Courtaud, Patrice
The nineteenth-century cemetery revisited by funerary archaeology: Interview with Patrice Courtaud and Anne Richier, conducted by Emmanuel Fureix
- 2021.
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Our knowledge of 19th century cemeteries focuses mainly on prestigious necropolises to the detriment of more modest cemeteries, the burial grounds of the lower classes, destined to disappear from the funerary scene. Archaeology enables us to get closer to this other side of the funerary 19th century. These last fifteen years have seen astonishing progress in our knowledge thanks to digs in forgotten, erased or disqualified cemeteries. The interview is with two archaeologists, Anne Richier and Patrice Courtaud, who have worked on major 19th century cemetery sites : a slave cemetery in Guadeloupe and a cemetery on the margins of Marseille, the Crottes cemetery, in use during the 19th century until it closed in 1905. Both necropolises also enable us to put into question the relationships in the 19th century to funerary norms, as well as the process by which cemeteries that do not have patrimonial status are erased.