Funerary patterns in towns in France and England between the fourth and the tenth centuries: a comparative approach

International audienceRecent archaeological research brought new light on the diversity of burial places in towns between the fourth and the tenth centuries in France and England. This paper seeks to show the similarities and the differences in the processes which lead to the formation of the parochial cemetery which became the norm from the eleventh-twelve centuries onwards. Britain shows far less continuity than Gaul in the use of burial places in Late Antiquity and early middle Ages and the construction of a church in a preexisting cemetery has not been really demonstrated, whereas it is a common feature in Gaul in suburban area. So far, the remains of churches are very sparse in late and post Roman Britain whereas they are numerous in Gaul where episcopal complexes and funerary basilicae were built from the middle of the fourth century onwards. There are more similarities in the disposal of the dead in various places of the urban space both in the late Roman period and in the early middle Ages: large cemeteries outside the walls but also small groups of graves and isolated tombs, both inside and outside the city walls which size varies a lot. Finally, whereas permanent churchyards started to develop around the minsters in England from the end of the seventh century onwards, in Gaul the earliest cemeteries attached to cathedrals were founded c. 1000