A market cross is a structure used to mark a market square in market towns, originally from the distinctive tradition in Early Medieval Insular art of free-standing stone standing or high crosses, often elaborately carved, which goes back to the 7th century. Market crosses can be found in most market towns in Britain, with those in Scotland known as mercat crosses. British emigrants often installed such crosses in their new cities and several can be found in Canada and Australia.
These structures range from carved stone spires, obelisks or crosses, common to small market towns such as that in Stalbridge, Dorset, to large, ornate covered structures, such as the Chichester Cross or Malmesbury Market Cross. Market Crosses can also be constructed from wood; an example is at Wymondham, Norfolk.
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Famous quotes containing the words market and/or cross:
“But the nomads were the terror of all those whom the soil or the advantages of the market had induced to build towns. Agriculture therefore was a religious injunction, because of the perils of the state from nomadism.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I know we’re not saints or virgins or lunatics; we know all the lust and lavatory jokes, and most of the dirty people; we can catch buses and count our change and cross the roads and talk real sentences. But our innocence goes awfully deep, and our discreditable secret is that we don’t know anything at all, and our horrid inner secret is that we don’t care that we don’t.”
—Dylan Thomas (1914–1953)