FT389 19HULTO
NARCHIVE/GETTYIMAGESinburialplaces.Setagainstthisarethe
widespread and entrenched beliefs found
in many culturesthat regardcemeteries
to be abodes of spirits.Suchideas have
been current for thousandsofyearsin the
Middle East, dating back to the civilisations
of Sumer,ancient Egypt and Babylonia.
Contemporaryexamples can be foundin
reports emerging in September 2019 from
Wadi-us-Salaam, the largest cemetery in
the world, situated at Najaf, Iraq.InArabic,
its name means ‘the field of peace’but for
some of its gravediggers, the dead are not
resting quietly.
The scale of the cemetery is
staggering. Itsvastness can only really be
comprehended from the air.First used for
burials more than 1,200yearsago, the
number of graves is not knownexactly,with
estimatessuggesting up to fivemillion, the
numbersswollen over the last 40years by
warfare and insurgency in the country.
As reported byAl-Jazeera,complaints are
coming from cemetery workers reporting
attacks by supernatural beings.Some
locals attribute these toasolid apparition,
variously known as ‘Tantal’, ‘Bzebza’, or
‘Gheria’. Hani Al Ghnaim,a61-year-old
gravedigger who has worked there for 11
years,claims there are two entities,one
livingand one dead. He believes the ghost
appears in different guises,including a
worm,achild and“a catinalarge fur
coat”–andfeedsoncorpses.Venturing
into the cemetery at night, Mr Al Ghnaim
arms himself withapick for protection. If
he encountersanapparition he screams to
driveitoff.
Some gravediggershavequit entirely.
Others reportsuffering physical assaults
by corpses being buried. One employee,
MurtazaJwadAbo Sebi,aged 23, recalled:
“It happened at night whileIwasworking
down inagrave to putadead woman in
her tomb during the funeral ceremony.
WhenIbent down, her hand slapped my
face so fiercely thatIwas left petrified.”
Despite his puzzlementastohow the
dead body,wrappedinashroud could
lash out, he receivedasevere shock and
underwentalasting traumatic reaction.
He attemptedsuicideand underwent a
courseoftreatment and psychotherapy at
the American UniversityHospital in Beirut,
Lebanon. He is now happily recovered and
married.
Less fortunatewasanother victim, Haider
al-Hatemi. He believes hewasstruck in
December 2016 byaghost“resembling
ashadow”, that“sneaked up behind me
and hit my head violently, leavingmebadly
injured.”Whatever occurred, there has been
adisturbing aftermath.Now unable towalk
straight, he believesaspirit has possessed
his body for morethan twoyears. Despite
costly shamanic healingsessions,Mral-
Hatemi remains ill and his wife is divorcing
him because of his behaviour.
According to Ameer Al Juboury,23, who
manages the gravediggers unit, ghostsare
walking because their burial plots arebeing
illegally sold by family membersonthe black
market. Presumably these spirits are angry
over being denied theirrightful graves,a
resting place in the cemetery being much
coveted by many of the Shia faithful,ortheir
remains have been disinterred by usurpers.
Alternatively,wheninterviewed about
these stories, Sajida Jalazai, Assistant
Professor ofReligionatTrinity University in
SanAntonio,Texas,tentatively identified
these entitiesasspecimens of‘ghuls’from
a“class of djinn that dineonthe flesh of
the livingand dead humans”that haunt
cemeteries. (Source:‘Gravediggers claim
ghostshaunt world’s largest cemetery’Al-
Jazeera,10Sep 2019).
Fromarationalist viewpoint, it is not
unknown for professionals dealingwith
the dead to become emotionally affected
by theirworkenvironment. Several
archæologists andmuseum curators havetoldmehow theybecameunsettledby
uncoveringhuman remains,orfrom working
in stores containing hundreds of collected
bone shards.With so many staff at the
colossal site,workers atWadi-Al-Salaam
might well includeasmall proportion
of employees especially sensitiveor
susceptible to such conditions,suffering
anxiety attacks or even hallucinatory
experiences.Without morebackground
information and furtherinvestigation,itis
impossible to reach any conclusiveverdict
on the meaning and significance of these
experiences.
What can be said is thatWestern
apparitional encounters in cemeteries –
rare to begin with–seldom displayany
corporealelement. Although poltergeist
manifestations are defined by physical
effects,any alleged entities are domestic,
intangible and invisible,with little evidence
that they “invade the tomb”. (See‘Do
Poltergeists Invade theTo mb?’ inGhosts
and Poltergeists,1953, by Herbert
Thurston).
Occasionally,British cemeteries have
beenthe focus forpanics andscares
prompting mass ghost hunts for seemingly
material entities.The Hammersmith ghost
of 1803-04wasasuicide interred in the
graveyard, considered sufficiently physical
for an off-duty customs officer to shoot at it,
withfatal results foralivingman,aplasterer
wearing white overalls mistakenasthe
apparition. (SeeANatural History Ghosts,
2012, by Roger Clarke; ‘The Hammersmith
Ghost’byAlanMurdie inJustice of the
Peace, 2003 ,v.167, pp. 975-77;also
FT296:42-45, 310:34-35.)
In the 20th centuryahunt for‘a vampire
withiron teeth’blewupataGlasgow
community graveyardonthe evening of
11 September1954.The graveyardfilled
withyoung children armed with stakes and
knives,searchingout avampire claimed
to have slain two infants (seeFT294:48).
Attemptsbyapoliceman to movethe
children on failed and the group hunted
for thevampire for hours,onlygoing home
when it started torain. Over the next two
eveningsgangs of children returned, but
the hunt petered out. No children were
prosecuted as all participantsfell below the
ageofcriminal responsibility in Scotland.
(Furthermore,aslater observedatHighgate
Cemetery in similar incidents occurring in
1970-74, it is not technicallyacrime to hunt
vampires).
Folklorists have puzzled over the
significance of the solid “vampirewith
ironteeth” .Though superficiallyhavinga
resonance with the ancient Middle East,LEFT:The Hammersmith Ghost caused a
cemetery scare–andafatal shooting–inearly
19th centuryLondon.Aghost“sneaked upbehind me and andhit my head violently,leaving me shaken”