Marisia - Maros Megyei Múzeum Évkönyve 33/4. (2013)
Articles
258 Zs. Nyárádi of roof tiles, support the idea that it was created during the 18th century. We collected the bone material found in secondary position and reburied it in the abandoned cemetery found east of the church. By the middle of the 17th century the cemetery had become considerably full and because of this a new cemetery was opened east of the church, on the right side of Kányád creek, which was already being used in 1665.45 In spite of the opening of a new cemetery, the wealthier families in the village continued to use the cemetery surrounding the church. b. The cemetery’s internal chronology At first observation of the churchyard, it became clear that the medieval cemetery was still used rather intensively during the 19th century. Because the construction plans included a 40-50 cm level deepening, before the work commenced we surveyed the gravestones found inside the churchyard and we removed all but two of them. The last burial was done in 1898. We identified a total of 27 gravestones, four of which had only their bases remaining, which had been buried in the ground, and nine had the inscriptions completely eroded of their sandstone surfaces. Three of the gravestones dated back to the 18th century and the rest to the 19th century. Beside the graves, which had been marked with tombstones, there were also other unmarked graves dating back to the same century. By this time however, there were already secular laws forbidding burials near churches. The first such secular decrees regulating burials were issued under the reign of Maria Theresa and their primary goal was to create more hygienic burial practices. These applied to every religious denomination.46 The first decree was issued in 1769, stipulating that the dead are to be buried deeper and that cemeteries are to be surrounded with fences as protection from grazing cattle. Later on wake ceremonies were prohibited, and further decrees stipulated that dead bodies are not to be left unburied for more than two days and that they should not be taken to the church but directly to the cemetery. New decrees were issued in 1775, which came into force in Hungary in 1777. Burials inside churches were prohibited, even inside crypts, and even their construction inside churches are also prohibited.47 The coming 45 LiberEccl. 1664,129. 46 Nyárádi 2012, 7-45. 47 Hóman-Szegfű 1939,515,517-519. into force of these decrees did not always generate fundamental changes in distant villages. The fact that they were reissued in 180748 and in 180849 indicates that they were not really abided. A new decree appears in 1876, according to which: ‘every commune must maintain a properly fitted communal burial place, corresponding to the local population and to health needs ’.50 This law effectively prohibited burials in the area of used churches, but as we can see this decree was also disregarded. During the excavation 9% of the graves dated back to the 19th century and out of the 20 identified graves only five were excavated. These had sizeable deep pits which cut through each of the construction layers and their filling was exceptionally loose and disturbed (Plate 4.1-2). Their pits destroyed a considerable number of earlier graves and we found much of their bone material scattered in secondary position inside their filling. In many cases, larger pieces were barely preserved of the coffins nailed with forged nails. The excavated graves were in medium condition, the smaller bones and the middle section of the skeleton were completely absorbed in many cases. Travelling back in time, the next graves were the ones connected to layers of the 18th century renovation of the church. In spite of the fact that a new cemetery was opened during the 17th century, during the 18th century the old burial place became more intensively used. Out of the 225 excavated graves, 59 dated back to this period, representing 26 percent of the total number. The depth of these burials corresponded with the provisions of the sanitary decrees as their depth was about 2 meters51 and their filling was exceptionally loose, containing the materials of many disturbed layers and graves. Their pits cut through the geological black humus and yellow clay layers, in many cases reaching even the stony subsoil, especially in the cemetery’s eastern part (Plate 5.1). These graves were in relatively bad condition with their bone material mostly absorbed. In many cases only the upper plank part of the coffin could be documented, in some cases with nothing was left from the bones. The next group of burials dated back to the period of the Principality, as the new cemetery was opened in the 17th century, the use of the 48 SREkL I. 116. 49 TUEkL I. entry dating back to 1808. 50 PEKT 1913, 331. 51 PEKT 1913, 331.
