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ABSTRACT A great deal of material has been written about cemeteries based on the assumption that they constitute a specific type of burial place, but few writers have given close attention to the task of describing the features that may be particular to cemeteries. This paper regards cemeteries as specifically demarcated sites of burial, with an ordered internal layout that is conducive both to families claiming control over their grave spaces, and to the conducting of what might be deemed by the community as appropriate funerary ritual. Cemetery space can be regarded as sacred, in that it acts as a focus for the pilgrimage of friends and family and is protected from activities deemed 'disrespectful'. However, cemeteries are principally secular spaces: ownership is almost always by municipal authorities or private sector concerns. The sites are intended to serve the whole community, and in doing so are closely integrated into community history. The sites are able to carry multiple social and political meanings. Using these elements of definition-physical characteristics, ownership and purpose, sacredness and the site's ability to promote or protect the individuality of the deceased-the paper characterizes churchyards, burial grounds, mass graves, war cemeteries and pantheons.
Introduction
Although there is a substantial literature that rests on the implicit assumption that cemeteries constitute a specific burial form, no study has yet attempted a detailed definition of the basic essentials of that form. A language of different burial space types needs to be set, establishing a common grammar for international, comparative and multidisciplinary studies. The use of such a grammar introduces a level of analysis that might otherwise be overlooked, and raises the possibility of more widespread and structured debate about burial space and its meanings. It is acknowledged that, in practice, burial space is essentially mutable: its meaning does not remain static over time; and its significance is not uniform over all cultures. Even at a basic level, the significance of such space alters as time accrues between the living and the dead. Furthermore, individual burial sites often do not present a single landscape: some may contain separate sections with distinctive meanings and purposes.
Comparative analysis clarifies distinctions, and opens up what may become fruitful avenues for research. This paper will propose definitions of...