Bodies, bones & overflowing churchyards: a history of graveyards

Welcome to the History Extra podcast, fascinating historical conversations from the makers of BBC History magazine. Burying the dead has never been a simple matter, whether due to elaborate grave goods, unique burial rituals or public health concerns, burial places through history have taken on a variety of unusual and intriguing forms. Roger Lockhurst's new book, Graveyards, A History of Living with the Dead, explores everything from the ancient tombs of the pharaohs and sky burials of Tibet to the overflowing churchyards of 18th century Paris and preserved bodies of 20th century Communists. Ellie Cawthorne spoke to him to find out more.

It's great to have you with us, Roger, talking all about graveyards, burial rites, graves, the whole shebang. So why is it interesting to look at graveyards? What fascinates you about them? Yeah, that was one of the key things I wanted to address, I guess, because you might immediately think it's morbid and I think lots of people do kind of avoid graveyards or have superstitions about graveyards, but on the other hand, Loads and loads of tourism is about going to see graves or going to see mausoleums, you know, and the most famous things in the on in the planet really are these kind of memorial sites, whether you're going to Egypt to see the pyramids, whether you're going to the Taj Mahal, whether you're going to Thailand to see Buddhist statues and amazing complexes.

People go all over the world to do this, so I kind of wanted to explain that interest and that obsession. And also I think the most surprising thing about it was just how constantly actually we are engaged with our own dead. And that's where the subtitle for the book came from, you know, this history of living with the dead. Yeah, I have to say that graveyards can be a great place.

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