There are no less than two hundred old crosses in Somerset, many of
them fifteenth-century work. Saxon crosses exist at Rowberrow and
Kelston; a twelfth-century cross at Harptree; Early English crosses at
Chilton Trinity, Dunster, and Broomfield; Decorated crosses at
Williton, Wiveliscombe, Bishops-Lydeard, Chewton Mendip, and those at
Sutton Bingham and Wraghall are fifteenth century. But not all these
are market crosses. The south-west district of England is particularly
rich in these relics of ancient piety, but many have been allowed to
disappear. Glastonbury market cross, a fine Perpendicular structure
with a roof, was taken down in 1808, and a new one with no surrounding
arcade was erected in 1846. The old one bore the arms of Richard Bere,
abbot of Glastonbury, who died in 1524. The wall of an adjacent house
has a piece of stone carving representing a man and a woman clasping
hands, and tradition asserts that this formed part of the original
cross. Together with the cross was an old conduit, which frequently
accompanied the market cross. Cheddar Cross is surrounded by its
battlemented arcade with grotesque gargoyles, a later erection, the
shaft going through the roof. Taunton market cross was erected in 1867
in place of a fifteenth-century structure destroyed in 1780.
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