brick and masonry chambers, with niches in the walls to con-
tain urns. Such was the expense of building them that sub-
scribers joined funeral cooperatives called collegia. Mean-
while, the poor and slaves were disposed of casually in pits,
initially on the Esquilline Hill. Beginning in the first century,
Romans began to copy Greek fashions of inhumation, which
had long been the practice throughout the eastern Mediterra-
nean. The motivation appears to have been display, since
Greek funerary monuments had developed from amphorae
over graves to structures elaborately decorated with an eclec-
tic iconography, including sphinxes and winged lions.
Roman versions can still be seen along the Via Appia, some
originally displaying bas-relief portraits of the occupants.
Also to be seen in Rome are the catacombs of the early Chris-
tian era, which represent a continuation of the Middle East-
ern practice of burial in caves or rock-cut tombs.
Underground vaults are another common development
from simple earth burial, and not only in the Mediterranean.
In much of sub-Saharan Africa, graves are roofed with logs
before being covered over.
A stone vault built above ground is usually described as
a mausoleum, after the massive tomb of King Mausolus in
Asia Minor. In central Borneo, ironwood mausoleums were
constructed on top of large pilings. Sometimes thirty feet or
more high and delicately carved in swirling designs, they are
the premier artistic achievements of the region. They may
contain coffins, large jars used for corpses, or smaller ones
for bones collected after secondary treatment, with some-
times a dozen or more sets of remains in one aerial chamber.
Adjacent to them are simple earth burials.
LOCATION OF TOMBS AND LOCATION OF THE DEAD. There
are striking differences from culture to culture in where
tombs are located in relation to the community. In New
Britain, corpses were buried directly under the floor of the
house, with the explicit aim of keeping the dead with their
kinsmen. Pressure from missionaries and colonial authorities
forced an end to the practice, but the dead are still buried
as close to their houses as possible. In parts of eastern Indone-
sia, corpses were buried under the dance ground in the mid-
dle of the village. Moreover, kin and neighbors were required
to sit by uncomplaining during a long wake because bodily
corruption was seen as a positive process that allowed the de-
ceased to return to mother earth. At the same time the dead
were associated with ancestral villages in the mountains, so
that they had a complex multiple presence for the living.
In Borneo, the elaborate mausoleums described above
were sited across the river from communal longhouses, so
that flowing water formed a barrier between the living and
the dead. The mausoleums were described as houses of the
dead; they were raised on pilings like the longhouse, and no
one entered this village of the dead without very good reasons
for fear that the inhabitants would see the intrusion as the
arrival of a new member. This perception was contradicted,
however, by long sacred chants at the funeral that took the
deceased on a riverine journey to the land of the dead. Con-
sequently, the dead were seen as simultaneously both near
and far, and that mystery contributed much to the power
and drama of indigenous ritual. The entire community of
ancestors was invited to funerals by other chants, but great
care was taken to disentangle them from the living after the
deceased was delivered to them.
Archaeological data from China show evidence of buri-
als beneath the house, but in recent centuries the living have
been careful not to live near graveyards for fear of unquiet
ghosts. However, in many Chinese communities, both in
China and abroad, ancestors figure prominently in the rituals
of extended kin groups, and they are represented by tablets
in special ancestor temples. Moreover, the location of the
tombs is thought to have a major influence, and the ancient
techniques of feng shui, or “wind and water,” are designed
to site deceased family members so that they deflect evil and
funnel blessings towards the living.
RELIQUARIES, STUPAS, AND CENOTAPHS. A special case of
the ambiguous presence of the dead is provided by holy rel-
ics. In medieval Europe there was a brisk trade in body parts
supposedly belonging to saints, and they were handled lov-
ingly and stored in valuable reliquaries. Yet the virtue of the
relics is, to say the least, doctrinally obscure. The saints are
presumably in heaven, and there is no reason why their bless-
ing should somehow inhere in their blood or bones. The par-
adox is sharper in Buddhism, but from its beginnings relics
of the Buddha have been enshrined in large stupas that be-
came centers of pilgrimage. Officially, relics, like statues,
have no power other than to provide a focus of individual
meditation, yet they have become national symbols. When
the Portuguese conquered Sri Lanka they seized the relic
housed in the Temple of the Tooth in Kandy, ground it into
powder and threw it in the sea. But faith is not so easily de-
stroyed. Within a short time the relic was miraculously redis-
covered by a fisherman in his net and restored to its rightful
place. Even when there are no remains in a tomb, it may be-
come a national symbol, as with the Cenotaph in London,
which honors the dead of both world wars.
CHANGING STYLES OF TOMBS IN ENGLAND AND THE UNIT-
ED STATES. Since the eighth century, graveyards in England
were located within settlements next to the parish church.
Consequently, villagers attending services were reminded of
their forebears, now resting under the protection of the
church. The elaboration of grave markers also served to re-
mind them of the local social order. Throughout the Middle
Ages, senior clerics tried to prohibit burials inside the church,
which were seen as desecrating. One thirteenth-century prel-
ate grumbled that such was the clutter of memorials that the
graveyard appeared to have moved inside the church. It was
difficult, however, to refuse landowners who patronized
churches so that they could be buried there. Life-sized effi-
gies were not unusual atop grand family tombs.
The urbanization accompanying the industrial revolu-
tion changed this pattern. City churches could no longer
provide space, and graveyards had to be moved to the out-TOMBS 9227