The Alderwasley Sheela Na Gig

This carving gets a passing mention in the book Ghosts and Legends of Derbyshire being listed as one of the sheela's in Derbyshire. It is situated on the old chapel in the village of Alderwasley. The chapel is a small building next to a church yard and is now being used as the church hall. The chapel is small and distinctly un-church like it does however have a number of carvings on it as shown below one of which is very unnerving. I could not find out that much about this building other than it used to be the chapel of the local lord of the manor. There is an old marble coat of arms on the chapel which I presume belongs to that family. The building is supposed to be haunted and some of the carvings on the building are quite eerie.(see below)

The carving is very weathered and and it is hard to determine whether it is a sheela or not. There is a cleft at the bottom of the carving and there seem to be hunched up knees and folded arms. The face is very weathered but you can still make out eyes and a mouth. The mouth seems to similar to the Holdgate Sheela in that the lips are joined.

I'm not entirely sure that the carving is a sheela, it is far too weathered to make out any details. The carving is on the corner of the building as well unlike the usual "guarding" position above or near a door or window. However as I have found out recently there are sheelas in Ireland which are found on the corners of buildings so it may be that this carving is a sheela after all.