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Slipping Standards
It was World War I that finally put the nail in the coffin of Victorian mourning. So many young men died for what seemed senseless reasons that Christian faith – and with it attitudes to death and mortality – was shaken to the core. The fallen men were lost or buried in France, and suddenly Victorian monuments seemed overblown, monstrous, and inappropriate. Almost overnight, lavish displays for the dead disappeared. Of course, people still had to be buried. Cemeteries like Highgate had plenty of funerals. But people spent less on them, and on the monuments. Trees and ivy slowly strangled the prized landscape design; burrowing roots toppled monuments. Those cemeteries, once boastful displays of wealth and status, are now overgrown stone junkyards, with the odd jewel shining through the ivy. |
Victorian cemeteries such as the Magnificent Seven reached the height of their popularity between about 1860 and 1880. Although they were still very fashionable (and profitable) for a long time after, the mania of the grand Victorian mourning spectacle turned a corner. Sensible people began to protest about the crippling cost of funerals, monuments and mourning clothes; others concerned with public health and urban space were exploring the alternative of cremation.