Hospital of St. Edmund, medieval grave slab

A slab of grey limestone, 1.87m x 1.15m x 1.09m, now set upright in the blocking of the C17 gateway of Gateshead House, which has been re-erected in the forecourt of the chapel. The slab has been a late medieval floor stone with a cross and marginal inscription both inlaid in brass. The slab is now badly weathered. The cross has been a striaght-arm form with a square panel at the head centre and terminating each arm. The lower part of the stone is completely erased. Hutchinson (1823, Vol. II, p 573) refers to this slab as lying in the ruins of the chapel: "….some steps at the east end leading to the altar are yet remaining; near them is a grave stone, on which is cut a cross…… it has also the marks of an inlaid border about it, but the brass is gone". Floor stones of this type are comparatively rare in the North of England, and there is no close parallel for the cross design in Durham. Has general appearance of being C15 or early C16 {Ryder, 1985, p 89-90}.