The following article Dead Men Walking – an Overview and Reconstructions of Apotropaic Burials was written by Lady Luceta di Cosimo. Her research was recently displayed at several A&S competitions including the Ice Dragon Pent and the A&S Faire.

Introduction

We can say with absolute certainty that everyone who ever lived during the SCA period of study has died, and their body was buried or otherwise disposed of in some way. The way it was done reflected on their contemporaries’ attitude towards death, afterlife, religious belief or lack thereof, and now provides an interesting insight into their beliefs in general, and, in some cases, their definition of humanity.

For the most part, it was “business as usual”; the dead were accorded their rites, which varied greatly between times and places, and the living moved on. However, in a persistent minority of cases, the neat model of “dead and gone” broke down. A portion of the dead was feared as a potential threat to the living. Specifically, throughout Medieval Europe, from the fall of the Roman Empire to late Renaissance, there was a persistent belief that some dead will come back and will harm or kill their survivors. These dead were treated differently, and their burials reflect the preventive measures the living took to decrease the probability of their post-mortem return. These are known as apotropaic measures, and the dead coming back to life were referred to as the revenants. A burial which shows that these measures were employed is called an apotropaic burial.

In period, fear of the walking dead was common and persistent. The accounts of the revenants come to us preserved in legends, but they can also be found in accounts of the lives of saints, ecclesiastical writings, sagas, and chronicles. We are still fascinated with the concept of the reanimated dead, judging by popularity of the shows such as “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”, “The Walking Dead”, and numerous remakes of “Dracula.”

From watching all these movies, we are very familiar with dealing with vampires and zombies – our versions of the medieval revenants. All of us can name a few vampire slaying techniques, such as staking or decapitation. Interestingly, these have not changed all that much, and many were used to deal with period revenants. However, what was also done frequently was to employ preventive measures, designed to prevent a suspicious corpse from rising as a revenant, rather than hunting it down and destroying it later.

As such, the corpses considered at risk for returning from the dead were buried differently from their normal mortal counterparts. These measures, called apotropaic measures, were thought to prevent or decrease the probability that a body would rise after death.

Who was at risk? The were four possible life outcomes: one could have lived a good life and died a good death; lived a bad life and died a bad death; lived a good life and died a bad death; or lived a bad life, and died a good death. Those living a good life and dying a good death were safe from post-mortem wanderings. Anyone else could rise after death and bother the living.

People who lived a bad life and died a bad death were the most obvious suspects. These included criminals, especially executed criminals, and a lot of burials with apotropaic measures are from early period execution cemeteries[1]. Sacrificial victims fell into the same category (and there is an overlap between criminals and sacrifices).

However, victims of accidents, epidemics, unexplained death, excommunicates, and people dying without proper last rites (people who had a good life and had a bad death) were also at risk.

People who lived non-normative lives, different in sexual orientation, religious affiliation, and such (considered to have lead bad lives, though may have died a good death), were also suspects.

Not all potential revenants were social outcasts. Sometimes respected members of the community were buried in a regular cemetery with proper respect, but still treated as a potential revenant.[2]

The apotropaic measures themselves were very similar to the techniques used to slay the revenants but were employed preventatively. Researchers seem to agree that these rites reflected the living’s attitude towards the dead and were designed to render the suspicious corpses “safe.”[3]

By making these models, I hoped to make it easier to understand variations on period funerary rites, which were employed on potential revenant corpses.

How I Did This 

I have narrowed down the apotropaic measures to the most commonly employed. I made a conscious decision to limit these to the treatment of the corpse itself and decided not to delve into magical apotropaics, such as spells, special prayers, or rituals which may have been used in conjunction with these burials. These are ephemeral, and leave no material traces. I have also stayed away from apotropaic grave goods. These were many, varied greatly through time and place, and left a material, though incomplete archeological record. If these were made from material other than metal, bone, or pottery, they have decayed. I have however included items interacting with the corpse itself, such as stakes or stones.

I researched available literature, including but not limited to, news releases, archeological surveys, books, etc., and accumulated a number of images of the apotropaic burials.

I have narrowed these to the representative burials, which demonstrate one or more apotropaic measures. In some cases, I have an incomplete record, such as only a detailed description of the burial from an article, or a partial burial picture. In these cases, I have used the evidence from similar burials to reconstruct the rest of the body.

Materials and Methods

Due to numerous ethical, legal, sanitary, and financial constraints, no period materials or methods were used in the recreation of the burials.

I have written a short summary for each type of burial, and given some theories behind the method used and period examples. I also made a display illustrating common apotropaic burial methods. I used the images of the excavated apotropaic burials I found during my research as well as period depictions of revenants and malevolent dead from period sources, mostly from various books of hours, the stories of the three living and the three dead, and dance macabre engravings.

I used Halloween skeleton garlands which I bought at RiteAid, self-drying terracotta clay I got on Amazon, aquarium pebbles, small stones from my back yard, toothpicks, and heavy duty tinfoil. I modified the skeletons according to the treatment of the corpses in the period burial, and arranged them on rolled out clay tablets, to simulate an appearance of the skeleton in situ. Then, if there were other objects, such as stakes, stones, etc., these were also placed according to the records. I let the clay dry, and then glued the skeletons and objects in place using Well-Bond glue.

Apotropaic Measures 

Decapitation

There is a significant overlap between apotropaic and judicial (punitive) decapitation, just as there is significant overlap between executed criminals and potential revenants. However, the ‘safe’ decapitated corpses would be buried with the head in anatomic position, while the dangerous ones would have it placed elsewhere, or buried without the head.[4]. In England, decapitations appear in the 5^th and become more common in the 6^th and 7^th centuries.[5]

Interestingly, this mode of burial was considered not only apotropaic, but also may have been derogatory: one of the early Norwegian laws states that “ if the head is severed from the body, and the head is placed between the feet, the wergild shall be doubled.”[6]

Prone (face down) burial

Prone, or face-down burials, are not limited to execution cemeteries, but are sometimes encountered in consecrated ground. Prone burials are chronologically and geographically scattered, but, at least in England, are seen during the 6^th and 7^th centuries.[7]  This type of burial is found much earlier, and some burials from the Frattesina graveyards (near Verona, Italy), probably of social outcasts, date from the 12 to 10^th century B.C., and are also found during the Roman Period.[8]  Prone position is also found in some of the Bog bodies from Denmark, as late as the 14^th century A.D.[9] The prone position was employed to make it difficult for the spirit to return into the body. There is a 16^th century account from a shepherd in Bavaria who had out of body experiences and commented it was harder to get back into his body if it was face down.[10] Additionally, the gaze of a corpse was considered dangerous causing illness, death or possession, and turning it face down, limited its effect.[11] [12] [13] The combination of prone burial and hands tied behind the back is not infrequent. The hands tied behind the back is considered a sign of death by hanging.[14] 

Leg Mutilation/Restraint

Mutilation of the legs to prevent the dead from walking appears to be widespread. The degree of damage differs. In some Frattesina 12-10^th century B.C. burials in Italy[15] and Anglo-Saxon England, the legs were bent backwards and sometimes disarticulated.[16] Broken tibias are seen in the bog bodies of Denmark, which span a 2000 year period, and are found as late as the 14^th century.[17] Occasionally in Anglo-Saxon England burials, legs or feet are amputated completely.[18] Alternatively, mutilation of the legs may be minimal. In Oedipus Rex, by Sophocles, written about 430 B.C., Oedipus (whose name means “swollen foot”) was left out in the wilderness to die, with feet tied together and pierced by a thorn, to prevent the exposed infant from walking back as a revenant.[19]

Occasionally the legs are tied, which serves as a physical restraint designed to prevent the corpse from walking. In burials, the crossing of legs at the ankles is interpreted as previously tied extremities, as the ropes were usually made of organic material and decayed.[20]

Stoning/partial stoning

The placement of stones in graves presented a physical impediment to the dead rising. Bodies weighed down with stones, either across the chest, throat, or the entire body, or bodies in graves filled with large rocks, are found throughout Europe. [21] ^[22]

Related to the stoning of the body is the custom of placing stones on roadside cairns, which often housed the bodies of the dead travellers found by the side of the road or criminals buried in liminal places. While it is still considered good luck to add a stone to the pile, in period the luck was more literal, as it was definitely lucky not be followed by a murderous revenant as one travels. Sometimes, other objects such as branches are also used but the stone mounds are better preserved.[23]  ^[24] The custom of placing small stones on the grave of one’s loved ones in some cultures may be a remnant of the same superstition.

Placement of rock or bricks into the mouth, on throat or the chest of the potential revenants

Placement of rocks or bricks in the mouth served a different purpose: it prevented the corpse from chewing on its shroud, itself and its neighbors, which could have caused the death of its family and friends, or caused epidemics.[25] (This belief was widespread, and is even mentioned in Malleum Maleficarum.[26]) Additionally, stuffing the mouth with rocks also prevented the spirit from returning into the body.[27]

Staking

Staking occurred either with metal or wooden stakes, or sharp pieces of metal. The body may be staked through limbs, or through the heart. There are regional variations, and the placement, number of stakes, and materials of the stakes vary. The places of burials also vary greatly. Some are on hard ground, and some are in bogs and rivers or in liminal places (which are discussed below). There is a very late example of a burial in 19^th century Lesbos, Greece, with iron stakes through the limbs. There are well known Bulgarian 13^th century burials where the bodies were staked through the heart with broken ploughshares,[28] and there are multiple examples of bodies buried within bogs, dating to the Iron Age, which were staked to the turf with wooden stakes or wickets.[29]

Staking had several functions including physically pinning the body to the ground. In watery burials, stakes prevented the body from floating up. Staking through the heart prevented the dead from rising – a folklore motif well preserved to this day. If the staking was through the legs, it served a dual function by pinning the body down and it also mutilated the legs, further preventing it from walking.

In 11^th century England, staking was employed specifically as an apotropaic measure in burials of unbaptized children, and women who died in childbirth.[30] Staking also persisted very late in suicide burials. In England, it was widely practiced in period, where the suicides were also buried at cross-roads. The latest documented occurrence of the staked suicide burial at cross-roads in England occurred in 1823. This practice was outlawed by the Burial of Suicides Act later the same year.[31]

The body of the Bocksten man, murdered and staked face down in a bog in Denmark around 1360, is further evidence of this type of burial. The stakes through the side and back may have been purely functional – pinning the body down in the turf, however the stake through the heart was to prevent the man from walking, as was burying him at the “meeting point of four parishes.” [32]

Burial with a sickle or a scythe fragment across its neck is found in eastern Europe.[33] It was believed the deceased would decapitate themselves when they rose out of the graves. It is possible that the widespread use of such burials contributed to the period depictions of death as a corpse with a sickle/scythe.[34]

Liminal Burials

Liminal burials include burials in non-normative locations. Burying outside of consecrated ground,[35] outside of the local district, or far away at the borders of geographical of political entities[36] fall into this category. Liminal burial places include:bogs,[37] [38] tidal margins,[39] ditches (indicates both the borders of human lands and water/earth border),[40] rivers, [41] [42] on the borders of parishes,^[43] and cross-roads.

As noted above, suicides in England were customarily buried at cross-roads, and Aelfric of Eynsham refers to the witches raising the dead at cross rods at night.[44] [45] Burial on river banks or river flood zones [46] were thought to relate rivers to borders between the realms of the dead and the living. This is a common motif in folklore of multiple cultures and can be encountered in modern mythology and different media, such as Miyazaki’s Spirited Away animated film, and Susan Cooper’s The Dark is Rising book series.

Burial “between heaven and earth” in the form of elevated burials, or exposure of executed criminals with eventual burial of the resulting skeleton[47] is another form of Liminal burial.  Other Liminal burials  include Execution cemeteries[48] which were special places for keeping the unwanted/dangerous dead. Charnel houses would be in the same category.

Note that other apotropaic measures were often used in conjunction with liminal burials. Furthermore, not all liminal burials are apotropaic in nature: intent is important! Some unusual burials are due to hasty body disposal, or accidental death, and not motivated by fear of revenants. [49]

Conclusion               

While death, burials, and funerary culture are not commonly included in SCA activities, I believe it is important to be aware of them in period. The attitudes of the living towards the dead, and the process of demonization of corpses are fascinating, and are reflected in many aspects of then contemporary culture – in miniatures, paintings, books, frescoes, chronicles, and folklore. The status of the outsider, or other, assigned to the revenant in period, is very useful. These dead have created the negative spaces around living, which can sometimes tell us more about their society than the people themselves. Even if we are not always aware of it, we have inherited this culture, which still permeates our lives, although, thankfully, mostly as entertainment.

Bibliography

Barber, Paul. Vampires, Burial, and Death : Folklore and Reality.  New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988.

Barrowclough, David. “Time to Slay Vampire Burials? The Archaeological and Historical Evidence for Vampires in Europe.” Cambridge: Red Dagger Press.

Blake, Matt. “Pictured: ‘Vampire’ Graves in Poland Where Skeletons Were Buried with Skulls between Their Legs.” Daily Mail, July 15, 2013.

Caciola, Nancy. Afterlives : The Return of the Dead in the Middle Ages.  Ithaca; London: Cornell University Press, 2016.

Devlin, Zoe, and Emma-Jayne Graham. Death Embodied : Archaeological Approaches to the Treatment of the Corpse. Studies in Funerary Archaeology.  Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2015.

Farrell, Maura. “Prone, Stoned, and Losing the Head: Deviant Burials in Early Medieval Ireland in the 5th to 12th Centuries.” Trowel (2012): 56.

Glob, P. V. The Bog People; Iron Age Man Preserved.  Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1969.

Gregoricka, Lesley A., Tracy K. Betsinger, Amy B. Scott, and Marek Polcyn. “Apotropaic Practices and the Undead: A Biogeochemical Assessment of Deviant Burials in Post-Medieval Poland.” PLoS ONE 9, no. 11 (2014): e113564.

Griffiths, Bill. Aspects of Anglo-Saxon Magic [in Text in English, Icelandic, Latin, and Old English] Rev. ed.  Hockwold-cum-Wilton, Norfolk, England: Anglo-Saxon Books, 2003.

Institoris, Heinrich, Jakob Sprenger, and Montague Summers. Malleus Maleficarum.  New York: B. Blom, 1970.

Laskey, Mark. “Rites of Desecration: Suicide, Sacrilege and the Crossroads Burial.” http://www.cvltnation.com/rites-of-desecration-suicide-sacrilege-and-profane-burial-at-the-crossroads/

Lecouteux, Claude. The Return of the Dead: Ghosts, Ancestors, and the Transparent Veil of the Pagan Mind. 1st U.S. ed.  Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions, 2009.

Reynolds, Andrew. Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs. Oxford, NY: Oxford University Press, 2009.

Riisøy, Anne Irene. “Deviant Burials: Societal Exclusion of Dead Outlaws in Medieval Norway.” (2015).

Zelenin, D. K., Tolstoy Nikita, and E. E. Levkievskaya. Essays on Russian Mythology : People Who Met a Violent Death and Mermaids: Selected Works (Ocherki Russkoy Mifologii: Umershie Neestestvennoi Smertyu I Rusalki: Isbrannyye Trudy). Traditsionnaia Dukhovnaia Kultura Slavian Moskva: “INDRIK” 1995.

Endnotes

[1] Andrew Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs (Oxford; NY: Oxford University Press, 2009).

[2] Ibid.194.

[3] Ibid. 89.

[4] Ibid. 34, describing a late seventh- early eighth century Anglo Saxon burial.

[5] Ibid. 89.

[6] Anne Irene Riisøy, “Deviant Burials: Societal Exclusion of Dead Outlaws in Medieval Norway,” (2015), 69, quoting Larson, 1935, The earliest Norwegian Laws, geing the Gulathing Law and the Frostathing Law.

[7] Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs, 89.

[8] Zoe Devlin and Emma-Jayne Graham, Death Embodied: Archaeological Approaches to the Treatment of the Corpse, Studies in Funerary Archaeology (Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2015), 145.

[9] P. V. Glob, The Bog People; Iron Age Man Preserved (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1969), 149-151.

[10] Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs, 89.

[11] Paul Barber, Vampires, Burial, and Death: Folklore and Reality (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988), 49.

[12] Nancy Caciola, Afterlives: The Return of the Dead in the Middle Ages (Ithaca, London: Cornell University Press, 2016).

[13] Riisøy, “Deviant Burials: Societal Exclusion of Dead Outlaws in Medieval Norway.”

[14] Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs, 163.

[15] Devlin and Graham, Death Embodied: Archaeological Approaches to the Treatment of the Corpse, 145-147.

[16] Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs, 163.

[17] Glob, The Bog People; Iron Age Man Preserved.

[18] Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs, 93-94.

[19] Barber, Vampires, Burial, and Death: Folklore and Reality, 61.

[20] Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs, 40.

[21] Matt Blake, “Pictured: ‘Vampire’ Graves in Poland Where Skeletons Were Buried with Skulls between Their Legs,” Daily Mail, July 15, 2013.

[22] David Barrowclough, “Time to Slay Vampire Burials? The Archaeological and Historical Evidence for Vampires in Europe,” (Cambridge: Red Dagger Press).

[23] D. K. Zelenin, Tolstoy Nikita, and E. E. Levkievskaya, Essays on Russian Mythology: People Who Met a Violent Death and Mermaids: Selected Works (Ocherki Russkoy Mifologii: Umershie Neestestvennoi Smertyu I Rusalki: Isbrannyye Trudy), Traditsionnaia Dukhovnaia Kultura Slavian (Moskva: “INDRIK”, 1995), 62-65.

[24] Claude Lecouteux, The Return of the Dead: Ghosts, Ancestors, and the Transparent Veil of the Pagan Mind, 1st U.S. ed. (Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions, 2009), 23.

[25] Barber, Vampires, Burial, and Death: Folklore and Reality, 47.

[26] Heinrich Institoris, Jakob Sprenger, and Montague Summers, Malleus Maleficarum (New York: B. Blom, 1970).

[27] Barber, Vampires, Burial, and Death: Folklore and Reality, 47.

[28] Barrowclough, “Time to Slay Vampire Burials? The Archaeological and Historical Evidence for Vampires in Europe.”

[29] Glob, The Bog People; Iron Age Man Preserved.

[30] Lecouteux, The Return of the Dead: Ghosts, Ancestors, and the Transparent Veil of the Pagan Mind., 38. From the Decret by Burchard of Worms, early 11^th century:

If a very small child dies without baptis, they take the body into a secret place and pierce it through with a rod. They say that if they did not do this, the child would come back and could cause harm to a great many people. If a woman does not manage to give birth to her child and dies in labor, in the very grave both mother and child are pierced with a rod that nails them to the ground.

[31] Mark Laskey, “Rites of Desecration: Suicide, Sacrilege and the Crossroads Burial,” http://www.cvltnation.com/rites-of-desecration-suicide-sacrilege-and-profane-burial-at-the-crossroads/

[32] Glob, The Bog People; Iron Age Man Preserved, 149-151.

[33] Lesley A. Gregoricka et al., “Apotropaic Practices and the Undead: A Biogeochemical Assessment of Deviant Burials in Post-Medieval Poland,” PLoS ONE 9, no. 11 (2014).

[34] Barber, Vampires, Burial, and Death : Folklore and Reality, 50-51.

[35] Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs, 25.

[36] Caciola, Afterlives: The Return of the Dead in the Middle Ages, 213, in Laxdaela Saga Hrapp is far away in an attempt to stop him.

[37] Ibid. 237, 12^th century account of William of Malmesbury of a man weighed down in a bog to prevent wandering.

[38] Glob, The Bog People; Iron Age Man Preserved.

[39] Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs.

[40] Maura Farrell, “Prone, Stoned, and Losing the Head: Deviant Burials in Early Medieval Ireland in the 5th to 12th Centuries,” Trowel (2012).

[41] Caciola, Afterlives: The Return of the Dead in the Middle Ages, 237.

[42] Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs, 24. In 10^th century England, witches were punished by drowning or throwing into a river, which took care both of the execution and body disposal of a potential revenant.

[43] Glob, The Bog People; Iron Age Man Preserved, 149-151.

[44] Laskey, “Rites of Desecration: Suicide, Sacrilege and the Crossroads Burial”.

[45] Bill Griffiths, Aspects of Anglo-Saxon Magic, Rev. ed. (Hockwold-cum-Wilton, Norfolk, England: Anglo-Saxon Books, 2003), 33.

[46] Farrell, “Prone, Stoned, and Losing the Head: Deviant Burials in Early Medieval Ireland in the 5th to 12th Centuries.”

[47] Devlin and Graham, Death Embodied : Archaeological Approaches to the Treatment of the Corpse, 64.

[48] Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs.

[49] Ibid. 38