Every monastery has a cemetery. Archaeological research into these cemeteries shows that monastic burial grounds often formed a nucleus for a much larger cemetery for the faithful. It would seem that "it became the ardent desire of many pious persons to be laid to rest among the religious" (The Catholic Encyclopedia, "Cemeteries"). How might this custom has a bearing on the status of the lay people involved?
We are going to discuss Christian burials and pagan burials here--you can take this link in one of two directions.
Christian:
We read about the deaths and burials of Leofgyth and Ceolfrith. Refresh your memory by checking the ends of these texts for details.
A quick look at monastic cemeteries shows that their configurations are not all the same. In some sites monks are divided from everyone else; sometimes the monks are buried with their heels oriented to the east (instead of facing east, which is ordinary, in expectation of the Last Day), or their heads facing the church, while everyone else is buried rather haphazardly. Some sites do not separate lay and monastic graves, burying everyone in neat rows. But in those that do, how might these differences have been rationalized?
We also can learn quite a bit about the social status of an individual through his or her remains in and grave goods (i.e., things buried with the body). Physical anthropologists can examine a skeleton and determine not only the individual's gender and age at time of death but also detect dietary deficiencies and other pathological conditions. Colin Renfrew and Paul Bahn point out that there is "often a relationship between the role and rank of the deceased during life and the manner in which the remains are disposed of and accompanied by artefacts" (see Archaeology: Theory, Methods, and Practice. New York: Thames and Hudson, 1991. 176).
What can we tell about the social status of monks from their grave records? Do some monks indicate which goods they wanted to be buried with, or was this always left to the discretion of the living? One much-discussed burial is that of St. Cuthbert, now at Durham Cathedral, whose tomb was moved several times. Are objects mentioned in the discussions of his grave? See the Coffin of St. Cuthbert, by D. McIntyre and E. Kitzinger (Oxford 1950) and the larger volume, the Relics of St. Cuthbert, for starters.
King Alfred's very Christian court heard about pagan burial and funeral customs, as we know from the Voyages of Ohthere and Wulfstan. This text discusses cremation, which was forbidden by the church. Why did the Church prohibit this practice? What ideas about the resurrection of the soul caused the Church to prohibit cremation of the dead? What ideas from competing early religious groups might have made this issue an important one?
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