English Graveyards
Many of the graveyards in England’s countryside are several hundreds of years old, some are dating back to the middle ages. This is a selection of images taken in Blean and Fordwich, near Canterbury.
It’s interesting to see how the design of the headstones has changed through the ages. The oldest ones are often sculpted much more elaborately featuring religious and floral elements, also the skull & cross-bones. After this the headstones tend to become increasingly simpler.
Apart from the variety of styles, I was most fascinated by the vibrant colours of lichen ranging from luminous green, to yellow and deep, ‘rusty’ orange. The British are to be complimented on the way they have allowed many of their graveyards to become lovely wild areas, that have developed organically resulting in some very interesting landscape with a rich diversity in flora and fauna.
The images shown here were all taken with a short telephoto lens. I deliberately used a shallow depth of field to accentuate details.
Martin