The largest cemetery in the world is located in Iraq near the city of An-Najaf. Mostly Shia Muslims, who make up a significant part of Iraqi society, are buried in this cemetery. The name of the cemetery "Wadi Al Salam" translates as "Valley of Peace". Indeed, this resting place is more like a huge valley, very densely packed with graves and monuments.
More than five million people have already been buried there on an area of six square kilometers. If you simply divide the area of the cemetery by the number of burials, you get about 1.2 square meters per person. But there are still roads, passages, fences, buildings and large mausoleums. So on average, the grave will have less than 1 square meter. That is, burials are made almost close - side by side.
Clickable 15,000 px, panorama
Many Islamic prophets are buried in this Muslim cemetery. Like many sites in Iraq, this grave complex was partially destroyed during the known hostilities.
On Wadi Us-Salaam there are graves of many thinkers, scientists and major political figures, as well as ordinary Muslims from many countries - Iraq, Pakistan, India, Afghanistan, Kuwait, Lebanon. Many Shiites at all costs want to be here after death.
In June 2010, UNESCO decided to include the cemetery of Wadi Us-Salaam near the holy city of An-Najaf for Muslims all over the world in the World Heritage Fund. To this end, a UNESCO delegation visited Iraq, where this issue was discussed for two weeks.
During its invasion of Iraq in 2003, as well as during the occupation, the American army did not hesitate to launch missile strikes on both the living and the dead - the world's largest cemetery felt the US desire to give democracy to Iraq.
Most of us, when offered to visit the cemetery, involuntarily have very sad pictures, the mood slightly deteriorates, and the author of such an idea seems to be a rather strange person. Meanwhile, the places of sorrow and sadness are also called the place of peace and harmony. Here bodies find their last refuge, and souls find rest. And not only the dead.
Walking through the necropolis can be very peaceful, not to mention the fact that many cemeteries will delight aesthetes with elegance and even luxury decoration. And the most amazing thing is that cemeteries tell much more about life than they evoke thoughts about death. Want to make sure?
1. Chimitirul Vesel, Sepyntsa
Translated from Romanian, the name of this necropolis means "merry cemetery". It would seem that there is fun? And meanwhile, very often here you can hear laughter. And this will not offend anyone: according to ancient Romanian beliefs, the transition to another world is the beginning of a better life, which means there is nothing to be sad about.
However, if you still go to the cemetery, you will quickly understand the reason for the fun. On wooden tombstones painted with bright colors, in a cheerful and ironic way, their author, local artist and sculptor Stan Jon Petrash, told how the people buried here lived and died. On many crosses (and Petrash created more than 700 of them) there are small poetic messages in a rather frivolous form. Unfortunately, they are all written in Romanian, but if you take a translator with you, you will be told about the following stories:
“Here lies my mother-in-law. If she had lived a year longer, then I would have been lying here.
“The deceased was a bitter drunkard and a bully. He constantly annoyed the neighbors until he was crushed by a car to the delight of the whole village "...
Petrash himself is buried here, the inscription on his grave reads: “In all my life I have not harmed anyone ...”, and his students continue the work of making bright and cheerful monuments.
2. Vienna Central Cemetery
One of the largest cemeteries in Europe is the Vienna Central Cemetery. It is located in the Simmering area and has about three million graves. You will agree that it is unrealistic to get around them all on foot, and therefore, since 1971, a special bus has been running along the ring road that crosses most of the cemetery - for those who do not have their own car. The only day of the year when moving around the cemetery is difficult is All Saints' Day. On this day, not only does the bus not run, but you can also get stuck in a traffic jam on your own transport.
However, the cemetery is not famous for its size. This is one of the most "musical" necropolises in the world: there is Mozart's tombstone (just a monument, the composer was buried in the cemetery of St. Mark in a common grave), as well as the graves of Ludwig van Beethoven, Johannes Brahms, Antonio Salieri, Franz Schubert, Johann Strauss- father and Johann Strauss-son, as well as many other musical figures.
3. The first Athenian cemetery
Fans of large shady parks in Athens have nowhere to go, except to the park near the parliament building or ... to the local cemetery. It is located almost in the center of the Greek capital and can successfully replace both the park and the museum. Firstly, there are many trees here, and secondly, many monuments and crypts made by famous Greek sculptors are real masterpieces.
One of the most famous monuments is the “Sleeping Girl” by Giannoulis Halepas (the last work of the author before he was recognized as suffering from schizophrenia), the embodiment of local ideas that death is nothing but an eternal sleep. It is worth taking a look at the huge pantheon, decorated with marble friezes with ancient scenes, on the grave of Heinrich Schliemann, an archaeologist who became famous thanks to the search for the legendary Troy and the excavations of ancient Mycenae.
4. Grand Jas, Cannes
But in France, the transformation of an old cemetery into a park is quite common. One of the clearest examples is Grand Jas, where the first burials date back to 1866.
This cemetery became famous due to its unusual landscape - burials were made in the form of terraces on a hillside - as well as amazing sculptural works. This is one of the most beautiful cemeteries in France. On its narrow paths, along which eucalyptus trees grow, it is very pleasant to walk, thinking about the eternal and vain, admiring the beautiful monuments and remembering the famous people who are buried here.
The writer Prosper Merimee, the ballerina Olga Khokhlova, the former lover of Pablo Picasso, the jeweler Carl Faberge, the pilot Nikolai Popov found their last shelter here...
5. Staglieno, Genoa
This cemetery is rightfully considered one of the most beautiful in Europe: the unique marble sculptures for tombstones that are installed here were made by such masters as Eduardo Alfieri, Giulio Monteverdi and Leonardo Bistolfi.
Officially, the Staglieno cemetery was founded on January 1, 1851, but is still not closed for burials. Among the famous people who are buried here are: singer-songwriter, poet Fabrizio di Andre; military and politician Nino Bixio; politician, writer and philosopher Giuseppe Mazzini; and Oscar Wilde's wife, Constance Lloyd.
6. Mirogoj, Zagreb
This Neo-Renaissance cemetery with shady alleys and arcades was designed by the Austrian architect Hermann Bolle. And the plot of land on which it was built belonged to the Croatian poet, educator, linguist Ljudevit Gai. And the peculiarity of this cemetery is that representatives of various confessions are buried here: Catholics and Protestants, Muslims and Jews, Orthodox and Mormons, and atheists also find their last refuge in the local shady alleys.
Here are buried such famous Croats as: politician Vladimir Bakarić, actress Ena Begovic, poet and educator Stenko Vraz, astronomer Oton Kucera, dissident Stepan Dzhurekovich, Nobel Prize winner chemist Vladimir Prelog, the first President of Croatia Franjo Tudjman.
7. Cimitero Monumentale, Milan
Not the largest (even in Milan it is in second place in this category), this cemetery is a living museum of the history, architecture and culture of Italy. Rich Italian families, both during their lifetime and after leaving this world, do not cease to compete in luxury and originality.
Crypts and sculptural compositions for this cemetery were made by the brightest architects and sculptors of the last century and a half. You will find here both classical monuments, and masterpieces of abstract art, and family crypts, and monumental tombs.
Composer Giuseppe Verdi, tenor Franco Corelli, conductor Arturo Toscanini, Formula 1 race car drivers father and son Ascari, members of the Campari family of winemakers (be sure to see the sculptural composition "The Last Supper" installed on their family tomb) and many other prominent Italians are buried here. .
8. Highgate Cemetery, London
Designed by architect Stephen Geary, it opened in 1839 and quickly became a fashionable burial site. By the way, in some parts of the cemetery, burials are carried out to this day. In its oldest part, where there are many amazingly beautiful Victorian tombstones and mausoleums, you can get only as part of a tourist group, but it's worth it.
The cemetery is known for the graves of people buried here (the founder of Marxism, Karl Marx; writers Ellen Wood, Douglas Adams, John Galsworthy, Anatoly Kuznetsov; former FSB officer, assistant to Boris Berezovsky Alexander Litvinenko; physicist Michael Faraday), and legends. In particular, a lot of stories are connected with vampires supposedly living here.
9. Montjuic, Barcelona
The cemetery of Montjuïc is located on the hill of the same name, which offers a beautiful view of the sea, which in itself is worthy of attention. But it's not worth visiting just for the view.
First of all, burial traditions in Spain are very different from what we are used to. Here, the dead are buried in concrete niches, which form entire multi-storey buildings and from afar resemble houses. In addition, the Montjuic cemetery, designed by the architect Leandre Albareda, is decorated with numerous arches, terraces and marble statues. And almost all buildings, crypts and monuments are made in the Gothic style.
Opened in 1883, Montjuïc Cemetery is still in use today, many famous people in Catalonia are buried here. It is also famous for the fact that Pedro Almodovar filmed the final scenes of the film “All About My Mother” here.
10. Pere Lachaise, Paris
Well, let's finish with the most famous cemetery in France, an indispensable participant in any ratings dedicated to this topic.
It is located in the 20th municipal district of Paris and is officially called the Eastern Cemetery.
The poor quarter, the merchant's mansion, the monastery succeeded each other in this place, until a cemetery was built here at the beginning of the 19th century. Initially not very popular due to its rather remote location, Père Lachaise nevertheless became one of the most significant necropolises in the world.
Marshals Murat, Ney and Davout, poets and writers Guillaume Apollinaire, Honoré de Belzac, Jean-Baptiste Molière, Marcel Proust, Gurtrude Stein, Oscar Wilde (one of the most visited graves, by the way), composers Georges Bizet, Frederic Chopin and Luigi Cherubini , artists Amadeo Modigliani, Camille Corot and Dominique Ingres, actresses Sarah Bernhardt and Annie Girardot, ballerina Isadora Duncan, inventor Ettore Bugatti (car lovers know this name well) and many, many, many others ...
As you can see, visiting a cemetery can be associated not only with a tragic event. In the necropolises, as nowhere else, you can feel the soul of the people - poetic, romantic, cheerful, each has its own.
The Northern Cemetery of Rostov-on-Don is one of the largest cemeteries in Europe and in the European part of Russia. It ranks second after the South St. Petersburg cemetery. The area of the necropolis is about 400 hectares. It is divided into 225 sections, each of which contains from 1000 to 3000 grave burials. Every year the cemetery is enlarged by about 9000 graves.
In recent years, the problem of the lack of free places for new burials has become acute. From time to time, the city leadership raises the issue of closing the Northern cemetery for burials, but the opening of a new one in the city has not yet been prepared, and burials continue here. Currently, the Northern Cemetery is the only public cemetery in Rostov-on-Don, where burials with a coffin and ashes are buried in urns.
Description
The northern cemetery of Rostov-on-Don was opened in 1972. About 500 thousand people are buried here. On the territory there is a temple, a cemetery administration building, outbuildings, ritual firms that are engaged in all types of funeral services. A fixed-route taxi runs around the territory.
The territory of the cemetery is very well-groomed, with a well-developed infrastructure. There is a rental office for equipment for caring for the burial site, a flower market, and a fixed-route taxi arrives at the cemetery. The territory is under round-the-clock video surveillance.
From the east of the cemetery there are the lands of the state farm "Temernitsky", from the north - a new residential microdistrict "Suvorovsky", in the southeastern part there is an Auchan store, in the southwestern part - a pet cemetery.
The most prestigious sites in the cemetery are near the entrance, where the burials of famous people and the most valuable tombstones are located.
The administration of the necropolis has a computerized database that allows you to search for burials and provides data on their location.
Crematorium at the Northern Cemetery of Rostov-on-Don
On the territory of the churchyard in 2001, a crematorium was built and opened and a site for urn burial was equipped. But most relatives prefer to bury the remains of deceased loved ones in the traditional way, using a coffin.
Temple
On the territory of the Northern Cemetery of Rostov-on-Don, there is the Church of the Intercession of the Most Holy Theotokos, next to which are the burial places of church workers and clergymen, they form an independent necropolis.
Burials of famous people in the cemetery of the city of Rostov-on-Don
From the entrance to the cemetery stretches the Alley of Heroes, here are the burial places of the military and honored residents of Rostov. The Monument to the participants of the Great Patriotic War, erected in 2010, is also located here.
Well-known public, scientific, cultural figures of the city and the country found eternal rest at the city cemetery. Not far from the entrance is the grave of V.V. Nikolaev, the famous Rostov athlete, Olympic champion, wrestler. On the main alley is the grave of Savin E.S., a well-known Rostov scientist and civil engineer of the Rostov Civil Engineering Institute. Here is the grave of the famous Rostov journalist and poet Krymsky Yu.P., his grave monument looks like a real pen, and is a romantic image of poetry.
Burials of famous figures of Rostov and Russia:
- Graves of artists and architects: Slepchenko V.R., Russian artist; Ganus I.V., architect, author of architectural projects for a number of churches in Rostov.
- The grave of the poetess - Alushkina N.B.
- Graves of musicians: Dizhechko G.Yu., Russian rock musician, group "Matrosskaya Tishina"; Andrianov V.V., Russian singer, soloist of the VIA "Leisya, song"; Nazaretov K.A., jazz musician and pianist.
- Graves of famous Russian actors: Ozhigova T. A., theater actress, People's Artist of the Soviet Union; Bushnov M.I., Soviet and Russian film and theater actor, People's Artist of the Soviet Union.
- The graves of athletes: Shatvoryan G.I., Soviet wrestler, world champion in Greco-Roman wrestling; Nikolaev V.V., wrestler, Olympic champion.
- The grave of a military man - Pechersky A.A., an officer of the Red Army, the leader of a successful uprising in a concentration camp in the Second World War.
- The grave of a scientist - Vorovich II, academician, mathematician.
Cemetery address
In the area where the Northern Cemetery of Rostov-on-Don is located, shuttle bus No. 77 and bus No. 33, Orbitalnaya stop, run. From there, walk about a kilometer.
Address of the Northern Cemetery of Rostov-on-Don: Rostov-on-Don, Orbitalnaya street, 1a.
Working hours: from 8:00 to 17:00 (winter period), from 8:00 to 20:00 (summer period).
North Cemetery Rostov-on-Don: prices
Every resident is guaranteed burial services by law of the Russian Federation. Information with the approved cost of funeral services has been published on the website of the city administration of the city. Two lists of prices are indicated: one is for those who are buried by relatives or relatives, and the second is for those who are buried by the state.
For example, these prices are:
The coffin - 2058 rubles (for the second category of citizens it will cost the state 1730 rubles).
Delivery of the coffin to the cemetery - 950 rubles.
Digging a grave pit -1300 rubles.
Cremation - 2250 rubles.
Data on the cost of services are given as of 2016.
According to the cemetery administration, in the future, the cost of burials will only grow, this is due to the rise in prices in the ritual business, therefore, the cost of services will also increase.
Due to the fact that there was practically no free land left for new burials on the territory of the Northern Cemetery, a new place for the cemetery was determined. The administration of Rostov-on-Don purchased a new plot of land for the city cemetery, located 12 km from the city.
January 27, 2015 No one is surprised that visits to cemeteries are included in excursion programs in many cities of the world. At the same time, the cemeteries themselves are sometimes able to surprise - tourists who appreciate architecture and unusual works of art, as well as a quiet, contemplative rest, find a lot of interesting things for themselves in local cemeteries. We publish here a list of the most amazing and beautiful, in our opinion, cemeteries in different parts of the world.
1. Père Lachaise Cemetery, France, Paris
Today, this cemetery in the eastern part of Paris is perhaps the most famous in the world. Hundreds of thousands of tourists visit it throughout the year. However, this was not always the case: in 1804, when the authorities allocated a place for him, the Parisians did not want to bury their relatives there just because of his low fame. The city hall of Paris took an unprecedented step: the ashes of the writer Molière and two legendary lovers: Abelard and Eloise were transported to Pere Lachaise. After that, many world-famous people found their last refuge here - Honore de Balzac, Frederic Chopin, Oscar Wilde, Edith Piaf, Marcel Marceau and many other figures of literature and art, as well as famous politicians.
2. Arlington National Cemetery, USA
The world's largest military cemetery is located in Arlington, a suburb of the US capital Washington. In addition to participants in wars and various military conflicts that the United States has waged around the world since 1865, presidents, chairmen of the Supreme Court, and American astronauts are buried at Arlington Cemetery. The cemetery covers an area of almost three square kilometers, currently there are about 300,000 graves.
Chinese Christian cemetery on the western side of Hong Kong Island in the form of an amphitheatre. The overpopulated territory of Hong Kong, a rocky island, did not allow the expansion of the Pok Fu Lam cemetery, created in 1882, so Hong Kong Christians were forced to build terraces for burials on the mountainside, connecting them with streets and alleys. Over time, the cemetery began to resemble a giant open amphitheater. Some burials are made with great artistic sophistication.
The only underwater cemetery-crematorium in the world is an artificial reef off the east coast of the United States. Here, those who during their lifetime were somehow connected with the sea find their last shelter - divers, sailors. The underwater territory of the reef covers an area of 65,000 m2. The most famous burial is the 86-year-old Edith Hink, a resident of Naples. Her relatives decided that Edith loved the sea so much that she deserved to be buried in it.
An ancient necropolis near the highland Ossetian village of Dargavs. 97 stone crypts have been preserved here, most often in the form of pointed towers. According to legend, during the plague in the 14th century, people themselves came here, built crypts and waited for death. The necropolis is located on Mount Rabinyrang, from where a picturesque panorama of the Caucasus Mountains opens.
One of the most visited places in the capital of Argentina, and rightfully one of the most beautiful cemeteries in the world. Here are the burial places of many Argentine presidents and other celebrities, the most famous of them is the grave of Eva Peron, a legendary woman, especially revered in Latin America. Eva Peron was an actress, the wife of Argentine President Juan Domingo Peron, and she herself was involved in politics a lot. The cemetery is part of the National History Museum. Among the sculptures in the cemetery, there are many genuine works of art that have been declared national cultural and historical treasures.
This strange "joyful" cemetery was created in the 1930s by original local artist Stan John Patra. Crosses and wooden tombstones are decorated with playful inscriptions and drawings in the primitivism genre, depicting episodes of the life (and sometimes death) of the buried, telling about their virtues and small weaknesses. According to the artist, a joyful attitude towards death is a legacy of the Dacians, the ancestors of modern Romanians, who believed that death was only a transition to a better life.
The cemetery was created in 1786, in accordance with the decree of the Emperor of Austria-Hungary Joseph II, who forbade the burial of people in the city. The further fate of the city cemetery is unusual - in the 19th century it became a favorite place for walks and romantic dates for Lviv residents, and in the 20th century it became a place of pilgrimage for tourists. People are attracted by a huge (about 400,000) number of sculptures, crypts and tombstones, with inscriptions in Polish, German, Ukrainian, Russian, Hebrew, Latin, Armenian and some other languages of the inhabitants of international Lviv. Many of the monuments are monuments of art, the Lychakiv Cemetery is included in the UNESCO World Heritage List.
The world's largest Islamic cemetery and one of the largest cemeteries in the world. There are about five million graves on an area of 6 km2. Many Muslim prophets are buried here, nearby is the grave of Hazrat Imam Ali ibn Abu Talib, the “Fourth Imam”, a shrine revered by Muslims around the world.
10. The hanging coffins of Sagada, Philippines
According to scientists, the mountain cemetery of "hanging coffins" has existed on the Philippine island of Luzon for more than two thousand years. Representatives of the Sogadi people bury their dead here. Now the Sogadians are Christians converted to the Catholic faith by the Spanish colonialists, but they refuse to bury the dead. Coffins hollowed out from solid logs are prepared during a person’s lifetime, most often he does it himself, and if for some reason he cannot finish this work, his relatives and friends hollow out the coffin. The burial ritual includes a complex procedure for delivering the coffin with the body of the deceased to a cemetery located high in the mountains, on sheer cliffs, and fixing it on a rock. Perhaps this is the most unusual cemetery from our entire list.
11. Sucre's General Cemetery, Bolivia 
The main cemetery of the city of Sucre is the most prestigious in Bolivia, the family of the deceased has to pay $10,000 for the burial. True, with this money the deceased stays for seven years in a special vault, a kind of pantheon, and only after that is moved to the ground, to an ordinary grave. True, not forever, but for the next twenty years, after which the grave is completely removed, there are many who want to be buried in the cemetery in Sucre. Many Bolivian presidents are buried here, including Hilarion Daza, the infamous initiator of the war with Chile, after which Bolivia lost access to the Pacific coast.
In the city of Najaf, located in the southern part of Iraq, 160 kilometers from Baghdad, there is the largest and oldest Muslim cemetery in the world - Wadi as-Salam (Valley of Peace), where Muslims have been continuously buried for more than 1400 years. The area of the cemetery itself is more than 600 hectares.
Many prophets, scientists and rulers are buried here. The tombs of Prophet Adam (AS) and Prophet Nuh (AS) are also located in Najaf. In addition, the mausoleum of the fourth righteous caliph of the Muslim world, Imam Ali (RA), is located here.
In the Valley of Peace, in addition to scientists, religious and political figures, there are graves of ordinary Muslims from Afghanistan, India, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Pakistan and other countries.
At the moment, more than five million Muslims from all over the world have found peace in Wadi as-Salam. Burials are located close to each other, so that one person accounts for about one square meter. Despite the density of burials, there are still roads, narrow passages between the graves, and in some places you can even find fences.
Gravestones are mainly made of burnt bricks or gypsum. There are both modest and large family burials, which are decorated with domes, they are usually visible from afar. Such burials are more typical for graves belonging to the 30-40s of the 20th century.
In mid-2010, the Valley of Peace was included in the UNESCO World Heritage List. And in 2012, the city of Najaf was chosen as the capital of Islamic culture by ISESCO. Recall that every year three cities from Africa, Asia and the Middle East are selected as capitals of Islamic culture. The nomination recognizes the contemporary and historical importance of cities in the field of culture, architecture and art, as well as their contribution to Islam.
