<< Our Photo Pages >> Kirkdale Sundial - Early Christian Sculptured Stone in England in Yorkshire (North)
Submitted by Thorgrim on Friday, 20 January 2006 Page Views: 12377
Early Medieval (Dark Age)Site Name: Kirkdale Sundial Alternative Name: St Gregory's MinsterCountry: England County: Yorkshire (North) Type: Early Christian Sculptured Stone
Nearest Town: Helmsley Nearest Village: Kirkdale
Map Ref: SE6768885776
Latitude: 54.263179N Longitude: 0.962324W
Condition:
5 | Perfect |
4 | Almost Perfect |
3 | Reasonable but with some damage |
2 | Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site |
1 | Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks |
0 | No data. |
-1 | Completely destroyed |
5 | Superb |
4 | Good |
3 | Ordinary |
2 | Not Good |
1 | Awful |
0 | No data. |
5 | Can be driven to, probably with disabled access |
4 | Short walk on a footpath |
3 | Requiring a bit more of a walk |
2 | A long walk |
1 | In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find |
0 | No data. |
5 | co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates |
4 | co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map |
3 | co-ordinates scaled from a bad map |
2 | co-ordinates of the nearest village |
1 | co-ordinates of the nearest town |
0 | no data |
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JordJ would like to visit
Anne T visited on 10th Oct 2014 - their rating: Cond: 4 Amb: 5 Access: 5 Anglo Saxon Crosses, St. Gregory’s Minster, Kirkdale, North Yorkshire (Kirkdale Sundial): Because the Corpus of Anglo Saxon Sculpture catalogue for Yorkshire cost £145, and my budget won’t currently run to buying it (!) I typed in ‘Anglo Saxon Sculptures’ into the internet and the search came up with both St. Gregory’s Minster and St. Andrew’s at Middleton. Good choice, Google! Thank you.
We arrived just after 11 o’clock to find two other cars in the car park. It turned out that one belonged to a florist setting up flowers for a wedding in the church that afternoon (she also said there was another wedding tomorrow, but they didn’t want to share the flowers) and one belonging to an elderly gentleman who, as we watched, hung his jacket on the church gate and picked up a brush and rake. He greeted us and asked us if we were going into the church and if we’d been before. On answering ‘no’, he told us to be careful of the step down into the church.
St. Gregory’s Minster is in a beautiful location, and is an even more beautiful building. It is clearly ancient and sits easily within the landscape.
The sundial above the main door into the church is breathtaking in its completeness. There are “Early Medieval carved stones built into the church include two early 9th century crosses; an early 10th century shaft/ slab fragment and a worn piece of late 9th century interlacing. Two grave slabs, early 8th century and 11th century two cross heads and a 10th-11th century shaft fragment are kept inside the church”.
Because there were so many flowers around the church, it was difficult to get a good photo of the cross heads inside the church. But outside it was spectacular and I was surprised to find only one other family wandering around looking at the fabric of the church, but not the cross-shafts.
By the time we’d finished wandering around the outside, there were many people coming in and out of the church and wandering around the churchyard. The car park was completely full, so we were glad we’d arrived earlier. The gentleman who’d greeted us on arrival caught us in the churchyard as we were going out. He told us that there had been ‘ladies’ who’d been round and told them they weren’t allowed to mow the back part of the churchyard, as there were over 80 (he spelled out ‘eight-oh’ to emphasise his point) species of wild flower. Walking back up the path with us, he asked if we’d enjoyed our visit, and I replied ‘very much so’. He said that people saying that made keeping the church tidy and clean worth while.
I felt very welcome at this hugely historic church and would go again to spend time and sit when it’s not so busy.
MAIGO have visited here
St Gregory's Minster contains much Anglo-Saxon work inside and out. There are early coffin lids of St Cedd and Ethelwald. Orm rebuilt the church in the reign of Edward the Confessor.
The splendid sundial contains the inscription: "This is the day's sun-marking at every hour. And Hawaro made me, and Brand, priest".
The lines with cross bars correspond to 6am, 9am, noon, 3pm and 6pm. The uncrossed lines divide time into one and a half hour periods. The line with a cross on it on the left hand side of the dial denotes 7.30am which marked the beginning of "daytime". (N and M Kerr's Guide to Anglo-Saxon Sites).
St Gregory's is listed as Historic England List ID 1149213 and recorded as Pastscape Monument No. 58657, which describes the sundial as "the finest example of a Saxon sundial in England".
The Journal of Antiquities also includes an entry for he Saxon Sundial at St Gregory’s Minster, Kirkdale, North Yorkshire, which includes images, descriptions directions for reaching the Minster, background information about its foundation, details of the other Anglo Saxon fragments in the church and a list of reference sources for more information.
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