Memento Mori - St Lawrence's Churchyard, Eyam

My cemetery creeping activities have been more active than ever this summer. And I confess I find great peace and calm from wandering through graveyards and observing the wildlife, the flora thriving in a truly natural, unfettered way and the legacy of generations summed up in a simple stone.

Recently I have found myself observing more and more closely the designs of gravestones. It is interesting to observe the aesthetics of different ages, the favoured motifs of the day, popular phrases which came and went, strange symbols familiar in a time long since passed but now nothing more than a curious creation on an eroding face of stone.

One strange design which struck me was that of a hand pointing to the sky, surrounded by flowers, holding a scroll with words 'Meet me there', suggesting an eternal reunion together in Heaven. Later the same day at Spittal Cemetery I found an almost identical design, with variations in the scroll wording, the flowers used and shapes within the headstone, but the similarities could be no mere coincidence. I initially assumed these were perhaps by the same stone mason, however further investigation proved this theory incorrect. Then I began to compare the actual inscriptions of the stones and their dates, both late Victorian period (1890's), both men, leaving behind a widow and daughter, who naturally in the order of the grave followed afterwards. The inscriptions on both of the stones are lengthy, and their ornamentation is fine and extensive, suggesting they would have come at quite a cost. Are both of these grave stones towns apart desperate expressions of grief for the loss of the head of the household? Or am I missing the bigger picture of Victorian funerary tradition?

Observing and comparing the various graves from many hundreds of years there are certainly trends and fashions, even in death. Some years the cross was very popular, or a Gothic arch, the Victorians seemed to favour lengthy inscriptions, sometimes even detailing how a person died (my favourite one to date is lightening) and lamenting their woe, yet as time moves on our grave stones become plainer, more uniform and the exuberance fades. The varied sea of stones, some dating back to the great plague, sit like broken teeth jutting in and out of the undulating grass and wild blooms. The ravages of time have spared some, with their proud artistry still intact and preserving the memory of many below, others have been less fortunate, with their twisting and toppling being a slow ballet performed over the ages as the weather wears away names and sentiments of love that are forever lost to time.

I dearly wish we still had the pride and enthusiasm for funerary art that our Victorian predecessors possessed. The time and care that was taken over these designs, the incredible work by stone masons bringing them to life, miniature monuments to a memory, designed to cement their place in history and stand the test of time. Yet the majority of modern monuments in Britain do not have the same detail or dedication displayed as in years gone by, with the concept of design and individuality virtually being eliminated, doesn't choosing the colour of your stone say enough about the deceased? Keep your inscription short and sweet, you're paying by the letter. Lined up neatly like faceless figures, there's something very detached and distant about modern gravestones, which perhaps says just as much about our attitude to death, the morbid and macabre as Victorian headstones said about theirs ...

Plague and Pestillence

Plague and pestilence are aplenty at Eyam museum, so its only natural that my enduring morbid curiosity bore me to Eyam, the 'plague village'.

The Derbyshire village of Eyam was famously infected with the plague in 1665 when plague bearing fleas arrived concealed in a bundle of cloth from London. The village, which quarantined itself from the outside world in an effort to prevent infection, is steeped in the history of the plague and ideals surrounding it, including Danse Macabre.
Outbreaks of plague historically have far reaching social, religious and economical consequences, all of which can be observed at Eyam museum.

Eyam museum details the scientific aspects of the plague, and chronicles its spread across Europe. However the most interesting side of the devastation of the plague is the human story, which is highlighted and focused upon in the Museums exhibits.
The plague provides an insight into how humans typically react to the extreme and sudden devastation of natural disasters, events such as this often bring out the best, and worst of human nature. Religion often becomes important, either as a ray of hope or an explanation for the catastrophe.

The images below detail some of my favourite exhibits of the museum, including morbid, god fearing woodcuts, taxidermy rats showing the differences between the common brown rat and the plague rat, and an iconic symbol which has become synonymous with the the great morality; The Plague Doctor.

At the Graves

Saint Lawrence Church in Eyam is a fairly typical English church, with most of the features you would expect to see in a modern Anglican church. However Eyams plague history means that among the hundreds of graves are a rare few of those who lost their lives to the plague. The graveyard is one of the most charming I have visited in England, with many beautiful old headstones, long forgotten and untended. The churchyard is dominated by an 8th Century Saxon Cross, which combines a mixture of Pagan and Christian imagery in its carvings and the tomb of Catherine Mompesson, wife of the Churches Reverend, whom died of the plague in 1666.