Anchors

Angels

Birds

Books

Celebrity

Children

Columns

Crosses

Dogs

Drapery, Veils

Epitaths

Flowers, Trees

Fruits and Veggies

Hands

Headstones

Homemade

Household

Humorous

Lambs

Military

Modern

Statuary

Urns

Wild, Wild West

Biographies

The Four Chaplains Lova Cline Johnny Morehouse Judge Richard Reid Albertina Forrest Rosalind English Henry Buehman Thomas Jeffords Mary Aguirre Louis Hughes

Cemeteries are oftentimes depicted as a scary place or a sad place to be. I find cemeteries restful, a reflective place filled with a sense of timelessness. I find stories that are carved into the headstones which gives me a glimpse of who that person was and sometimes their life experiences. The more I explore cemeteries the more I learn. Perhaps to many it is wasted information but it is my hobby.

When I started roaming cemeteries, I often wondered about the symbolism. What do the carvings mean? Is there a story there? Who are these people? That was when I started researching “headstones iconography.” I discovered there are stories and if you knew how to decipher the carvings, you can discover a basic understanding of who that person was.

Motifs on gravestones can express ethnic identity, religious affiliation, association membership, or simply the preference of the time or of the community. A symbol that was commonly used in one area to mean something specific might mean something completely different in another part of the country or the world or in a different era of time. Therefore, it is important to understand the history of the area or of the time.

Taphophile

The difference between a coffin, a casket and a sarcophagus is a coffin is wider at the shoulders, narrower at the head and feet. A coffin is rectangular and a sarcophagus is more molded into the shape of the human body and often had a portrait of the deceased painted on the lid.

The word "cemetery," which is the traditional place to bury the dead, comes from the German words koimeterion (meaning a sleeping place), and koiman (to put to sleep).

The difference between a cemetery and a graveyard is a cemetery is a burial ground unattached to a church.

Common types of burial places - Necropolis, Ossuary, Columbarium, Graveyard, Churchyard, Tomb, Catacomb, Crypt, Mass grave, Unmarked grave, and Tumulus. Specific and rarer types of burial places – Mausoleum, Reliquary, Sepulcher, Potter's Field, Eco-cemetery, Stupa, Shaft and chamber tomb, Stone ship, Megalithic tomb.