Time's death-struggle

In this tombstone carving you see a winged figure (Time) hovering over a corpse/skeleton, and both appear to be clasping an arrow. It's clearly a struggle of some sort.
Fellow blogger Beneath Thy Feet explained the significance of it to me as Time arrriving to claim his due at the moment of the person's death.  The arrow I guess represents the inevitable trajectory of existence - towards death.
The superscript motto reads: Time and Death shal be no more

So far I've found two of these type of carvings in Staffordshire: one in Audley churchyard, and this one, which is in Horton churchyard.

Taking a photo from the left side of the same carving more clearly shows the woman praying (she who is to become the skeleton I suppose), an hourglass, and, erm... three shapes whose significance I don't know!  If you know what these three shapes represent, I'd be very happy to hear...



This post was featured on the Cemetery Sunday website