Graveslab

The National Monuments Service's description

Lying on shelving within the 17th-century mortuary chapel adjoining externally the S wall of the nave of the 13th-century church of St Mary’s (KK020-060006-) in Gowran. Two pieces, which fit together, of a broken straight-sided limestone graveslab (Tot. surviving H 1.02m; upper portion with cross-head H 0.67m; Wth 0.56m; lower portion with cross-shaft H 0.57m; Wth 0.4m)decorated in raised relief with a seven-armed floriated cross with a two bar-knop at the base of the cross-head. There was a raised border (Wth 0.09m) around the edge, but only a portion of this survives on the sinister side. The broken upper portion bears part of the cross-head and sinister margin and the lower portion the cross-shaft and sinister margin. This may be the slab described by Carrigan (1905, vol. 3, 405) as, ‘A very large floor-slab, or table of altar-tomb, now broken, with an eight-pointed cross down the centre, and dating from about the year 1600, has the following Old English inscription, in relief, down one of the sides: Hic jacet Richard Nase et Ellana Shortall exor ei q obiit [ ] die mensis [ ]. This is the entire of the original inscription. The tomb lies in the nave’.

Compiled by: Jean Farrelly

Date of upload: 18 September 2019