Harold Miller asked:

>... why the earliest graves are the farthest from the 1787
>road and the nearest house across the road, and why all of the stones face
>east, rather than north towards the road. In a deep, narrow lot, would one
>not assume the stones would face the entrance on the road?

I have been working on a cemetery resrearch project for a number of years
that looks at these very questions and more.  Cemeteries are often looked
at as just sources for genealogical information, but they are so full of
patterns reflecting human behavior that it makes your head spin.

In a study of 60 cemeteries in western Madison County, NY, I noted
orientation of the grave and placement of the headstones among the general
genealogical, landscape and demographic data that I collected.  I ran into
many situations, that, like that encountered by Harold, made me ask "what
was going on here!?!?"

Most of this data looks at pre-1860 cemeteries, as after that date, with
the kicking in of the "Rural Cemetery Movement" and the rise of the
man-made landscape, these patterns almost entirely disapeared.  In many old
cemeteres that are still in use today, you can see the formal pattern of
the old part contrasting the sweeping avenues of the later designs.

Here's a clip from the draft of what I have been writing:

"Of the over 60 cemeteries in this study, I was able to determine
orientation of the graves in 47 cemeteries (some the cemeteries are reports
only and no field data is available).  These 47 cemeteries ranged in
earliest possible founding date from 1795 to 1853.  I found that there was
a strict adherence to the rule of orienting the rows to the north and
south.  As the rows were oriented north to south the burials were obviously
perpendicular to this and thus met the oftcited Christian practice of
burial with the head to the west and feet to the east so the dead could
face the rising sun on the day of the resurrection (my priomary question in
this reguard is, what happens if the resurrection occurs on a cloudy day or
in the late afternoon?). Even in the earliest cemeteries (settlement of the
are began in 1793) have the rows of graves oriented to within a few degrees
of north (with the bodies lying with the head to west and the feet to the
east).  I have looked at changes in local magnetic variation hoping to
identify when the cemetery was laid out, but this came to naught.

"This general N-S and E-W bearing was perhaps easy to achieve because the
Great Lot divisions of the historic landscape were only 3 degrees off from
north, but that does not explain the strict adherence to the N-S
orientation of the rows (E-W of the bodies) found in several cemeteries in
which the major landscape feature was not a Great Lot line but a road that
went off at an angle, or where the cemeteries were situated upon landscape
features such as ridges and gravel knolls where following the contours of
the land would have been far more efficient.  One cemetery, still in use,
has graves in places where it is difficult to stand and others enclose
entire gravel knobs with graves [figuratively] cascading down the steep
sides.  Only one cemetery was noticeably anomalous to this pattern with a
row bearing of North 20 degrees West; this being a cemetery situated at an
intersection of two roads which were angled to the Great Lot lines.  It
still fit the perception of placing the bodies with the heads to the west
and feet to the east, so I presume that much of a deviation was acceptable."


I also noted that many stones faced away from the cemetery entrance and
visitors to the grave would have had to walk around the grave to see the
name on the stone.  I presume that this was so that people would not have
to step on the grave to read the name, as we have to do today.  I also
noted that the markings on the footstone also faced away from the
grave.  This explanation is not fully acceptable as you would have to stand
on another grave in order to read the stone.  Perhaps it was so that you
did not have to stand on your loved one's grave, and who cares about the
other people?  Strict adherence to this rule was also seen in several
cemeteries where the road and entrance was on the east but not a single
stone could be read unless you walked around to the back side of the
cemetery.  I did considerable research on early roads trying to find if the
entrance to the cemetery had changed, but in all cases the present road
alignment pre-dated the establishment of the cemetery.

Exceptions to these patterns do exist, and I have found that it often
indicates some anomaly in how the cemetery developed.  I found that stones
that were out of alignment or facing a different way were usually graves
that had been removed from abandoned cemeteries and were late additions to
the cemetery.  Stones that are very close together indicates
in-filling.  There are many ways to tell that a cemetery had been
re-arranged at a later date.  I know of one cemetery in Virgil, Cortland
Co., that has had all its stones turned around and lined up, first so as to
make it easy to mow, but also so you could read them all easily (a sad
thing as it destroyed the entire historic pattern of the cemetery.)  Many
old New England graveyards also suffered this sad fate in cleanup and
restoration efforts.

Reasons for the location of cemeteries is a tough question to address.  I
found a number of factors such as land form, close to a road, in sight of a
house, has a nice view, central to the neighborhood, near a church, etc.
that could help explain why a cemetery was in a particular
location.  Having a good view was a particularly obvious factor, although
finding a 'bad' view in Cazenovia is tough.  Soiul type may have played a
role, although well drained soil of any sort was chosen.

There were some few observances which made little sense, and there are
several cemeteries where the earliest graves are to the back of the
cemetery.  On the contrary there were many with oldest graves in the
front.  Many cemeteries seemed to be organized or surveyed into plots from
the beginning and had a nice even dispersal of dates across the cemetery,
with family plots being the most prominent pattern.  Others were clusters
on high ground with later burials filling in between.

Every time I saw a pattern I tried to figure out why it formed and in what
other cemeteries that shared pattern was found.  Some I think I have
explained, others I am totally clueless about.  Then also, as I traveled
the state, I noted that other cemeteries had patterns that I had not seen
in the Cazenovia area, and all I can conclude is that they indicated
different formation processes and evolution.  Being down in Virginia now is
a whole 'nother world, as few cemeteries are even marked, let alone have
interesting grave stones.

http://www.rootsweb.com/~nyccazen/Cemeteries/
http://users.erols.com/weiskotten/CFNcemeteries.html

         Dan W.