European Cemeteries

Cimitero Maggiore di Padova

2023-05-24T03:20:00.000-07:00

I finally got around to visit the Main Cemetery in Padova. I've visited the City itself a couple of times but never the Cemetery itself.

There's not a lot of information available about it: Founded in 1881 (according to Sandra Berresford: A legacy of love -by the way an absolute Masterpiece!- ) or 1882 (Official Website). It is a rather large cemetery but it is rather empty at the same time.

If you enter at the main entrance just tun right and you'll see about 90% of the interesting stuff compressed in a portico about 50 meters long.

2023-05-13T11:13:00.001-07:00

Cimitero di Monumentale Rimini

There is not really a lot of information available about this cemetery available. It is seemingly famous for having the grave of Frederico Fellini but that's about all i've managed to dig out. Mind you i've not digged deep because i couldn't be bothered to.

I knew though that it would be interesting anyway because it's a fairly big cemetery and it has a "monumentale" in the name. That's always an indication of being a good cemetery in my mind.

The entrance. Got lucky with the weather!

Cimitero Certosa, Bologna

2021-04-04T07:10:00.005-07:00

These days i'm working on a book and due to my research i've realised that i've never made a post about the Certosa in Bologna. I was there shortly before Christmas 2015 so it's a slight gap between visiting it and posting about it...

I definetly recommend to visit that gem if you ever get the chance. Bologna itself is a wonderful city and the cemetery is one of my faves. Look for yourself:

Le Cimitere du Monastère de Ciemetz, Nice

2019-09-13T08:35:00.000-07:00

This is the second cemetery we visited in Nice. It's life began as a monastery and that is more or less the only information i was able to dig out.

It's located on a hill overviewing Nice and the view is absolutely stunning. Supposedly Henri Matisse is buried here but we didn't bother to look out for his grave since we are not looking for celebs but for interesting sculptures and graves.

So here they are:

Cimitiere du Chateau, Nice, France

2019-08-20T02:54:00.001-07:00

Bon Jour and welcome again! This is the first Post about a cemetery in France. To be precise it is the Cimitiere du Chateau in Nice and it is located on a hill overlooking the city. You'll probably notice that when we get to the pictures. The cemetery itself is rather small but it is truly a gem. You can tell that Nice is near Italy because the place does remind me of some Cemeteries i've visited in Italy over the years.

The biggest disadvantage however was that this cemetery has no toilets. Otherwise it was well worth the visit.

They removed the Wings! I've never seen that before

This is kinda scary. look at the claws!

At work

This was shot on the jewish part of the cemetery. Luckily it was open

Cimitero Monumentale Milano Part 11 (final Part. For now)

2019-04-01T08:08:00.000-07:00

Yes. You've read the title correctly. This is the final part of the Milan series. We finally reached the entrance hall which was the last part we visited that day.

I wonder why this reminds me of the cover of "Beautiful Death" Anyway if you consider to buy it: Don't bother. The Text provided by Dean Koontz is completely off-topic while the pictures are mostly disappointing.

Cimitero Monumentale Milano Part ten

2019-03-26T08:40:00.000-07:00

We're getting there. This is the 10th part of that series and still it's not finished yet. This time i've got some fine examples for you and at the end one of the weirdest i've ever seen on a cemetery

one of my absolute favourites. So gorgeous

Another brillant miniature

??? That is seriously weird.

Cimitero Monumentale Perugia

2019-02-27T11:07:00.000-08:00

My first visit to a cemetery this year was -as it turned out- the Cimitero Monumentale Perugia.

We went there last week and we were very lucky regarding the weather: Crisp blue sky awaited us!

The cemetery itself is rather small but we still didn't have the time to see it all but even the hour we spent there was worth our while.

Here we go:

Cimitero Monumentale Milano Revisit Part 9

2019-02-13T09:08:00.002-08:00

Although this is part 9 (nine!) of the ongoing series there is still no end in sight. My estimate is that we covered about 2/3 from that batch.

I'm guessing it's not a Rodin. But it is clearly inspired by him.

Gorgeous

Just a small section of the cemetery.. like being in a candy shop.

Normally i'm not into celebrity hunting but this one is rather amazing: The last supper in a lifesize scale. It's the grave for the Campari-Family.

Cimitero Monumentale Milano Revisit Part 8

2019-02-09T07:36:00.001-08:00

With a slight guilty feeling i realized i've left this blog more or less abandoned the last year. I'd like to change that and i'm beginning with the next part of my Milan Series.

And since i'm not really in the mood to write that much i'm getting straight to the pictures:

Is it just me or does it actually remind of Star Wars- The Clone Wars?

Some beautiful casing for a candle

Gorgeous Minature

Another one

This is a weird modern grave. But i really like it

Detail

Found the skull?

Brescia: Cimitero Vantiniano

2017-11-30T06:47:00.000-08:00

The Cimitero Vantiniano was founded in 1815 and is one of the first Cemeteries build from scratch after Napoleon's Edict of Saint Cloud. The Edict forbid to bury the dead in and around churches and lead to the cemeteries we know today.

We first tried to visit this cemetery back in 2016 but it was closed over noon at the time. This time however we were there well before noon and could visit it properly:

The veiled female mourner by Battista Lombardi

The Monument of the Cuzzetti-Bonardy Family, Artist Odoardo Tabacci

Trieste, Cimitero Cattolico di S. Anna

2017-11-28T08:30:00.000-08:00

The Trieste Cemetery was a bit of a mystery for us since there was not really anything substantial to find out about it on the internet. But since Trieste is reasonable big and there is no bad cemetery in Italy as long as the city to where it belongs has more than 50.000 people it should be ok to visit it.

To cut it short: It is an excellent Cemetery. The only thing that really annoyed us is that one of the huge arcades was sealed off because of safety reasons. And that brings me to the atmosphere of the Cemetery. Especially the old sections has an air of derelict about it and visiting it in autumn makes it even more forlorn.

There are several smaller cemeteries in the area, with separate entrances but only the greek-orthodox was worth visiting. The jewish was closed.

The following are from the greek-orthodox section:

She looks like a pirate!

Hamburg Ohlsdorf -revisit in Winter-

2017-02-08T12:49:00.000-08:00

Last month i had the opportunity to revisit this huge cemetery again. And the circumstances were quite extraordinary: It was phantastically cold with practically no wind and a bright winter sun that gave us a rather beautiful light. So on the one hand we had really good conditons to shoot some beautiful stuff, but on the other hand we gave up rather fast since we were chilled to the bone.

One thing though that really puts me off every time i visit this particular cemetery: There is Rhododendron everywhere! And i bloody hate that stuff..

Since this Cemetery is one of the largest in the world (if not the largest of them all if you consider the amount of space it occupies) you are allowed to travel by car. So this time it was -more or less- a drive by shooting....

The cemetery itself has -at least in my mind- a strange coldness about it. And i am not talking about the weather this time. The sculptures are very often made from sand stone and they tend to feel hard and harsh to the beholder and they don't intend to comfort the mourners in any way.

Well.. see for yourself:

Cimitero Monumentale Milano - Part seven -

2016-07-26T06:00:00.000-07:00

It's about time to do a little update. We're getting around the Cemetery just nicely. I recon we're about halfway there....

So here we go:

Cimitero Monumentale Milano -Part six-

2016-07-18T05:49:00.001-07:00

It's about time to publish another one. And -as usual in this series- i will not bore you to death with a lengthy intro but get straight to the pictures:

Cimitero Monumentale Milano revisit -Part 5-

2016-06-30T08:08:00.000-07:00

The sheer amount of pictures worthy for this blog we shot at this visit is still overwhelming. And at ths rate i'm posting them i won't be finished by 2018... Still complaining and nagging about it doesn't do the job. Continuing to post them will. So here's another batch:

Cimitero Monumentale Milano -Revisit Part 4-

2016-05-30T07:29:00.001-07:00

Not really much to say about this one. If so you will see it in the captions

No matter where you look: Always something interesting around

This is just plain weird

Cimitero Monumentale Milano - Part 3 -

2016-05-07T08:40:00.000-07:00

Since i am in a really publishing mood.. and since there are still so many i have to show you i won't waste any more time doing so.

This post is no different to the last ones; no particular theme - just a general chronological order. And general lacking of text. I am not that creative when it comes to that..

Cimitero Monumentale Milano -Part 2-

2016-05-04T13:57:00.000-07:00

As i promised in the last entry: This time less text and more Pics. Although one thing i have to mention: The pics are in a chronoligical order. So if you've ever been there for yourself you can (more or less) track the way we went.

Cimitero Monumentale Milano: Revisit Part one

2016-05-03T10:53:00.001-07:00

My first post about the Cimitero Monumentale in Milan is now nearly six years old. It was about time to revisit this gem again, especially since my first visit was during dreadful weather.

Well... This time it wasn't raining so that was better. It was still very cloudy so it wasn't perfect.

The cemetery itself is unbelievable. The sheer amount of monuments is overwhelming and you have to be prepared, organized and very disciplined. Plan a route and stick to it - otherwise you will get lost and wander around with no clue what you've seen and what you've missed. That alone is very hard: There are plenty of points where you are surrounded by sculptures and you could go in any direction and find dozens of sculptures... and when you get there you find another.. and another.. and soon you are lost and you don't know where you've came from....

Just to give you a picture of the amazingness: We took about 3.000 pictures on our holiday (two weeks in Italy). 1.500 of these were taken on this day in Milan. That's how amazing that cemetery is.

And -you've noticed that probably by now- i normally don't write a lot and let the pictures do the talking, but this time i cannot help it. I will show you a selection of the best pictures over the next few weeks so you can get a glimpse of what i've seen there.

Florence: Cimitero Delle Porte Sante

2016-04-28T10:08:00.001-07:00

If you ever get the chance to visit Florence you should definetly visit this place as well!

Not only is it quite near to the center of the old city itself (only about 20 minutes by foot) but it provides affordable and -even more important- available parking space.

Florence itself is a wonderful city, but the sheer mass of tourists is putting me off. The place is just too full. The queue in front of Giotto's Campanile was just awfully long. Turns out it is far more convenient to take a tour of the city in Assassin's Creed II.

So the Cemetery: First of all it offers a breathtaking view of the City:

Since this is a blog about Cemeteries i kept the focus on the Sculpture. Not the Tourist-Trap in the background.

And -i get not tired about saying this- every slightly bigger cemetery in Italy is just wonderful. So here is a small selection of the pictures we made that beautiful spring day:

Didn't knew that Wilhelm Busch was buried here.... Turns out he wasn't. This one here just looks exactly like him.

Odoardo Spadaro

Cimitero di Bergamo

2016-04-08T01:24:00.002-07:00

We had the chance to visit the Cimitero di Bergamo on a lovely spring morning in March 2016.

We arrived by bus (since we had an appartment in the city of Bergamo itself - which is a gorgeous town by the way) and gaped at the front of this Cemetery... See for yourself:

My wife at the steps; just to get a picture how massive this is...

I was entering the Cemetery with my Camera hanging at my side and with my Backpack full of the other gear and immediatly a Guard said to me that only Panorama-Pictures are allowed. Which totally sucks. Especially when equipped with a tele lens (as my wife prefers). I nodded in a polite way and we went to take some panorama pictures of this gorgeous cemetery:

Panorama number one

Another Panorama. This time there is a bloody scultpure in the way.

Perfect Panorama except for the bloody sculpture

Last caption. The joke is getting a bit old...

Lisbon again.. but this time not Prazeres but Cemiterio Alto de Sao Joao

2015-10-30T15:11:00.000-07:00

And what a long name for a Cemetery it is.

It is the by far the biggest Cemetery in Lisbon, but it's not quite as fascinating as the Prazeres. Still a good place to go as my pictures will proove.

The cemetery itself has a strange feeling: It is like a city for the dead. Alleys full of graves that remind you of houses where the dead dwell. You can peek into the doors and see the coffins... most of them slowly rotting. It has a rather creepy feeling.

The biggest difference between Prazeres and this one is the lack of sculptures. There were a few but it wasn't as rich as Prazeres itself.

Here are the Pictures:

Main Cemetery in Kassel

2015-02-03T05:01:00.001-08:00

I know, i know.... it's been a while since the last entry. 13 months to be precise! And yet... i'm not done here. There are still plenty of cemteteries to visit.

The cemetery in Kassel is a big one. Lots of old and huge trees and the atmosphere at this autumn day was spectacular. It was sunny and the morning mist was still around, so the light was just amazing.

See for yourself:

Hamburg Ohlsdorf -revisit-

2014-01-09T03:40:00.001-08:00

The last time in Hamburg Ohlsdorf was not *very* good. It was a tight schedule and it was ruined by a biblical downpour so that the amount of pictures i took there didn't do this cemetery any justice.

This time however it was not perfect (a slight drizzle and a dull grey sky) but it was not impossible.

Still we (my wife was again with me) couldn't see all of it. This cemetery is so huge that you honestly need a week to explore all. And it is a tiresome job since everything is so far apart. We stumbled around for about 3 hours and came up with some decent images.

Anyway, enough of the words and on to the picures...