Ancient London Burial Ground Unearthed

Crossrail excavations have unearthed an ancient London burial ground, reports The Guardian.

A walled, two-acre burial ground which was opened in the mid-17th century by order of the mayor of London has been discovered. It was the first built away from the city's parish churches and their overfilled graveyards, and was usually known as Bedlam because it was on land formerly occupied by the mental hospital.

 

The victims of several plague outbreaks were also buried there, and as it filled, there were appeals for more top soil to keep the bodies decently covered; by the time it closed in 1714 it is said to have held a two-metre layer solid with corpses.

Because the bodies came from all over London, those buried there are unusually socially diverse. There are no surviving burial records for the cemetery, and instead names are scattered through thousands of records in the parishes where those buried there lived or died. The tunnelling project's chief archaeologist says up to 4,000 bodies of plague victims and inmates of Bedlam may yet be discovered.

Click here to read the full report from The Guardian.