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IMC 2018: Sessions

Session 1647: Burials and Memory in Context: From Disturbed Graves to Burial Monuments

Thursday 5 July 2018, 11.15-12.45

Sponsor:Department of Medieval Studies, Central European University, Budapest
Organiser:József Laszlovszky, Department of Medieval Studies, Central European University, Budapest
Moderator/Chair:Alice Choyke, Department of Medieval Studies, Central European University, Budapest
Paper 1647-aDisturbed Graves and Bad Memories: Deviant Burials in the Northern Balkan Region and Their Archaeological, Religious, and Legal Context
(Language: English)
Petar Parvanov, Department of Medieval Studies, Central European University, Budapest
Index terms: Archaeology - Sites, Daily Life, Law, Religious Life
Paper 1647-bDesacred Memory: A Medieval Crime Unveiled - Disturbed Burials of Monks from the Cistercian Grange of Pomáz-Nagykovácsi
(Language: English)
Mária Vargha, Department of Medieval Studies, Central European University, Budapest
Index terms: Archaeology - Sites, Canon Law, Monasticism, Religious Life
Paper 1647-cLoss of Memory: Thoughts on the Duration of Medieval Tombs
(Language: English)
Robert Marcoux, Département d'histoire, Université Laval, Québec
Index terms: Ecclesiastical History, Religious Life
Abstract

Medieval burials in churches or in churchyard cemeteries were regulated by canon law and ecclesiastical traditions. Burial monuments or the consecrated area of Christian cemeteries offered space for a wide range of memorial practices and different types of burial monuments emerged to commemorate the members of the community. More recent archaeological studies and investigations of church interiors with burial monuments have revealed a number of unusual practices and patterns. The comparison of deviant burials in pre-Christian and Christianized societies became an important research question in medieval burial archaeology. Furthermore, the new interpretation of disturbed graves or re-used burial monuments have changed our understanding of traditional burial practices in the Middle Ages. The three papers of the session focus on the archaeological interpretation of deviant burials in different types of cemeteries or disturbed graves in medieval churches. Their interpretation is not only important for the concepts and regulations connected to burial practices, but also for medieval memory studies.