Crowland is something of a special case as it has a series of boundary crosses which are said to have been erected to mark the boundaries of the lands of Crowland abbey. The history of the Crowland crosses has been explored by several authors, most recently by David Stocker in ‘The Early Church in Lincolnshire’ in Pre-Viking Lindsey, 1993, pp. 101-120. He states: Possibly by 833, and more certainly by c.950, the boundary of the island was marked with a series of posts in the form of crosses, some of stone others of wood. The sites of eight of these crosses have been identified and four crosses survive. However … of the four surviving shafts none is earlier than the 12th century … these markers were evidently moved outwards as the marshland edges of the island were reclaimed … the island reaching its present boundary by the 12th century. The map below shows the locations of the known cross sites.
The surviving stones were described and illustrated by A. S. Canham in 1890 in a paper published in J Brit Arch Assoc 47 pp. 116-129. The illustrations from that paper are reproduced below
The Boundary Crosses of Crowland are also discussed and described by D S Davies in Lincs Notes and Queries. Vol XIII No.5 January 1915 pp129-157. A copy of his observations on Crowland is reproduced here.
Only three of these crosses survive today. They are described in this gazetteer as:
- Crowland – St Guthlac’s Cross
- Crowland – St Vincent’s Cross
- Crowland – Kenulph’s Cross
In addition I am recording Crowland Triangular Bridge as a lost cross, and there are comments on Fynset Cross (which may be a Crowland boundary cross) in the notes on St Vincent’s Cross
