Churchyard

In Christian countries a churchyard is a patch of land adjoining or surrounding a church, which is usually owned by the relevant church or local parish itself. While churchyards can be any patch of land on church grounds, historically, they were often used as graveyards (burial places). Because the environment of this type of plot remains calm and stable for a long period of time, a unique landscape design is formed.

Christians sought burials near sacred sites to benefit from the protection of the saint (burial ad sanctos, "near the saints"). Graves surrounding a church can be as old as the church itself. They were often used by families who lacked the means or status to be buried in a vault in the church basement. In some areas, notably Britain and northwest France, cemeteries may predate the construction of the church. The shape and the height of Churchyards in northwestern France are both indicators of age. Churches often sit on sites of great antiquity, long predating Christianity. 

Today a churchyard looks quiet and somber but in medieval times, despite protests by generations of bishops, the church grounds were popular sites for games, gatherings, dancing and dalliances. The church grounds being the only public grounds available. News and gossip brought out an audience, often after mass. Before the 17th century gravestones were rare with most country churches having none before the 18th century.

History

The general rectangular shape of today's churchyard began in the Early Middle Ages, so sometimes older grounds are indicated by oval or round forms. Selection of a location by the church involved commandeering pagan holy places, which were linked to landscape features. Springs were particularly important as they were thought of as points of contact between the underworld and the surface world. These locations were associated with particular pre-Christian gods and goddesses, sometimes Roman gods had previously replaced Gallic or Celts ones. Christian missionaries were specifically instructed to take over sites of pagan worship, thus depriving the old gods of their perches, but also enabling the Christian religion to inherit some of the sanctity that native people associated with the site.

Another broad indication of greater antiquity is the height of the churchyard earth in relation to the ground outside the walls. Centuries of repeated burials in the same location resulted in the gradual elevation of terrain.

After the establishment of the parish as the centre of the Christian spiritual life, the possession of a cemetery, as well as the baptismal font, was a mark of parochial status. During the Middle Ages, religious orders also constructed cemeteries around their churches. Thus, the most common use of churchyards was as a consecrated burial ground known as a graveyard. Graveyards were usually established at the same time as the building of the relevant place of worship (which can date back to the 6th to 14th centuries) and were often used by those families who could not afford to be buried inside or beneath the place of worship itself. However, many churchyards in Northwestern France and in the UK may predate the establishment of the Christian church there today. For example, existence of the Fortingall Yew, an ancient tree (Taxus baccata) in the churchyard of Fortingall, a village in Perthshire, Scotland, has been used to suggest pre-Christian activity on the site, although yews are difficult to date exactly.

Most headstones and other memorials are of the 17th century at the earliest, as ground would often be reused for further burials and only some families could afford any memorials.

In Northwestern France, the churchyard cross usually was the only obstacle for the frequent activities on the church grounds. This cross was always found on the sunlite side mounted on stepped base, and indicated that the churchyard was consecrated ground. Sunny southern side of the church was the favored spot for burials. The northern exposure, associated with the devil, was designated for the graves of strangers, unbaptised children, outcasts and suicides. During the 18th and 19th centuries, the increased use of stone monuments, brought pressure to use these shadow realms. Archery sometimes was practiced on these northern sides as well because less activity happened there.

The use of churchyards as burial grounds for the deceased was diminished all over Europe in various stages between the 18th to 19th centuries due to lack of space for new headstones. In many European states, burial in churchyards was outlawed altogether either by royal decrees or government legislation for public hygiene reasons and portions of churchyards were taken in order for roads to be built or expanded. The loss of part (or all) of the churchyard, often led also to the removal and permanent loss of centuries-old graves and headstones. In some cases the human remains were exhumed and the gravestones transferred. 

In other cases, all headstones have been removed, to create a park-like environment, or simply to facilitate the seasonal cutting and removal of grass or weeds. In at least one case in the United States, the headstones from a churchyard in Pittsburgh were used to help form the foundation for an addition to the church fifty years after the last burial in the churchyard took place (the foundation itself unknowingly went through fifteen graves), with the churchyard itself becoming a parking lot nearly forty years after that; the churchyard was largely forgotten until PennDOT purchased the church property via eminent domain for construction of Interstate 279 and subsequently unearthed 727 graves.

Some churchyards across the world are still used as graveyards today, particularly in most hamlets and small towns. Public cemeteries are primarily seen in major towns and cities.

Ecology

Churchyards can be host to unique and ancient habitats because they may remain significantly unchanged for hundreds of years. During the industrialisation of the 19th century, the green space was already almost in the centre of some disproportionately growing city. Some cemetery was not leveled, like the garden cemetery established in the 18th century as a communal but still church cemetery, was abandoned and converted into a publicly accessible park. Instead of the former inner-city church cemeteries, numerous large cemeteries were created on the outskirts of the city, often designed by important architects in collaboration with garden and landscape architects, such as the Engesohde city cemetery. 

Sourced from Wikipedia