A Tale of Two Cemeteries and Two Angels

A couple weeks ago I journeyed to Rome, Italy. My tombstone tourist itinerary included two cemeteries, the Capuchin Church, the Vatican crypts, and the site of Julius Caesar’s cremation at the Forum. The two cemeteries I visited, aside from being historic burial grounds, had very different feels, and were good examples of how cemeteries are now promoting themselves…and how they are not. The two cemeteries also happen to play host to the two most famous funerary angels in the world.

My first stop was the Non-Catholic Cemetery, more commonly known as the Protestant cemetery, a tidy little cemetery tucked in behind the Cestius Pyramid, an impressive structure built in the first century B. C. When I first visited the cemetery a decade ago, it was starting to show signs of neglect. Most visitors to the cemetery came to see the graves of English poet John Keats who died of tuberculosis in 1821 and Percy Bysshe Shelley who drowned in 1822. The visitors generally spent a few minutes giving their respects, then went on with their tourist business elsewhere in Rome. However, many of them also went to see an evocative angel sculpted by American William Wetmore Story for his wife Emelyn, who died in 1898.

In 2006, an organization known as the Friends on the Non-Catholic Cemetery got busy and started promoting the cemetery, not just as a tourist attraction, but as a place to be buried. The result? This sleepy little cemetery is now far from dead (pardon the pun). Indeed, business is booming. During my two hour visit, I saw well over a hundred visitors, many of whom were groups of what appeared to be high school students. I don’t speak Italian, but it was clear to me that the teachers were lecturing on art and architecture as well as pointing out famous residents. All of them went t,o and marveled at, the Story Angel.

Despite the tidy size of the cemetery, I noticed a number of new graves. To be sure, the Non-Catholic Cemetery of Rome is quickly running out of space, but, thanks to the very active Friends of the Non-Catholic Cemetery, the vibrancy of the cemetery seems assured for future generations to enjoy.

The next day I journeyed to Verano Cemetery in Northeast Rome just outside Rome’s original city walls. Verano Cemetery was established in 1847, and, like many cemeteries of that era, was modeled on Père-Lachaise in Paris. Entering the cemetery, I was treated with a vast arcaded area known as the quatriportico (four entrances). The arcades were peppered with dozens of evocative and majestic statues, many executed by famous sculptors. Here were pensive angels, heroic figures, and public figures. What was in short supply were Roman citizens and tourists. Aside from a couple of priests and a rather zealous security guard who told me photography was not permitted (we later made peace when he understood my intentions were to celebrate the cemetery’s residents and not exploit them), there were few people wandering around. The cemetery is so large that a city bus stops at twenty-one locations within the cemetery, but I never saw anyone on the bus. I felt like I was in a Twilight Zone episode where the world had ended and I was the only one left.

I had a specific destination in mind, so I wandered away from the quatriportico in search of my prey, the Monteverde Angel, that, along with the Story Angel in the Non-Catholic Cemetery, is one of the most famous angelic sculptures in the world. With the help of my two companions, my daughter and her husband, we located the Monteverde Angel, but during our one hour plus journey to the angel and beyond we did not see another single person. What we did see were dozens and dozens of incredible mausoleums and sculptures. If the sculptures we saw were anywhere else but a cemetery, I can safely say they would be a major tourist attraction in Rome.

One can only hope that someday the governing body of Verano Cemetery will understand what an incredible resource they have, and provide maps and other aids to locate notable tombs. After all, people did not erect their final resting places with the intention of being ignored. They did so with the intention of being remembered.

[Douglas Keister Visit Doug’s Author Page] Google+