Fancy-Pants Tombs: Egypt’s Pyramids
Ancient history’s monuments to dead leaders were typically, well, monumental. Nowhere on earth is that as evident as it is in Egypt. Great Pyramids of Giza are arguably...
Cemeteries
The Many Forms of Above-Ground Burial
Humans have a long history of creative memorialization of the dead, frequently involving above-ground burial. The extravagance of some memorials, such as were recently explored on this very...
Cities of the Dead
New Orleans is known worldwide for its graveyards. Crescent City’s gothic mystique imbues its cemeteries with a seductive draw, and who doesn’t like a little atmosphere? If you’re...
A Brief History of Headstones
It’s that time of year! “Graveyards” are popping up in neighborhoods and front yards all across this great land: tombstones askew, phalanges and femurs poking up through the...
Disturbing the Dead: When and How
At some point, many funeral homes will be asked to reverse their usual process and “unbury” a corpse. Disinterment, while not widespread, certainly isn’t uncommon in the modern...
So Many Tools to Trick Out Your Tombstone
Cremation rates may be rising rapidly, but that doesn’t mean traditional burial plots will be obsolete anytime soon. In 2018, cartographer Joshua Stevens created a map showing that...
Simple Ideas to Get Involved This Memorial Day
The national holiday we now know as Memorial Day started out in the late 1860s as “Decoration Day,” a remembrance of fallen Civil War soldiers held on May...