat. 570, fol. 51; see Alexander, , Insular Manuscripts, pl. 175.Google Scholar

172 For a consideration of the date of the Repton Stone, see below, pp. 279–90.

173 Cramp, , County Durham and Northumberland, pp. 81–2Google Scholar and pl. 61.292. We are not certain that the description of this figure as having ‘grotesquely hunched shoulders, possibly holding a club or a “Thor's hammer” in its right hand’ can be correct and would prefer to see it as perhaps involving more than one figure.

174 Ibid. pp. 137–8 and pl. 132.721. We are most grateful to Professor Rosemary Cramp for providing us with the original photographs of Sockburn 6B and 3D (see below, n. 175), from which our pls. XII c and XII d are reproduced. Mr Eric Cambridge kindly made the arrangements.

175 Ibid. pp. 136–7 and pl. 130.713. See above, n. 174.

176 Beckwith, , Ivory Carvings, pp. 22–4 and 118–19Google Scholar (cat. no. 4) and ills. 1 and 16.

177 Temple, Elzbieta, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts 900–1066, A Survey of Manuscripts Iluminated in the British Isles 2 (London, 1976), 95–6Google Scholar (cat. no. 78) and pl. 248.

178 Ibid. pp. 102–4 (cat. no. 86) and pl. 265.

179 Henderson, George, ‘Late-Antique Influences in Some English Mediaeval Illustrations of Genesis’, Jnl of the Warburg and Courtauld Insts. 25 (1962), 172–98CrossRefGoogle Scholar, argues that the source of Claudius B. iv was an elaborate Greek book ‘containing a great series of Bible pictures in origin Late Antique but belonging to no known recension’ (p. 196). By contrast Dodwell, C. R., ‘L'originalité iconographique de plusieurs illustrations anglo-saxonnes de l'ancien Testament’, CCM 14 (1971), 319–28CrossRefGoogle Scholar, suggests that ‘l'image de la chute des Anges (fo. 2) n'est même pas en rapport avec le texte biblique. D'une part, elle a des licns avec le commentaire de Saint Augustin (De Genesi ad Litteram, PL XXXIV.228), et d'autre part avec l'intérêt littéraire anglo-saxon pour ce thème qui sort de la poésie anglo-saxonne’ (p. 320).

180 On this doubt, see above, p. 278.

181 Colgrave, , Life of Guthlac, pp. 104–7Google Scholar, and cf. pp. 92–3, ‘de atris vergentis mundi faucibus’ (ch. xxvii).

182 Ibid. pp. 102–3 (ch. xxxi).

183 Ibid. pp. 114–15 (ch. xxxvi).

184 See above, n. 15.

185 For Aldhelm's account of Hilarion's encounter with a dragon, which provides another indication of Anglo-Saxon interest in such creatures, see Aldhelm: the Prose Works, trans. Michael Lapidge and Michael Herren (Ipswich, 1979), p. 88Google Scholar. We are grateful to Professor Christine Fell for pointing out the significance of this reference.

186 Beckwith, John, ‘Reculver, Ruthwell and Bewcastle’, Kolloquium über frühmittelalterliche Skulptur 1 (Heidelberg, 1969), 17–20Google Scholar, esp. 18 and Taf. 11, 1 and 2.

187 For discussions of the problems and methods of dating, see particularly, Cramp, Rosemary, Early Northumbrian Sculpture, Jarrow Lecture 1965 (Jarrow [1966])Google Scholar, ‘The Anglian Tradition in the Ninth Century’, Anglo-Saxon and Viking Age Sculpture, ed. Lang, pp. 1–33, and General Introduction, pp. xlvii–xlviii; and Bailey, , Viking Age Sculpture, pp. 45–75.Google Scholar

188 See above, p. 238.

189 See above, pp. 252–3.

190 See above, pp. 233–6.

191 See above, pp. 269–71, esp. n. 146.

192 Steuer, ‘Zur Bewaffnung’, p. 65; Christlein, Alamannen, pp. 73–4; Paulsen, Niederstotzingen, pp. 101–2; and see esp. Hübener, Wolfgang, ‘Waffen und Bewaffnung’, Sachsen und Angelsachsen, pp. 463–70, at 468.Google Scholar

193 The sword is a later addition, but the right hand is cast to hold such an item; there is no sign of a seax. See above, p. 266, n. 121. Einhard, Vita Karoli Magni, cap. 23 (see above, n. 123) in describing Charlemagne's dress, mentions only his sword and in this detail is supported by Notker (Two Lives of Charlemagne, transl. Lewis Thorpe (Harmondsworth, 1969), p. 132Google Scholar (cap. 34)).

194 The dating evidence for all types of seax is poor: the best collection of the available evidence remains Wheeler, R. E. M., London and the Saxons (London, 1935), pp. 175–81Google Scholar, fig. 42 (for the four types) and pls. XIII-XV; but see also The Golden Age of Anglo-Saxon Art 966–1066, ed. Janet Backhouse, D. H. Turner and Leslie Webster (London, 1984), pp. 101–3Google Scholar (cat. nos. 94 and 95).

195 Such a development would follow the evolution of the seax on the continent, for which see Hübener, ‘Waffen und Bewaffnung’, p. 468. It might be possible to trace this evolution by a new study of the words used for swords and knives in Old English literature.

196 Brady, , ‘“Weapons” in Beowulf’, pp. 93–5 and 109.Google Scholar In line 1545b Grendel's dam attacked Beowulf with a seax; see Ibid. pp. 94 and 107.

197 Seaby, Wilfred A. and Woodfield, Paul, ‘Viking Stirrups from England and their Background’, MA 24 (1980), 87–122Google Scholar, survey the development of the stirrup and provide an inventory of the 36 finds of pre-Conquest stirrups from Britain. Only three (nos. 3 and 4, a pair from Balladoole, Isle of Man, and no. 36, from Winchester) come from archaeologically datable contexts, of the end of the ninth century and the late tenth century respectively. The one English manuscript mentioned by the authors as showing stirrups (London, British Library, Cotton Cleopatra C. viii, 4V and 5) is now thought to date to the late tenth century (Temple, , Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts 900–1066, pp. 70–1Google Scholar (cat. no. 49)); and a stirrup is also shown on Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 23, fol. 2, also dated to the late tenth century (Ibid., pp. 69–70 (cat. no. 48) and pl. 155). We suggest that a high-status rider representation showing strong evidence of continental influence would be most unlikely not to show stirrups if it was of tenth-century date, given the good evidence for their appearance on ninth- and even eighth-century representations in the Carolingian world (Seaby and Woodfield, ‘Stirrups’, p. 89). Stirrups do not occur on the ninth-century equestrian statue which may be of Charlemagne (see above, n. 121).

198 William, of Malmesbury, , De Gestis Regum Anglorum, ed. Stubbs, W., 2 vols., Rolls Ser. (London, 1887–1889), 1, 25–6Google Scholar; Clapham, A. W., English Romanesque Architecture before the Conquest (Oxford, 1930), pp. 61–2.Google Scholar

199 There is a large literature; but see Brown, G. Baldwin, The arts in Early England v, The Ruthwell and Bewcastle Crosses, etc. (London, 1921)Google Scholar, esp. pp. 245–72, with unnumbered ‘translation and explanation’ between pp. 244 and 245; and cf. Page, R. I., ‘The Bewcastle Cross’, Nottingham Med. Stud. 4 (1960), 36–57CrossRefGoogle Scholar, who shows that the surviving runes do not support an association with Alhfrith.

200 Cramp, ‘Early Northumbrian Sculpture’, pp. 8–9.

201 Cramp, ‘Anglian Tradition’, pp. 6–7.

202 See above, pp. 273, n. 155 and 279.

203 See further below, p. 288.

204 See above, n. 121; for the moustache, see especially the photograph in Karl der Grosse. Werk und Wirkung, Abb. 13.

205 See above, n. 171.

206 Brown, Baldwin, Ruthwell and Bewcastle Crosses, pp. 20, 130, 137 and 312.Google Scholar

207 See above, pp. 268–9 and n. 139.

208 See above, p. 277 and n. 171.

209 See above, n. 163.

210 Treasures of Early Irish Art 1500 BC to 1500 AD, ed. Polly Cone, The Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, 1977), p. 92Google Scholar (cat. no. 30) and pl. opposite p. 85; Henry, Irish Art, p. 122 and pl. 43a. See also above, n. 163.

211 Kendrick, T. D., Anglo-Saxon Art to A.D. 900 (London, 1938), pp. 144–7, at 147.Google Scholar

212 Alexander, , Insular Manuscripts, pp. 61–2Google Scholar (cat. no. 36).

213 See above, p. 279.

214 Friedman, John Block, Orpheus in the Middle Ages (ambridge, Mass., 1970), pp. 183–4.Google Scholar We are most grateful to Professor Christine Fell for this reference. Cf. Analecta Hymnica Medii Aevi LI, ed. C. Blume (Leipzig, 1908), p. 275Google Scholar (no. 216, Section 4).

215 Ross, , Pagan Celtic Britain, pp. 151–4.Google Scholar

216 Stenton, , Anglo-Saxon England, pp. 120–1, 125–8 and 202–5.Google Scholar For relations between Mercia and the British kingdoms, see Kirby, D. P., ‘Welsh Bards and the Border’, Mercian Studies, ed. Dornier, pp. 31–42Google Scholar, esp. 35–9. Guthlac fought against the British, had been an exile among them and had learned their language; see Colgrave, , Life of Guthlac, p. 3.Google Scholar

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218 Ibid. p. 194. See also Cramp, ‘Anglian Tradition’, pp. 6–7.

219 The fundamental discussion remains Schramm, Percy Ernst, ‘Das Herrscherbild in der Kunst des frühen Mittelalters’, Vorträge der Bibliothek Warburg 2. i (1922–1923), 145–224Google Scholar, esp. 150 66 (‘Das Reiterdenkmal bei den Römern, Karolingern, Byzantinern und Sassaniden’); but see also André Grabar, , L'empereur dans l'art byzantine (Paris, 1936), esp. pp. 45–54Google Scholar, and Wessel, Klaus, ‘Kaiserbild’, Reallexikon zur byzantinischen Kunst, ed. Wessel, Klaus and Restle, Marcell 111 (Stuttgart, 1972.), cols. 722–853.Google Scholar

220 See above, nn. 118–19.

221 Schramm, ‘Herrscherbild’, pp. 150–2 and 154–5; Reinach, T., ‘Commentaire archéologique sur le poème de Constantin le Rhodien’, Revue des études grecques 9 (1896), 66–103, at 82–5CrossRefGoogle Scholar and fig. 6.

222 Schramm, ‘Herrscherbild’, pp. 164–5 and Abb. 4.

223 Grabar, , L'empereur, p. 47.Google Scholar

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225 Schramm, ‘Herrscherbild’, pp. 163–4.

226 Ibid. pp. 156–8.

227 Cf. above, n. 121.

228 Schramm, ‘Herrscherbild’, pp. 146–50, at 148.

229 See above, p. 244.

230 Stenton, , Anglo-Saxon England, p. 203.Google Scholar

231 Ibid. pp. 203 and 205.

232 Two Chronicles, ed. Plummer 1, 48–9 (s.a. 755); Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People, ed. Bertram Colgrave and R. A. B. Mynors (Oxford, 1969), p. 575 (s.a. 757; continuation annal in the Moore manuscript).

233 Biddle, ‘Archaeology, Architecture and the Cult of Saints’, in press.

234 Stenton, , Anglo-Saxon England, p. 205.Google Scholar