Romania’s Merry Cemetery
by Alina Beck on 27/03/09 at 7:51 am
Romania is a country full of surprises, and the Merry Cemetery at Săpânţa, Maramureş is no exception.
Tucked away in a small village in the northern Romanian region of Maramureş is a final resting place unlike any other.
Instead of headstones and plain crosses, the graves in this little churchyard are decorated with whimsical and often strangely moving paintings depicting scenes from the person’s life, and sometimes even the events leading up to their deaths.
Image via Wikipedia
Most of the paintings are the work of local man, Stan Ioan Patras, who created the distinctive designs until his death just over thirty years ago. Using his signature shade of blue (known as ‘Săpânţa blue’ after his home village) which he saw as a symbol of hope and freedom, as well as green for life, red for passion and yellow for fertility, he created a vivid gallery of rural life and death on more than 800 carved memorials.
There are housewives cooking, farmers ploughing, local doctors and musicians, carpenters, hunters, children and adults all depicted in bright primary colours. Every aspect of daily life is here – a child holding her mother’s hand, a young woman milking a cow, a man weaving at a rickety wooden loom.
Image via Wikipedia
And the images do not shy away from the reality of life and death. Amongst the traditional rural scenes are some shockingly frank depictions of accidents and tragedies, including an explosion that killed three people. The artwork may be rather naive in style but the reality of life and death is in no way sugar-coated.
Image via Wikipedia
Many of the images are accompanied by verses and epitaphs, written in the first person. Some are shockingly straight-forward – “An evil man shot me in the back” – whereas others almost light-heartedly capture some aspect of the person whose memory is being honoured, such as this man who obviously enjoyed Romania’s fiery plum brandy:
“Now I will tell you a good one
I kind of liked the plum ţuica
With my friends at the pub
I used to forget what I came for.”
Image via Wikipedia
Like so much of Romanian life, the Merry Cemetery is quirky, fascinating, beautiful and totally unexpected. If you’re ever planning a trip to Eastern Europe, why not add the village of Săpânţa to your itinerary?
Image via Wikipedia
More about Romania:
Find out about Romania’s world-famous painted monasteries, UNESCO world heritage sites.
Liked it
papaleng
Mar 27th, 2009
nice article, it’s the first time to learn about happy cemetery.
Christine Ramsay
Mar 27th, 2009
That is such a beautiful and quirky cemetery. It makes it such a happy place to lie. A wonderful, well written and beautifully illustrated article.
Debra.
Mar 27th, 2009
Beautiful and colorful cemetery with a lively upbeat feel.It’s a change of pace from the sad and darkness that cemetery’s usually bring. Well written article and beautiful pics too.
Daghost413860
Mar 27th, 2009
I love this cemetery! I love the animations on the tombstones…they can be so grim and so funny! An artistic wonder!
Thank you for sharing this article!!
nutuba
Mar 27th, 2009
Excellent travel article for a fascinating place! I’ve never heard of any cemetary quite like this …
monica55
Mar 27th, 2009
What an attractive cemetary. Great research. Well done
Monica
The Quail
Mar 27th, 2009
Awesome article found it to be very interesting and intrigging.
Michelle
Mar 27th, 2009
Nice to see a cemetery that dares to be different!
Glynis Smy
Mar 27th, 2009
How interesting!
Karen Gross
Mar 27th, 2009
Morbid, but fascinating! We in the west try to disguise and ignore death. This cemetery celebrates the lives of those who have come before.
Kikolani
Mar 27th, 2009
They celebrate life, instead of mourning the death. That’s kind of beautiful.
rutherfranc
Mar 27th, 2009
this reminded me of the old saying `be happy at funerals, he has no problem anymore.. cry at weddings, problems are at the door`.. great share..
BunnygotBlog
Mar 27th, 2009
This is an amazing story and curb on cemetery’s somber presence.Very creative way to honor life.
coffeeadict
Mar 27th, 2009
What an unusual way of dealing with life and death. But it is intriguing in a way, too. It brings the dead and the living closer together, I think…
George W Whitehead
Mar 27th, 2009
Certainly not as morbid as a western cemetery, Alina. Great article and great images.
Olivia Reason
Mar 27th, 2009
I would love to visit such a place. This is an informative, well-written travel article.
Kimberly Moore
Mar 27th, 2009
Thumbs-up! Love things that are unique!
clay hurtubise
Mar 27th, 2009
Neat, makes me want to visit Romania!
Thanks,
Clay
Kate Smedley
Mar 28th, 2009
What a lovely way to celebrate life, I always enjoy your articles on life in Romania Alina, a fascinating insight once again. Perhaps we should do more of this here.
Kevoow
Mar 28th, 2009
Great article.
Sandra Tapia
Mar 28th, 2009
Fascinating piece! So full of culture. Thanks for the knowledge.
Love and Blessings,
San
Denise Kawaii
Mar 29th, 2009
What a happy place to be buried – should we all be so lucky!
CutestPrincess
Mar 30th, 2009
beautiful place, fantastic photos!
OhSugar
Mar 30th, 2009
Very interesting article. These pictures are quiet beautiful and compliments the name of the cemetery. Nice work.
manya
Apr 6th, 2009
Its always so much more interesting to know about places that we barely hear about. Thanks for sharing this article with us.
-manya
Kane
Apr 7th, 2009
I usually think cemeteries are ridiculous. Seems a silly waste of space and for what? It’s not like you need the meat that gets buried there and for how long? Everyone will get dug up or built over at some point in the future. That aside, this one is cool and makes for a neat tourist attraction.
Joshua Miguel
Apr 11th, 2009
i think this is a great concept. we always have this notion that graveyards are haunted and full of sorrow… this one will change it.
Maureen Dolan
May 2nd, 2009
I will definitely visit this when I return to Romania. I think more cemeteries should be like this one. Nice article.
Brian Daniel Stankich
May 20th, 2009
I was in Romania in 2005!
Ervin
Jul 20th, 2009
Good article. I’ve just visited some relatives in the area and stopped by. I read whatever was available on site and then I started looking for articles on the Internet. This is a much better summary than whatever is on Wikipedia. You might want to update the Wikipedia article with the story that is missing there.