Slide 1
Spna, MaramureThe Merry Cemetery
TheMerry Cemeteryis acemeteryin the village
ofSapanta,Maramurescounty, Romania. It is famous for its colourful
tombstones withnaivepaintings describing, in an original and poetic
manner, the persons who are buried there as well as scenes from
their lives. The Merry Cemetery became an open-air museum and a
national tourist attraction.
Here, instead of the usual boring stone grave markers and marble
mausoleums that populate just about every other graveyard in the
world, each plot is adorned with a colorfully-painted wooden cross,
with a poem for a epitaph.
Through the epitaphs written on the tombstones, the craftsman
praised or criticized the character and the life of the dead. Very
often his texts had a touch of irony, especially when he wanted to
highlight the flaws of the deceased. The combinations of vivid
colors used on the wooden crosses, as well as the witty epitaphs
written on them,explain why the place is known under the name of
The Merry Cemeteryand justify why it is a world-famous tourist
attraction.
In the paintings from the cemetery there are manyabstract
motifsinspired from the decorations used on the wooden gates or in
the textile fabrics from the region. For example, sometimes we
encounter the solar motif located right in the middle of the wooden
cross.
A man by the name ofStan Ioan Patras began the tradition of
these crosses back in 1935. Tombstone sculptor and artist, he
decided to move away from the traditional way of carving wooden
crosses. Being a simple, religious person who feared God, he
understood that death is part of life. This determined him to stop
looking at death with the rigidity we are used to.
The paintings on the wooden crosses depicted an important scene
from the life of the departed. Sometimes, these scenes illustrated
the persons occupation: forester, hunter, carpenter, cook or
farmer. Women were pictured baking bread, weaving carpets or
spinning wool. If the person had died in an unusual way (by
accident), the painting on the cross illustrated the type of
accident.
Today, Merry Cemetery is a national historic site that sees a
trickle of visitors each day (though its also still a functioning
cemetery and locals can be buried here if they wish). It makes a
fun afternoon stop if youre in the Maramures region to check out
some of Romanias UNESCO-recognized painted churches, and is well
worth a detour.
Outside the cemeteryare booths where you can find various
traditional, homemade objects. The prices are accessible.After
visiting the Merry Cemetery, do not hesitate to also visit the Stan
Ioan Patras Memorial House in Sapanta or the The Memorial Museum
for Communist Victims.
In the end, this quote from the cemetery says it all:The Merry
Cemetery is a unique place of pilgrimage. It is a place where
people come to mourn their dead, but, above all, it is a place
expressing in a very deep and optimistic manner the true meanings
and beauties of life.
Bibliografiehttp://www.dangerous-business.com/2012/07/merry-cemetery-a-different-way-to-look-at-death/http://travelguideromania.com/merry-cemetery-sapanta-maramures/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merry_Cemetery
Thank you for the attention!
Alexandru Lavinia,Badea Ioana-Daniela,
GRUPA 8311
