The thesis deals with the phenomenon of burial, the understanding of death and the meaning of the cemetery as a final resting place and at the same time a closed and special spatial entity. Through time and space, and especially within Western, European civilisation and from the medieval period onwards (sometimes touching on some other spaces, cultures and periods), key changes began to take place at that time, both within the individual and in the wider, collective consciousness, which, over the centuries that followed, were embodied in the gradual changes of the cemetery. From the scattered and self-contained medieval churchyard where corpses rotted all over the place, to the subtle and artfully landscaped suburban park cemetery that sprang up in the Enlightenment as a response to the past and its stubborn traditions. In doing so, it took up the ideals of antiquity and looked to art for inspiration. The social changes over time were also clearly reflected in the space.
In particular, the role of the cemetery within human life in the village and later in the city is crucial, as a place where the relationship between the living and the dead is strongly expressed. The decline of the traditional cemetery and the rise of the modern cemetery have been gradual, simultaneous and intertwined, and the explanation of the various factors that have contributed to this is one of the main themes. As well as exploring the relationship of society and culture to death and the ways in which we cope with it. The text is interspersed with (graphic) analyses of a variety of cemeteries, each illustrating the unique characteristics of the spatial development of the cemetery through different historical and stylistic periods. Sometimes in an attempt to understand the elements that make up cemeteries and to define their interrelationships, or because of their familiarity and role in the development of the spaces of the dead.
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