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<p>Archaeological works at St. Mark’s Church, Surbiton, revealed careful cemetery management with brick-built graves designed for inhumation burials. However, seven burials (7/200, 3.5%) excavated under an archaeological watching brief were cremation burials. These early modern remains provide an important insight into local ecclesiastical acceptance of a newly reformed manner of disposal of the dead within a suburban churchyard. Ad-hoc brick extensions enabled the secondary interment of two cremation urns into existing inhumation graves while one further cremation urn was interred directly next to a wooden coffin. Two further cremation burials were buried adjacently but directly overlying an inhumation grave. Stratigraphic sequences and surviving documentation demonstrate the importance of family burial traditions despite differing modes of interment. Six ceramic urns were found matching those advertised by the Cremation Society of England and two were sealed with lead stamped tags showing direct evidence of Society involvement in provisioning cremations. Unusually, one English multifunctional stoneware vessel was found and fragments of wooden surrounds and a small metal grip plate indicate some urns were buried in wooden cremation coffins. Three cremation burials dated to 1918, 1920, and 1933. While the practice was deemed legal in 1884, early modern cremation was not widely utilized; only 1,796 cremations took place in 1920. As archaeological investigations of the late Victorian/Edwardian and interwar assemblages are rare, this study makes an important addition to the corpus of burial data from post-medieval Britain during periods of social change, industrialization and world conflict.</p>

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Rare Archaeological Evidence of Early Modern Cremation Burials and Mixed Burial Practices in a Suburban Parish Churchyard

  • 期刊论文

  • 发表日期：

    2025年3月31日

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  • Rachel Ives

摘要

Archaeological works at St. Mark’s Church, Surbiton, revealed careful cemetery management with brick-built graves designed for inhumation burials. However, seven burials (7/200, 3.5%) excavated under an archaeological watching brief were cremation burials. These early modern remains provide an important insight into local ecclesiastical acceptance of a newly reformed manner of disposal of the dead within a suburban churchyard. Ad-hoc brick extensions enabled the secondary interment of two cremation urns into existing inhumation graves while one further cremation urn was interred directly next to a wooden coffin. Two further cremation burials were buried adjacently but directly overlying an inhumation grave. Stratigraphic sequences and surviving documentation demonstrate the importance of family burial traditions despite differing modes of interment. Six ceramic urns were found matching those advertised by the Cremation Society of England and two were sealed with lead stamped tags showing direct evidence of Society involvement in provisioning cremations. Unusually, one English multifunctional stoneware vessel was found and fragments of wooden surrounds and a small metal grip plate indicate some urns were buried in wooden cremation coffins. Three cremation burials dated to 1918, 1920, and 1933. While the practice was deemed legal in 1884, early modern cremation was not widely utilized; only 1,796 cremations took place in 1920. As archaeological investigations of the late Victorian/Edwardian and interwar assemblages are rare, this study makes an important addition to the corpus of burial data from post-medieval Britain during periods of social change, industrialization and world conflict.