Accessibility

Font Size

100% 150% 200%

Background Colour

Default Contrast
Close Reset

Meigle

Grave Slab (Pictish)

Site Name Meigle

Classification Grave Slab (Pictish)

Alternative Name(s) Meigle Museum; Meigle Stones; Meigle No. 26

Canmore ID 30856

Site Number NO24SE 25.26

NGR NO 2872 4459

Datum OSGB36 - NGR

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/30856

Ordnance Survey licence number AC0000807262. All rights reserved.
Canmore Disclaimer. © Copyright and database right 2024.

Toggle Aerial | View on large map

Digital Images

Administrative Areas

  • Council Perth And Kinross
  • Parish Meigle
  • Former Region Tayside
  • Former District Perth And Kinross
  • Former County Perthshire

Early Medieval Carved Stones Project (22 May 2019)

Meigle 26, Perthshire, recumbent gravestone

Measurements: H 1.52m, W 0.50m, D 0.28m

Stone type: sandstone

Place of discovery: NO 2873 4460

Present location: in Meigle Museum.

Evidence for discovery: found after the church was destroyed by fire in 1869, built into a burial vault beneath an aisle attached to the north side of the church. Entry to the vault was by stair from inside the church near the pulpit, which implies that the aisle was built at the same time as the church in the 1780s. The recumbent was set as a lintel over the door at the foot of the stair, with face B visible (Galloway 1877, 430-1).

Present condition: there is some edge damage and face A is worn, but on the whole the condition of the carving is good.

Description

This large monument is carved on four faces in a mixture of relief, false relief and incision, and each is edged by a narrow roll moulding. It is somewhat wedge-shaped in long section, with the higher end acting as the head, where there is a sunken rectangular slot perhaps designed to take an upright wooden cross. The upper face A is carved with a frame comprising two pairs of animals, the bodies of which are conjoined halfway along the monument. The head end has two animals whose open jaws grasp either end of the sunken slot and whose elongated bodies contain triangular interlace. The lower end has two birds with confronted beaks and elongated bodies filled with spiral interlace. Within this zoomorphic frame is a central square panel divided by fine roll mouldings into four triangles, each of which contains three bosses linked by serpents. At either end of this panel are a spiral heap of three goggle-eyed serpents with long snouts and a pair of confronted sea-monsters, their noses touching and their forelegs entwined.

Face B has a central square panel resembling wickerwork. Beside it at the lower end are two quadrupeds, one with a spiral tail and the other with a cloud of interlace formed of its tail and a serpent springing from its head. At the higher end are five horsemen and two hounds.

Face D is also carved with three scenes: in the centre a swastika of four naked human figures, flanked by two animals devouring a human whose severed head floats above their busy jaws, and at the lower end a bear and a sleeping animal.

Face E is carved with a manticore pursuing a bearded man who is looking apprehensively over his shoulder.

The underside of the monument, face C, is undressed.

Date: ninth or tenth century.

References: Galloway 1877, 426-31; ECMS pt 3, 303-5.

Desk-based information compiled by A Ritchie 2019.

Archaeology Notes (1990)

NO24SE 25.26 2872 4459.

This recumbent monument, found when the former parish church (NO24SE 33.00) was destroyed in 1869, has a convex upper surface and tapers a little towards the bottom (1.52m long by 0.5m broad and 0.28m thick); at the head there is a socket on the upper surface. Four of the slab's faces are heavily decorated. On the upper surface there are borders of interlace, which terminate in the heads of two beasts which grasp the socket in their open jaws; at the foot there are opposing bird-headed monsters, with the tips of their beaks touching. Within this border there are three distinct motifs: at the head, a spiral decoration formed by three serpents, each biting the tail of the next one; at the centre, a square panel divided diagonally into four triangles, with three bosses of spiral work in each; at the foot of the stone there are two sea-horses with intertwined forelegs. At the head of the stone, the vertical end-panel shows a beast pursuing a naked, and clearly apprehensive, man who is looking over his shoulder.

The right-hand side is divided into three by a central square panel of key-pattern. To the left, there are two animals, one with a spiral tail and the other a crested and winged gryphon, whose tail and lappet are interlaced and end in biting animal heads. To the right (at the head of the stone) there is a hunting scene of five horsemen, three of them riding abreast, and two hounds. The left-hand side of the stone is also divided into three, this time by a central swastica formed of four crouched human figures, each clasping the foot of his neighbour. To the left (at the head of the stone) two beasts devour a figure of which only the head and a single leg remain (the latter in the jaws of one of the beasts). To the right there are two animals, probably a bear and a horse, the latter lying down with its legs doubled up under its body. The decorative body scrolls on several of the animals form a link between the art of recumbent gravestones and that of symbol-bearing monuments.

Information from RCAHMS (JNGR) 1990.

Activities

Publication Account (1964)

Recumbent grave-stone: slotted on the upper surface for an upright cross. The shaft would apparently have been held secure by two marginal beasts, whose open mouths would appear to grasp it. The beasts have large heads and fangs in both top and bottom jaws. Their bodies die away into a margin of interlace and re-appear at the other end as long beaked creatures confronting one another as on stone No. 4. The upper surface has three panels: three coiled serpents, twelve bosses, two linked sea-horses. On one side, a pair of beasts devour or disgorge a man's body, a leg appears in the mouth of one, the severed head above. In the middle of this side is a human swastika; at the right-hand end, a bear and a horse. On the other side: bear-like and bird-like creatures with spiralled and interlaced tails: the centre piece is a square key pattern, then five horsemen and two running hounds. At the head end of the stone a quadruped with a human head pursues a naked 'Pict' looking apprehensively over his shoulder. S Cruden 1964.

References

MyCanmore Image Contributions


Contribute an Image

MyCanmore Text Contributions