Viking Age Sculpture in Northern England

The time seems appropriate for this book. It is now over half a century since W. G. Collingwood published his classic study "Northumbrian Crosses of the pre-Norman Age" (1927), a book which remains both an impressive memorial to a pioneering scholar and a constant point of reference for following generations of students; no one will ever match his artist's instinctive understanding of the mind of the medieval sculptor. Collingwood recognized, however, that little further progress could be made until we had a complete catalogue of all the early carvings. That work is nearing completion under the general editorship of Professor Rosemary Cramp at Durham and we are now in a position to re-assess the significance of those thousands of sculptural fragments which are scattered across the churches, graveyards and museums of northern England. I have tried to show the information which might be won from this material. Others, no doubt, would have made a different selection and I can only hope that my omissions will spur them to fill the gaps. Inevitably, in what is designed as a general introduction, I may occasionally have skirted some difficulties, ridden brusquely over what I should have stopped to examine, and skated with unjustified assurance over evidence which might not carry the full weight of the argument I have laid upon it. My colleagues will recognize these spots if I have failed to indicate them, and when the reader follows up the bibliography he will soon encounter views that healthily contradict what I have claimed.