From the outside, they typically look just like small grassy hills, perhaps buttressed by some jagged, upright slabs that could’ve been nicked off of Stonehenge. But, each one also has a doorway literally into the hill, and some feature shelves lined with human remains, like a public mausoleum built into the earth....Angel, whose company, Sacred Stones, has built three barrows since 2015 and is exploring building another six, recalls a visit to an ancient barrow.... the Cairn Holy tomb, which dates back to the fourth millennium B.C. The identities of those interred there are long lost, but something caught the eye of Angel and his daughter: fresh flowers recently left inside. “This is thousands of years old,” says Angel. In the intervening millennia, burial practices changed countless times. And yet, he says, he makes a point of returning to this same ancient barrow on every Scottish holiday he takes. Each time, without fail, he finds fresh flowers. The identity of those interred seems less important than celebrating their time on Earth, and the ancient barrow’s permanence made that possible thousands of years later.
Here is another article on the subject.
I made reference to the idiocy of flowers left in barrows as far back as 1997! Those buried were accompanied by bloodier sacrifices at the time. "Flowers for the dying and newly dead, wood for the recently dead, stone for the completely dead." It is mere sentimentalism, pretending that those buried there (who are not our ancestors, BTW. Our ancestors eliminated them, by disease, slaughter, and/or competition) were much like us, somehow, because we feel that. And they weren't druids either, dammit.
ReplyDeletePeople are free to get buried any way they want, to my mind, but observers are also free to point out that they are damn fools who believe fables about prehistory.
Maybe it's evidence of having read Tolkien, which is good; or the Beowulf, which is good too. Actually some of the older Norse sources speak of barrows and the awful feasting that goes on inside them among the dead.
ReplyDeleteI think the concept is less attractive with cremated remains in urns, rather than barrows laid out with swords and twisted wire that might draw a dragon's eye.
It's sensible, though, to make a space for the dead. There's a cemetery just up behind my house on the mountain that's very old, and once a year the local Baptist church comes up and decorates it, and then they hold an outdoor service there among their ancestors -- their actual ones, some of whom they knew and some of whom they've heard of. I always tip my hat to the graves when I'm up there, as a sign of respect for my neighbors and predecessors; and I built a ford, and maintain it, to help their descendants get up there to show their own respects.
Being laid to rest in a barrow, with sword and Colt by my side sounds OK.
ReplyDeleteAlthough the longship , full afire with sails set toward the open sea sounds like a better spectacle for the mourners. Assuming there are any.
The graves in our old cemetery in Connecticut were markers of a different age, a lot of them from the 1700's. Sometimes a stone would have four or five names on it, mother, children, all dead in a matter of weeks from dread disease. We played among them as children, I hope should their spirits look down, they would find a pleasure in seeing us there. Never did we deface a grave, although the stones were used as cover from Indian attacks, on occasion.
Every one should walk though a graveyard from time to time. A useful thing.