Various fragments recovered from evaluation trenches at the west end of Battle Abbey Church in Spring 1999 are currently being held by English Heritage (Central Archaeology Service) at Fort Cumberland, Portsmouth. They include several pieces of polished Purbeck marble, including a fragment carved with a semi-shaft and capital, and a beast's head. The forthcoming Interim Report by the excavation director Sarah Reilley may shed further light on the original function and location of these fragments, but there is a suggestion that they had been reused, and were retrieved from rubble core. The beast's head is included in the Corpus for its similarity to carvings on the Salehurst font, which is Early English in character but has been attributed to the 12thc. The fragment with the semi-shaft is included as it may belong to a contemporary ensemble from Battle Abbey Church.

See also: Battle Abbey (Sussex), Fort Brockhurst (Hants), Dover Castle (Kent).

See report on Battle Abbey. These two fragments were excavated by English Heritage Central Archaeology Service in April 1999. A number of other Purbeck marble fragments, including pieces of the cloister, had been retrieved during earlier excavations.

The lizard-like beast's head resembles the long-snouted heads commonly found on Romanesque label stops, but cannot have come from such a context on account of its small size and curved form. The closest parallels are the salamanders carved on the base of Salehurst font (qv), located just north of Battle Abbey, and it seems likely that this head adorned the base of the Battle Abbey Church font. If the Salehurst font (c.1200-25, but sometimes attributed to the 12thc.) is a local copy of the higher quality Battle Abbey font, the latter may have dated from c.1200. The fragment with the semi-shaft may also have come from an item of church furnishing, and probably also dates from c.1200. The object it came from was clearly polygonal, and probably octagonal. It may have been the octagonal basin of a font.