The Victorian Book of the Dead

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In addition to these moral and ethical concerns, there were also practical issues surrounding the practice of Victorian death photography. For example, taking these photographs was expensive and time-consuming, which meant that it was only available to the wealthier members of society. Be calm, aunt; I am alive and well. Now, don’t be childish, dear; I have been in danger, but here I am.” The news stories collected and edited by Woodyard were gleaned from thousands of old newspaper articles, and are organized by topic, from “Victorian Personifications of Death,” to “Crape: Its Uses and Abuses,” and “Grave Errors: Exploding Corpses, Flaming Formaldehyde, and Other Funeral Fatalities.” As these title chapters indicate, there is an abundance of mordant humor woven throughout these pieces, which I really enjoyed. In fact, though I appreciated the grim, maudlin, and “grewsome” (an alternate spelling the author seems to delight in) aspects of these tales, I found myself surprisingly attracted the funnier side of these excessive Victorian mourners, who I think had more of a sense of humor than people give them credit for. The tales are at their very best, though, when they stray into the realm of the utterly bizarre, which they do more often than not.

Victorian Age Death and Mourning Practices in the Victorian Age

a b c Ruby, Jay (1995). Secure the Shadow: Death Photography in America. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. p.63.

Kürti, László. (2012). 'For the last time': the Hiltman-Kinsey post-mortem photographs, 1918–1920". Visual Studies, Volume 27, 2012 - Issue 1.doi.org/10.1080/1472586X.2012.642960 While the book is indexed and cites its references thoroughly enough to work as a reference book and scholarly resource, and I’ll definitely use it as such, the sheer variety and fun of the strange, marginal, little news items in here invite the meandering approach. It’s a perfect book to keep by a bedside or on a coffee table, and flip through whenever the urge strikes. You’ll never find anything less than the unexpected. There is so much material in this book that it’s impossible to list, but here are just a few of my favorite headlines:

victorian book of the dead - Pinterest victorian book of the dead - Pinterest

Here’s the gist: Somewhere the fanciful idea got started that some dead Victorians were photographed in a standing position, supported by metal propper-uppers. If you can see the base of a metal stand behind a Victorian photographic subject, it means the subject is really and truly dead. In the early 1900s, detailed information regarding an individual's death could be commonly found in a newspaper's obituary section. This was indicative of the community's role in death, before societal norms shifted the experience of death to be much more personal and private. In 1940, photographs of the deceased, their casket, or grave stone with documentation of the funeral and wake are rare. By 1960, there is almost no record of community-based professional post-mortem photography in Nordic society with some amateur photographs remaining for the purpose of the family of the deceased. [20]While there was an insane amount of ‘mourning wear’ that people would wear to show their grief, apparently there used to be a specific type of ‘mourning rings’ that were in the shape of little coffins with a carved skeleton inside that had the name and/or birth and death dates of the person they lost. You can look them up and they’re both beautiful and oddly adorable.

Victorian Book of the Dead | Boroughs of the Dead The Victorian Book of the Dead | Boroughs of the Dead

There were also concerns about these photographs’ impact on the living. Some critics argued that looking at pictures of the dead could be traumatic and distressing, particularly for grieving people. A large regional collection of professional and private post-mortem photographs are contained in the Reykjavík Museum of Photography while others are displayed in the National Museum of Iceland. These displays are primarily composed of photographs of funerals and wakes rather than the deceased. [20] United Kingdom [ edit ]The Crown will portray Princess Diana as PREGNANT and will show Mohamed Al-Fayed claiming she and Dodi were killed as part of an 'establishment plot', in a move likely to cause fury in royal family, source claims My favorite example mentioned has to be the Parrot Murderer: an evil-dispositioned bird, and a feathered victim of the Gas Habit.

of the dead taken in Victorian age Haunting photographs of the dead taken in Victorian age

The fashion historian in me also feels the need comment on how much I liked the chapter Crape too. It's got lots of fun details on the garments worn by mourners. The divorce was obtained with ease, as Thorne made no answer to the complaint and the case was perfectly clear in our favor. This particular artist also mentions that he has taken photographs of persons in coffins and on beds, while children were placed in parents’ arms or set up in chairs. But there is no mention of standing poses for the dead or of using a headrest to support them, as, indeed, there is no mention in any of the photographic journals or photographers’ accounts I’ve seen. Rube Burrow, notorious train-robber, post-mortem

I need not tell you,” said Mrs. Bazalgette [to the dress-maker], “why I sent for you: you know the sad bereavement that has fallen on me, but you can not know all I have lost in her. Nobody can tell what she was to all of us, but most of all to me. I was her darling, and she was mine.” Here tears choked Mrs. Bazalgette’s words for a while. Recovering herself, she paid a tribute to the character of the deceased. “It was a soul without one grain of selfishness: all her thoughts were for others, not one for herself. She loved us all: indeed, she loved some that were hardly worthy of so pure a creature’s love: but the reason was, she had no eye for the faults of her friends; she pictured them like herself, and loved her own sweet image in them. And such a temper! and so free from guile. I may truly say her mind was as lovely as her person.” There is a horrific tale called “The Croglin Grange Vampire” told by Augustus Hare in The Story of My Life (1896/1900). The hideous Thing in this story from Van Wert, Ohiois strongly reminiscent of Hare’s unearthly creature found in a churchyard vault.