Funerary facts

James Holloway suggests that a wide overview could have done with more depth

Burying the Dead

An Archæological History of Burial Grounds, Graveyards and Cemeteries

Lorraine Evans

Pen & Sword 2020

Hb, 216pp, £19.99. ISBN 9781526706676

Human funerary practice is as varied as every other aspect of culture, and the rites practised by one culture can seem inexplicable or even grotesque to another. In Burying the Dead, Lorraine Evans surveys burial practices throughout history and around the world, picking out particularly interesting examples to showcase the diversity and changeability of custom and belief.

Evans has cast her nets wide: in her first two chapters, which begin with the transition from paganism to Christianity in England, she incorporates examples from Mexico, Hawaii, Borneo, Tibet, Malawi, Bhutan, Lithuania, Ghana, Alaska and more.

She then divides up her material thematically: the next chapter focuses on “deviant” burials, which include not only people who existed on the fringes of society, such as unbaptised children or executed criminals, but also those thought of as dangerous after death. These include “vampire” burials, where steps seem to have been taken to prevent the dead body from rising. After deviant burials, Evans investigates conflict graves, burials at sea or underwater, war memorials, the history of the modern cemetery, and even cemeteries for nonhumans, such as pet cemeteries or aeroplane “graveyards.”

There’s so much variety in Burying the Dead that any reader can learn something new – even if you know everything there is to know about early mediæval execution cemeteries, you may be unaware that a 19th-century architect proposed building a 94-storey pyramid to hold the bodies of up to five million Londoners.

The first problem with

Burying the Dead is that it never really goes beyond this kind of overview. Evans amasses an impressive number of examples to show off the diversity of human funeral practice, but the chapters lack real conclusions and indeed don’t really have arguments.

The second issue is production. An overview of worldwide burial practice could be enjoyable for a curious reader or someone just getting into burial studies, but the execution needs some work to make it more accessible. The text lacks maps, and its only illustrations are a set of photographs of different cemeteries and burial rites. The discussion of vampire burials would have been greatly improved with some illustrated examples, for instance, as would many of the other themes. The problems also extend to the text, which needs some further editing.

Burying the Dead takes a refreshingly inclusive approach to writing about burial, creating an enjoyable tour of the varied funerary customs of human history. It’s packed with fascinating examples of burial practices, but lacks detailed context or sustained argument. If it advanced a more substantive point or added some more excitement to its collection of funerary facts, it would be a more satisfying work.

★★★