Late medieval & early modern gravestones and burial

Dionysus

Just wondering, after the thread by Cloons about gravestones in the Irish, does anybody know what marked the graves of the poor or common people in olden times?

When did gravestones become the norm for ordinary Irish people?

I know next to my home is the gravestone/tomb of a man from the sixteenth century - all in Latin, of course. I have visited many graves/tombs but when I see English on them I am certain they are not medieval graves and are almost certainly from, at the earliest, the 18th century.

Around this area are many late medieval and early modern tombs, almost all of which have the family coat of arms engraved on them of relations to the deceased person - again, all of them, without exception, are in Latin. English was very firmly the language of the peasantry when it came to commemorating death in the Pale. Well, to be more accurate Irish was almost certainly the language of the majority of the peasantry of the Pale but that's another story. Either way, Latin was the language of prestige and English and Irish were nowhere to be seen on these gravestones.

But to get back to my question: how were the graves of poor/ordinary people marked in late medieval and early modern Ireland?

Thanks!

PS: It is a case for another day that the above sixteenth-century tomb is not even a national monument. According to Dúchas, now The Heritage Service, when I spoke to them years ago they said there were over 100,000 similar "heritage sites" in Ireland and they hadn't the resources to protect them all.

convert

Clodagh Tait wrote a book on death and burial in late medieval and Early Modern Ireland. It covers grave and tombstones, funerals, etc. It may be helpful to you. There are some other books, too, though it's not a topic that tends to get much publicity, unfortunately