15 Strange Details of Old Scottish Graveyards That Had a Brilliant Reason

Why are old Scottish gravestones covered in skulls, bones and hourglasses? Why does one stone show a plough, another a ship and another something that looks like the number 4? Why are some tombs tables standing on legs, why are the oldest stones in Glasgow shaped like Viking houses, and why did an old man spend forty years riding a white pony across the moors to recarve forgotten graves? In this film we uncover fifteen strange details of old Scottish graveyards, and the brilliant reason behind each one. From memento mori and trade emblems to table stones, the lair, east-facing graves, the Covenanter martyrs and Old Mortality, the hogbacks of Govan, the warrior slabs of Kilmartin and Iona, and the Glasgow Necropolis, this is the story of how Scots remembered their dead. Is there a strange stone in your local kirkyard? Tell us in the comments. SOURCES SCARF – Gravestones: https://scarf.scot/thematic/future-th... Canmore – Carnwath gravestone: https://canmore.org.uk/collection/800932 Wikipedia – The Govan Stones: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gov... Historic Environment Scotland – Kilmartin carved stones: https://portal.historicenvironment.sc... Wikipedia – Glasgow Necropolis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glasgow... History Workshop – Covenanter gravestones: https://www.historyworkshop.org.uk/ma... Some images are illustrative reconstructions. Will the apprentice is a composite character; his meeting with Robert Paterson is imagined. Folk beliefs are presented as such. #Scotland #Graveyards #ScottishHistory #Kirkyard #ScottishHeritage