Auld reekie, Jan 23. Tombstone Tourism

in Pinmapplelast year

Old Calton Burial ground

As graveyards go, this is pretty old, the vast expensive monuments out lasting their incumbents by centuries. There are stories to be told, history to be revealed, so brave the cold air blowing in off the Firth, the wet grass and the occasional fellow wanderer and immerse yourself amongst the dead.

_DSC9868.jpeg

The graveyard, accepted its first residents way back in 1718 after the land was purchased for the princely sum of £1,000 by the local Society of the Incorporated Trades.

_DSC9873.jpeg

The monuments and walls are now a historical listed building.

_DSC9869.jpeg

A mixture of overly grand structures,the humungus cylindrical tower is that of David Hume, a critical thinker and atheist. In his will he stated that a:

"Monument be built over my body, with an inscription containing only my Name and the Year of my Birth and Death"

To the fore front stands a monument topped by Abraham Lincoln, dedicated to the Scots who died fighting for the Union in the American Civil War. It is the only monument to the Civil War outside the United States.

_DSC9874.jpeg

_DSC9897.jpeg

Infant mortality was high. Families were big. I guess when there is nothing else to do........!!

_DSC9885.jpeg

Like locally born Mr. Burn an architect, builder and master mason and his wife Janet (12 surviving children out of 16).

For the love of god that poor woman must have had a fanny like a tattered windsock

_DSC9900.jpeg

Nelson's Monument in the far right distance, designed by Burn, who died before its completion.

_DSC9898.jpeg

The Battle of Corunna, was part of the bigger Napoleonic war, 35,000 British troops entered Spain, 8,000 did not return alive.

_DSC9895.jpeg

The Battle of Inkerman took place in the Crimea War, a battle won by the Allies against Imperial Russia, just one of 635 british troops who died in the battle. 175 French were killed. 3,286 Russians met their demise.

War what is it good for?
Absolutely nothing.

_DSC9888.jpeg

Archibald Constable book shop owner and publisher, in 181 bought the rights to obtained the publishing rights to the Encyclopædia Britannica

_DSC9876.jpeg

David Allan a Scottish painter, this monument was erected 78yrs after his death by The Royal Scottish Academy

_DSC9883.jpeg

William Raeburn perfumer to the Prince of Wales, who led such a wonderful gay life.

_DSC9878.jpeg

This imposing obelisk was erected in 1843 and is known as the Martyr's Monument. For challenging the upper ruling classes and fighting for Universal Suffrage, a number of individuals sentenced to deportation.

.....and some of the less notable

_DSC9891.jpeg

_DSC9894.jpeg

_DSC9893.jpeg

_DSC9890.jpeg

_DSC9899.jpeg

_DSC9879.jpeg

In days of yore, through the Gothic period and Victorian times, the population in general, or perhaps more so the hoi polloi revered death were fascinated by it, mediums. psychics and other assorted charlatans preyed on the gullible and needy.

_DSC9872.jpeg

Their love, fear of death extended to intricate carvings on gravestones

_DSC9875.jpeg

The skull and cross bones, crossed turf cutter tools and hourglass on its side all represent death, "Memento Mori" Remember Death. 1762.

_DSC9870.jpeg

Similar on this grave but with the hourglass taking wing

_DSC9880.jpeg

Time and tide so they saying goes, waits for no man, so lets leave these folk to sleep the sleep of the just and walk across the city to an even more stunning graveyard.

Tombstone Tourism is alive and kicking in Edinburgh

Sort:  

Hi @grindle,
Thank you for participating in the #teamuk curated tag. We have upvoted your quality content.
For more information visit our discord https://discord.gg/8CVx2Am

cheers @teamuksupport for your support, much appreciated

Dem old bones, you dragged up some history there lad!

Busy they were with no TV, 13 out of 16 not bad considering the plight and blight of old Blimey, excellent explore through the dead center.

@tipu curate

cheers @joanstewart , no good just visiting a place and shoving a few snaps up is there.

Like you, I enjoy the research and giving the populous some interesting facts where possible,

Congratulations, your post has been added to Pinmapple! 🎉🥳🍍

Did you know you have your own profile map?
And every post has their own map too!

Want to have your post on the map too?

  • Go to Pinmapple
  • Click the get code button
  • Click on the map where your post should be (zoom in if needed)
  • Copy and paste the generated code in your post (Hive only)
  • Congrats, your post is now on the map!

Wounderfull place .thanks for sharing these pictures .

cheers @vinayj for stopping by, thanks for engaging

Manually curated by brumest from the @qurator Team. Keep up the good work!

cheers @qurator for your continued support, much appreciate it

Old cemeteriesare can be very enjoyable to tour. The old markers are way more impressive than the ones people generally get today.

could not agree more! modern ones hold little interest for me tbh.

scenarios like this look like there were taken out of a movie but its just another place for locals, its strange how not been familiar with a place work tricks with the mind

cheers @skiptvads thanks for stopping by, check in at the weekend when I upload the "harry Potter' graveyard yawn!

Thats going to be an interesting one ✌️

👍 going uo today

Perfect place to wander over some graveyards… Edinburgh.
I like wandering around there. So much to see…
Especially when they are so old as you show us. Nice 😎😉
Thanks for sharing.
Have a beautiful week future @grindle
Cheers!

cheers @littlebee4 , very photogenic city indeed

Cheers @grindle 👋🏻😊

Reading your post reminded me of the visit I made last December to Prague, where I visited the Jewish Cemetery, and the funerary monuments are similar, we can do an exercise of imagination and go back in time to those times, oh enigmatic times.
Greetings from Romania.

hey cheers @triplug , thanks for stopping by. I have heard about that graveyard, I bet it is pretty cool, I was in Romania last June, a hectic schedule, so never got to see any graveyards, Totally agree with letting our imaginations take us back to different times

You're welcome.
When you schedule to come to Romania, make your schedule so that you can visit exactly what you like to visit the most, Romania has everything, you must be decided, hehe.

good point well made!!! cheers

Thanks!
Greetings from Romania.

hey @triplug greetings from Wales

Hello @grindle
Cheers from Romania.

I love a good old graveyard and nosing through the family history, it's amazing how much you can learn about people from their headstone

spot on @livinguktaiwan research and a good imagination and you can be transported back to earlier times.

Hiya, @LivingUKTaiwan here, just swinging by to let you know that this post made it into our Top 3 in Daily Travel Digest #1770.

Your post has been manually curated by the @pinmapple team. If you like what we're doing, please drop by to check out all the rest of today's great posts and consider supporting other authors like yourself and us so we can keep the project going!

Become part of our travel community:

awesome !!!! Thanks for your continued spport @livinguktaiwan @livinguktaiwan always appreciated

Can't beat an old graveyard. All my relatives were poor so tho I can trace ancestry to UK in 1700 or something there's no graves.

For the love of god that poor woman must have had a fanny like a tattered windsock

It stretches after the first few I think.

thanks for stopping by @riverflows you have done well getting that far back my search only took me to 1815.

t stretches after the first few I think.

Roflmao @riverflows

🤣🤣🤣🤣