MARKET CROSS, WITH PLAN
A phenomenon in regard to churchyard crosses at the present day is the inequality of their distribution, which, however, must not be taken as a criterion of their number and situation in former times. Indeed, their existence was very general; and the fact of their preservation or destruction depends on local conditions. Some counties, like Somersetshire, Gloucestershire, and Northamptonshire, for example, contain numbers, while other counties contain scarcely any at all. Thus, Charles Fowler, F.R.I.B.A., writing in 1896 concerning the Diocese of Llandaff, which comprises Glamorganshire and Monmouthshire, says: "In nearly every churchyard there are remains of a cross of some kind. These crosses were placed midway between the enclosure entrance and south porch, to the east of the principal path.... Many of the steps and bases of these crosses are to be found in the diocese, but the tops have mostly all disappeared; also very many of the shafts." On the other hand, in Hertfordshire there are but two specimens, both incomplete; and again, in Kent, with the exception of the ancient bases in Folkestone and Teynham churchyards, there is not another example extant. And yet numbers and numbers of Kentish churchyard crosses are positively known, through mention of them in wills, to have been standing in the Middle Ages.
In churchyard crosses a certain feature, occurring more particularly in the southwestern district of England, has proved somewhat of a puzzle to archæologists, to wit, the presence of a little niche or recess (Figs. [15] and [16]), sunk in the side of the socket or, more rarely, in the lower part of the shaft. Instances have been noted at Wonastow and Raglan, in Monmouthshire; Lydney and Newland, in Gloucestershire; Blackmere, Brampton Abbots, Colwell, Kingdon, St Weonards, Whitchurch, and Wigmore, in Herefordshire; and at Broadway and Great Malvern, in Worcestershire. At the last named (Fig. [16]) the niche is hollowed out in the shaft itself. It has been supposed that the purpose of the niche was to contain a light; but a much more probable suggestion, of the late Sir William St John Hope's, is that the niche was designed as a receptacle for the pyx, enclosing the Sacred Host, in the course of the Palm Sunday procession.
13. MILDENHALL, SUFFOLK
MARKET CROSS
14. WITNEY, OXFORDSHIRE
MARKET CROSS
