Fallen Stones - Msida Bastion Cemetery

Fallen Stones
Msida Bastion Cemetery - Malta

Charles McCorrie VC

 

Charles McCorrie VC

Msida Bastion Cemetery - Malta

"He was approx. 25 years old, and a Private in the 57th Regiment (later Middlesex Regiment (Duke of Cambridge's Own)), British Army, during the Crimean War when the following deed took place for which he was awarded the VC. On 23 June 1855 at Sebastopol, in the Crimea, Private McCorrie threw over the parapet a live shell which had been thrown from the enemy's battery.
He died in Malta on 8 April 1857"

Sir Robert Cavendish Spencer,

Sir Francis Freemantle (1765 – 1819)



Vice-Admiral Sir Thomas Francis Fremantle
Upper Barraka Gardens - Valetta



Fra Dom Vincenzo Labini




Maltese Death, Mourning, and Funeral Customs
A. Cremona
"Folklore"  Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec. 31, 1923)

"The hiring of poor women and beggars to pray over and watch the corpse for the whole night. This custom prevails mostly in Gozo. In old days official female mourners, named neiffiieha (from neiiiiah, " to cry ") were employed. The prac- tice was abolished in Malta during the plague of A.D. 1676.1 Sicilians employed mourners called Praeficae or Reputatrices, a custom of Greek and Roman origin and practised by the Irish until A.D. 1849. It still prevails among the Corsicans and the Sahara tribes of Algeria.

The old ceremonial of the Maltese female mourners is described by Abela as follows :- They wore trailing veils (kurkdr), and when they entered the premises of the deceased they cut down the bower vines in the yard and threw the flower pots from the balconies and windows into the street. They searched the house for the finest piece of china, dashed it on the floor, and mixed the fragments with ashes from the hearth. They boiled the whole together in a pot, and with the mixture washed the door posts and window shutters of the house. During these proceedings they sang couplets which ended in long-drawn sighs and lamentations. Then they gathered round the corpse and knelt down, extolling the virtues of the deceased, the relations joining in their mourning".

Aristocracy and death

© Godric Godricson

Barraka Gardens, Valetta

© Godric Godricson

Hope and Justice



Giving the best of human work to God in Malta
© Godric Godricson



An Israelite belief in the afterlife is evident over time and amplified in II Maccabees and I Enoch. In effect, it could be argued that in the centuries immediately preceding Jesus, the idea of a bodily resurrection was well understood and would not have needed a detailed explanation. The association of death, religion and burial was already made and understood.

The question seems to be "What was it in the conceptualisation of the Resurrection of Jesus that unified earlier Jewish beliefs in a physical resurrection?" What was contained within post exilic and apocalyptic traditions which had the power to inspire gentiles with no knowledge of such religious traditions?  It seems that a new facet gained prominence in Jewish beliefs surrounding resurrection as a concept and specifically in the Resurrection of Jesus. This new facet departed from the emphasis of the earlier Hebrew Bible  and  this new facet was the idea of ‘Hope’. The dark, vague and forbidding Sheol of the earlier  Hebrew Bible was  sometimes ameliorated by positive, or hopeful, images although the most optimistic post exilic and apocalyptic imagery surrounding resurrection did not contain such ideas of hope as made manifest in the Resurrection of Jesus.  In this Christian death we see something better than life on earth and something to be desired,

The success of The Resurrection as an idea is that it unites ‘hope’ with ‘justice’ and ideas of theodicy.  It may be that an early belief in God; without hope of reward is subsequently seasoned by ideas of ‘justice’. This development in theology evidences a change in the way that the relationship between mankind and God is perceived by humanity. We now have a positive carrot to encourage humanity and to balance the stick.

Mourning clothes

Maltese Death, Mourning, and Funeral Customs
A. Cremona
"Folklore"  Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec. 31, 1923)

© Godric Godricson

"The wearing of special mourning clothes was general in the fourteenth century, but became less marked by the year 1700. Women used to wear woollen trailing skirts and dark shawls over their heads. Some better-class people wore one black transparent veil over the head and another veil of black silk taffeta over the gown, reaching to the waist. A sort of Majorca woollen cloth is prescribed for mourning wear to the heirs under a will of A.D. 1543.

The Grand Master's suite wore a special garment called Scoto, of thin light serge. Although it is nowadays customary with some families to put on as little mourning as possible and to shorten its period, a full mourning dress is worn by others for two full years after the death of parents. The simplest style of mourning, a black necktie and a crape arm band, is in general use after the death of a distant relative".

Lamps and lights

Maltese Death, Mourning, and Funeral Customs
A. Cremona
"Folklore"  Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec. 31, 1923)

© Godric Godricson

"An oil lamp is often lit and left for forty days before the Crucifix or image of the Madonna in the death chamber. This is supposed to please the soul of the departed, whose ghost is in this way prevented from haunting the house. In some of the Gozo villages the persons attending the corpse to the burial- ground return in procession after the funeral mass to the room of the deceased, where they kneel down and say the rosary before the Crucifix, placed on a chest covered with white cloth, and between two lighted candles which are afterwards replaced by the devotional oil lamps".

Borma tal-Fqdr

Maltese Death, Mourning, and Funeral Customs
A. Cremona
"Folklore"  Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec. 31, 1923)

© Godric Godricson

"Some families give the poor bread. The love-feasts of the primitive Christians were in mediaeval times replaced in both Malta and Sicily by the distribution of cakes and of boiled wheat mixed with sesame. Distributions of meat and bread to the poor came also to be a custom at some festas, but were continued in Sicily mainly by the giving of beans and bread on All Souls' Day. In Malta on that day, however, the old custom has been replaced by the free kitchens or the "Potage for the Poor" (Borma tal-Fqdr)".

Vistu

Maltese Death, Mourning, and Funeral Customs
A. Cremona
"Folklore"  Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec. 31, 1923)

© Godric Godricson

"Mourning customs in Malta have during the last century passed through wide changes and, as in other European coun- tries, have reverted to a more simple type. Some are purely mediaeval, and are influenced by the prolonged intercourse with Sicily and Italy during the rule of the Grand Masters. The vernacular term for mourning is vistu, corresponding to the Sicilian visitusu (" to be in mourning ")".

Mourning dinners

Maltese Death, Mourning, and Funeral Customs
A. Cremona
"Folklore"  Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec. 31, 1923)

© Godric Godricson

"Old custom prohibited cooking for three days, and the family of the deceased was provided with meals by friends or distant relatives. This rule was, and perhaps is still, followed in some districts of Sicily and amongst Arab tribes of Northern Africa. While meals were being served the bereaved family sat with folded legs on the floor, which was covered with a straw mat. The historian Ciantar relates in 1772 that these mourning dinners still took place in his early days. This custom has now been discontinued, and our village people merely abstain from having their pastry and other food prepared in a public oven for a period of some months after the death of a member of the family".

H.M.T.B. ORWELL

 


Plaque
Upper Barraka Gardens - Valetta  [Link]

© Godric Godricson



IN

MEMORY OF

Mr. EDWARD SMITH GUNNER R.N.
FREDERICK WHITE P.O. 1 CL.
WILLIAM JONES P.O. 1 CL.
JOSEPH NORTH P.O. 2 CL.
ARTHUR EDWARDS A.B.
RICHARD FIDDICK A.B.
WILLIAM McCLURE A.B.
WILLIAM RYAN A.B.
JOHN FROOD A.B.
WILLIAM BROOKS A.B.
WILLIAM BOYCE A.B.
WILLIAM MAYOR A.B.
WILLIAM McCORMACK LDG. SIG.
WALTER ORRIN QUAL. SIG.
WILLIAM PERRY LDG. STO. 1 CL.

OF H.M.T.B. DESTROYER "ORWELL" WHO LOST THEIR LIVES IN THE COLLISION BETWEEN THAT SHIP AND H.M. SHIP "PIONEER" OFF CAPE VARLAM ON THE  30TH JANUARY 1903.

ERECTED BY THE OFFICERS MEN OF THE FLEET.

Rinaldo Sceberras-Testaferrata



Plaque
Upper Barraka Gardens - Valetta  [Link]
© Godric Godricson

Find a Grave [Link]



How it all began

© Godric Godricson

I started wandering around in churchyards when I was a child and I still recall my parents looking anxiously when I asked for permission to go and have a look at our local churchyard.  I think I was about 12 years old and the habit had begun.  After that time, I would often find my parents parking the car by the side of the road as I ran off into the churchyard to have a look at the monuments and see what was there.  Looking back at it;  my parents were very tolerant of my apparently strange interest in headstones and graveyards.  I remember my mother having a very serious chat with me on one occasion about the reasons for my 'cemetery addiction' and I have to say that I don't think she was very satisfied with the response.  So, what was it about cemeteries and graveyards that interested a child?



Argotti Botanic Gardens & Herbarium
Valetta [Link]

© Godric Godricson

Well, I didn't have one of those 'difficult' childhoods. There wasn't a 'mean and moody',  testosterone driven young person who sought sanctuary from parents in the isolation of the cemetery.  There are no dark Gothic themes playing out in my life.  I wasn't running away from anything, instead, I was running towards something. That 'something' was a liking for the architecture of church buildings, the design and construction of churchyard monuments and the peace and tranquillity that comes from the well manicured lawn.  Oh, well manicured lawns............... I'm not addicted to them like some people are and in many ways a parish churchyard in the United Kingdom is often likely to own a rather rough lawn.  That is the way I like it now but when I was a child  I think I appreciated the attention to detail that can manifest itself after the mower has been out and cut down the long grass.

© Godric Godricson

I suppose, in some ways, a liking for well cut lawns was a cultural hangover from Victorian times when cemeteries were  rather beautiful gardens for the dead. Cemeteries were to be looked after and maintained and to be pristine.  I now buy into the idea of cemeteries being much more unkempt and being like wildlife islands in the middle of large towns and cities.  I quite like the idea of urban cemeteries being places of the living where busy office workers can enjoy their sandwich whilst waiting to go back to work and where rather bored teenagers can dream about future lives whilst they text each other incessantly on mobile phones.  Cemeteries are not just  places for the dead. They are places that tell us about the living (both now and in the past).  I have to say I am an inveterate people watcher and cemeteries often provide the perfect place to watch people coming and going and living their lives.  The well-behaved family as well as the rather poor immigrant worker hoping to pass an idle moment are all evident in the urban landscape.


© Godric Godricson

I did go to Durham University for a few years and took an archaeology course ( I am not an archaeologist)  and this merely fanned the flames when it came to cemeteries and what they contained.  So, I have some knowledge of what goes on underground when the earth is thrown onto the box.  Archaeology is one of those things that runs through my life and which entertains, amuses and informs my life.  I'm so pleased to have spent some time at Durham which is a privileged place set in a landscape of economic deprivation.  Again, I suppose I start to see contradictions and it is perhaps the contradictions between one thing and another that I enjoy and find satisfying in cemeteries.

I particularly like rural cemeteries.  In the United Kingdom we have so many old parish Churches that perhaps we often miss the beauty that is ever present in the rural landscape. Rural cemeteries are magnificent places and sometimes you will find a particularly fine carving or an incredibly beautiful sculpture.  Most likely,  you will find a fairly ordinary headstone telling the everyday lives of ordinary people and that is absolutely OK .  Ordinary people leading ordinary lives is what this country was all about and what it continues to be about.  Yes, there are magnificent monuments and mausolea that are  unusual and relate to historic and noble families although such structures often have little relationship to the contemporary visitor who now walks in the cemetery and sees the world going by.

© Godric Godricson

This blog is about the places that I go and the places where I take  pictures and explore the immense heritage that we have in United Kingdom.  The blog is not a creepy place because I'm not a creepy person.  I believe that the glass is always half full rather than half empty and I always see the bright side of situations.  In cemeteries, rather than simply a place for the dead,  I perceive an environmental bolthole where life will manifest itself no matter what happens.