Graveyard - Graveyards Replaced By Cemeteries

Graveyards Replaced By Cemeteries

Various conditions in the late 18th century and throughout the 19th century led to the burial of the dead in graveyards being discontinued. Among the reasons for this were:

• A very sharp rise in the size of the population during the early stages of the Industrial Revolution

• Continued outbreaks of highly infectious diseases in towns and cities due to lack of public hygiene. Many graveyards in cities were located on land enclosed within the city walls.

• Limits to, and lack of, space in graveyards for new headstones and corpses.

As a consequence of these reasons, city authorities, national governments and places of worship all changed their regulations for burials. In many European states, burial in graveyards was outlawed altogether either by royal decrees or government legislation.

In some cases, skeletons were exhumed from graveyards and moved into ossuaries or catacombs. A large action of this type occurred in 18th century Paris when human remains were transferred from graveyards all over the city to the Catacombs of Paris.

However in most places across Europe completely new places of burial were established away from heavily populated areas and outside of old towns and cities. Often against the wishes of the clergy, churchyards were closed to burials. New cemeteries were established as privately- or municipally-owned sites and thus independent from churches and their churchyards. Some were designed for single faiths or were divided into sections or enclosures according to the faith or denomination of the deceased. The timing varied according to country, politics and city. Thus Paris closed its central churchyards and relocated its burials during the Napoleonic period, creating cemeteries such as Père Lachaise. The British Parliament allowed seven private cemeteries to be opened around London between 1832 and 1841. It only outlawed burials in City churchyards in 1852, allowing municipalities to set up their own subsidised cemeteries in competition. Other European cities followed suit during the 19th century.

Thus cemeteries, rather than graveyards, became the principal place of burial for the deceased and this state continues to this day.