Maltby's medieval cross is worth a closer look...
MALTBY'S medieval cross – located at a busy road junction – is easy to pass by but it is well worth a close look.
Its shaft, topped with an attractive saltire, is set into a substantial base which is mounted on a stepped stone plinth.
Some of the cut stones which make up the plinth are marked with heraldic shields but, rather oddly, these have been laid upside-down.
Although all the elements clearly date from the Middle Ages, in the early 20th century it was reported that an elderly Maltby resident remembered that its top had been brought from the old Parish Church, when it was substantially demolished in 1858.
At various times it has been described as a 'praying cross', a 'preaching cross' or a 'market cross'. But its original purpose was, most probably, to be a landmark on the medieval route east from Rotherham.
If early travellers took the road to the right of the cross, their way led to Roche Abbey and to Blyth town and priory.
If they took the road to the left, their route would take them to the important town and castle of Tickhill and onward to the inland port of Bawtry.
A press photograph, taken about 1925, shows the cross in its original and slightly lower location, a few yards closer to Rotherham but the cutting of a new and wider route for Blyth Road, in the late 1920s, saw Maltby Cross carefully removed to its present site.
by Alice Rodgers, Maltby Local History Society
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Weather for Dinnington
Wednesday 23 May 2012
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Temperature: 13 C to 24 C
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