Graves in the grass

There are no surviving gravestones at Greyfriars dated pre 1606. There is one fragment that may bear a date of 1596, but we can’t be sure of its age. We do know there were some grave markers erected between the 1560’s and the early 1600’s but these were cleared away by order of the City Council at various times in that period. It appears the Council were concerned that headstones erected on the grass area of the Kirkyard would limit the capacity of the Kirkyard to accommodate vast numbers of burials. It was also consistent with the policy of the new reformed church that everyone should be buried in secret (meaning without grave markers). However, from 1606 onwards the council allowed wealthy families to buy the right to erect mural monuments against the walls of the Kirkyard. This raised valuable funds for building the Kirk without significantly reducing the capacity of the grass area. But move on to the 1700’s and a few very small headstones start to be allowed on the grass. These photos show the oldest two that I have spotted. One is very clearly dated 1712. The other appears to be dated 1703. Such small headstones may have been considered acceptable as they don’t take up much space. By contrast, other burial grounds in and around Edinburgh in the 1700’s allowed far larger & more elaborate stone memorials on the grass, but at Greyfriars in the 1700’s large memorials were still limited to the walls. On the grass only quite basic, small, solid, simple stones appear at Greyfriars. However, by the very end of the 1700’s the council started allowing larger and more plentiful headstones in some open grassed areas of the Kirkyard, perhaps because the volume of new burials were starting to reduce as Edinburgh began opening new large cemeteries in other areas of the City. Another reason for the small & simple stones on the grass in the 1700’s may be that in that period Greyfriars’ main grassed areas were regarded as a poor man’s burial place with the wealthy folk only wanting the best wall side plots or those in the newly opened Covenanter Prison extension.

Only one of the small headstones dating to the 1700’s has any symbolism on it. This one dated 1775 has a set square & compass, which are Masonic symbols and the tools of a Mason.