Christian Burial Privation in the Middle Ages: an interdisciplinary approach (France, mid-10th–early 14th)

Abstract

In the mid-10th century, the Christian Church creates consecrated cemeteries forbidden to those we might call the ‘bad dead’. At the same time, the landscape and social practices change thanks to a better defined guidance of the faithful on liturgical, sacramental and juridical matters. Between the11th and 13th centuries, the clerics define a number of ‘bad Christian’ groups to be deprived of sepultura ecclesiastica, who were previously regarded by historians of written sources and archaeologists as ‘outsiders’. Although ecclesiastical justice was uncompromising regarding the future of those excommunicated, their reintegration within the Church was pondered. This study aims to understand these funeral bans and to assess the management of burial areas and their surroundings from a new perspective. Not only does it shed light on the future of the bodies deprived of sepultura ecclesiastica, but it also raises the question of the care assumed by the authorities of the ‘bad dead’.