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Kirkconnel, Fair Helen's Cross

Cross (Medieval)

Site Name Kirkconnel, Fair Helen's Cross

Classification Cross (Medieval)

Alternative Name(s) Kirkconnel, Old Parish Church

Canmore ID 67107

Site Number NY27NW 9

NGR NY 24973 75373

Datum OSGB36 - NGR

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/67107

Ordnance Survey licence number AC0000807262. All rights reserved.
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Administrative Areas

  • Council Dumfries And Galloway
  • Parish Kirkpatrick-fleming
  • Former Region Dumfries And Galloway
  • Former District Annandale And Eskdale
  • Former County Dumfries-shire

Early Medieval Carved Stones Project

Kirkconnel (St Conal), Dumfriesshire, cross

Measurements: H 2.74m above ground, W shaft 0.34m

Stone type:

Place of discovery: NY 2498 7537

Present location: in situ about 30m north-west of Kirkconnel graveyard.

Evidence for discovery: first noted in 1912. The churchyard is oval and likely to be early, lying in a bend of the Kirtle Water. The name ‘Fair Helen’s Cross’ relates to a local ballad and appears not to have been applied to the cross before the nineteenth century.

Present condition: one side-arm and much of the upper arm is missing.

Description

This cross was shaped from a single slab of stone. It appears to be plain, but what survives of the head is obscured by a secondary rectangular recess for a panel, as if for a signpost.

Date range: early medieval.

Primary references: RCAHMS 1920, no 374; RCAHMS 1997, 263.

Desk-based information compiled by A Ritchie 2019

Early Medieval Carved Stones Project

Kirkconnel (St Conal), Dumfriesshire, cross

Measurements: H 2.74m above ground, W shaft 0.34m

Stone type:

Place of discovery: NY 2498 7537

Present location: in situ about 30m north-west of Kirkconnel graveyard.

Evidence for discovery: first noted in 1912. The churchyard is oval and likely to be early, lying in a bend of the Kirtle Water. The name ‘Fair Helen’s Cross’ relates to a local ballad and appears not to have been applied to the cross before the nineteenth century.

Present condition: one side-arm and much of the upper arm is missing.

Description

This cross was shaped from a single slab of stone. It appears to be plain, but what survives of the head is obscured by a secondary rectangular recess for a panel, as if for a signpost.

Date range: early medieval.

Primary references: RCAHMS 1920, no 374.

Desk-based information compiled by A Ritchie 2019

Archaeology Notes

NY27NW 9 2498 7537

Not to be confused with Kirkconnel, Old Parish Church, Fair Helen's Tombstone (NY 2503 7534), for which see NY27NE 1.01.

(NY 24987537) Fair Helen's Cross (NR)

OS 1:10000 map (1977)

This is a free-standing Latin cross, 9ft high and 1ft 1 1/2ins thick, with square angles at the side arms and obtuse angles at the top. One of the side arms is almost destroyed and the top is incomplete. Panels are recessed 1/2 inch in the arms and head.

RCAHMS 1920, visited 1912

As described by the RCAHMS. A DOE plaque at 'Fair Helen's Tombstone' (NY27NE 1.01) states that the cross is known as 'Fair Helen's Cross', and is supposed to mark the spot where she was killed (but see NY27NE 2).

Visited by OS (WDJ) 16 October 1967

No change to the previous field report.

Visited by OS (IA) 20 February 1973

There is good reason to suppose that this is the village cross of Kirkconnel (NY27NW 15), later re-erected on the present site when the legend of 'Fair Helen' gained popularity (from Sir Walter Scott's publication in 'Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border). Its date is difficult to determine, but it is probably late Medieval. The panels are secondary work.

T H McK Clough and L R Laing 1969.

Listed as Kirkconnel, Fair Helen's Cross.

RCAHMS 1997.

References

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