Under the old Butter Cross, Whitney Oxon
One of the uses of the market cross was to inculcate the sacredness of bargains. There is a curious stone erection in the market-place at Middleham, Yorkshire, which seems to have taken the place of the market cross and to have taught the same truth. It consists of a platform on which are two pillars; one carries the effigy of some animal in a kneeling posture, resembling a sheep or a cow, the other supports an octagonal object traditionally supposed to represent a cheese. The farmers used to walk up the opposing flights of steps when concluding a bargain and shake hands over the sculptures.[47]
BOUNDARY CROSSES
Crosses marked in medieval times the boundaries of ecclesiastical properties, which by this sacred symbol were thus protected from encroachment and spoliation. County boundaries were also marked by crosses and meare stones. The seven crosses of Oldham marked the estate owned by the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem.
CROSSES AT CROSS-ROADS AND HOLY WELLS
Where roads meet and many travellers passed a cross was often erected. It was a wayside or weeping cross. There pilgrims knelt to implore divine aid for their journey and protection from outlaws and robbers, from accidents and sudden death. At holy wells the cross was set in order to remind the frequenters of the sacredness of the springs and to wean them from all superstitious thoughts and pagan customs. Sir Walter Scott alludes to this connexion of the cross and well in Marmion, when he tells of "a little fountain cell" bearing the legend:—
Drink, weary pilgrim, drink and pray
For the kind soul of Sybil Grey,
Who built this cross and well.
"In the corner of a field on the Billington Hall Farm, just outside the parish of Haughton, there lies the base, with a portion of the shaft, of a fourteenth-century wayside cross. It stands within ten feet of an old disused lane leading from Billington to Bradley. Common report pronounced it to be an old font. Report states that it was said to be a stone dropped out of a cart as the stones from Billington Chapel were being conveyed to Bradley to be used in building its churchyard wall. A superstitious veneration has always attached to it. A former owner of the property wrote as follows: 'The late Mr. Jackson, who was a very superstitious man, once told me that a former tenant of the farm, whilst ploughing the field, pulled up the stone, and the same day his team of wagon-horses was all drowned. He then put it into the same place again, and all went on right; and that he himself would not have it disturbed upon any account.' A similar legend is attached to another cross. Cross Llywydd, near Raglan, called The White Cross, which is still complete, and has evidently been whitewashed, was moved by a man from its base at some cross-roads to his garden. From that time he had no luck and all his animals died. He attributed this to his sacrilegious act and removed it to a piece of waste ground. The next owner afterwards enclosed the waste with the cross standing in it.
"The Haughton Cross is only a fragment—almost precisely similar to a fragment at Butleigh, in Somerset, of early fourteenth-century date. The remaining part is clearly the top stone of the base, measuring 2 ft. 1½ in. square by 1 ft. 6 in. high, and the lowest portion of the shaft sunk into it, and measuring 1 ft. 1 in. square by 10½ in. high. Careful excavation showed that the stone is probably still standing on its original site."[48]
"There is in the same parish, where there are four cross-roads, a place known as 'The White Cross.' Not a vestige of a stone remains. But on a slight mound at the crossing stands a venerable oak, now dying. In Monmouthshire oaks have often been so planted on the sites of crosses; and in some cases the bases of the crosses still remain. There are in that county about thirty sites of such crosses, and in seventeen some stones still exist; and probably there are many more unknown to the antiquary, but hidden away in corners of old paths, and in field-ways, and in ditches that used to serve as roads. A question of great interest arises. What were the origin and use of these wayside crosses? and why were so many of them, especially at cross-roads, known as 'The White Cross'? At Abergavenny a cross stood at cross-roads. There is a White Cross Street in London and one in Monmouth, where a cross stood. Were these planted by the White Cross Knights (the Knights of Malta, or of S. John of Jerusalem)? Or are they the work of the Carmelite, or White, Friars? There is good authority for the general idea that they were often used as preaching stations, or as praying stations, as is so frequently the case in Brittany. But did they at cross-roads in any way serve the purpose of the modern sign-post? They are certainly of very early origin. The author of Ecclesiastical Polity says that the erection of wayside crosses was a very ancient practice. Chrysostom says that they were common in his time. Eusebius says that their building was begun by Constantine the Great to eradicate paganism. Juvenal states that a shapeless post, with a marble head of Mercury on it, was erected at cross-roads to point out the way; and Eusebius says that wherever Constantine found a statue of Bivialia (the Roman goddess who delivered from straying from the path), or of Mercurius Triceps (who served the same kind purpose for the Greeks), he pulled it down and had a cross placed upon the site. If, then, these cross-road crosses of later medieval times also had something to do with directions for the way, another source of the designation 'White Cross' is by no means to be laughed out of court, viz. that they were whitewashed, and thus more prominent objects by day, and especially by night. It is quite certain that many of them were whitewashed, for the remains of this may still be seen on them. And the use of whitewash or plaister was far more usual in England than is generally known. There is no doubt that the whole of the outside of the abbey church of St. Albans, and of White Castle, from top to base, were coated with whitewash."[49]
Whether they were whitened or not, or whether they served as guide-posts or stations for prayer, it is well that they should be carefully preserved and restored as memorials of the faith of our forefathers, and for the purpose of raising the heart of the modern pilgrim to Christ, the Saviour of men.