The most unusual gravestones of celebrities. Unusual tombstones The coolest monuments on graves

On January 6, 1993, the world famous ballet dancer Rudolf Nureyev passed away. According to the wish of the star, he was buried in the Russian cemetery of Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois near Paris, and his tombstone became as unique as the dancer himself was. Many celebrities design their tombstones and monuments on their own during their lifetime, but for some, fans and heirs pay tribute to them. At the same time, often the decorations of the graves of famous people are real works of art.

1. Rudolf Nureyev. After the death of the artist, one of the leading artists of the Paris Opera, Enzo Frigerio, who was a friend and colleague of the dancer, suggested decorating his grave in the form of an oriental carpet, since Nureyev loved ancient carpets and ancient textiles from different countries.

With the funds raised by the dancer's friends in 1996, the tombstone was made in the Italian mosaic workshop Acomena Spazio Mosaico. At the same time, the mosaic is made of such high quality that the seams between small elements are practically not visible on it.

Some tourists even ask if the carpet gets wet in the rain and how often it is changed, the tombstone turned out so realistic.

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3. Vaslav Nijinsky. Another Russian dancer and choreographer of Polish origin, one of the leading members of the Russian Diaghilev Ballet, is also buried in Paris, at the Montmartre cemetery.

4. Yuri Nikulin. The grave of the beloved actor is decorated with a sculptural composition: a smoking pensive actor in a hat, at whose feet lies a Giant Schnauzer - the first dog that the artist brought from abroad.

5. Freddie Mercury. Although the ashes of the singer were scattered, a sculptural portrait in Swiss Montreux is considered his place of memory and a kind of tombstone. The statue was made in 1996, five years after the death of the actor.

6. John Wayne. After the death of the legend of American cinema, his grave stood without a monument for almost 20 years. The actor himself asked to write on the tombstone: "Ugly, strong and worthy", however, against his will, a scene from a western was depicted on the stone and a quote was placed: "Tomorrow is the most important thing in life. It comes to us at midnight very clean. It's great when it comes and is in our hands.Tomorrow hopes that we have learned something from "yesterday".

7. Jimi Hendrix. The musician is buried in Greenwood Memorial Park in Renton, Washington, and his grave is adorned with a majestic stone pavilion.

8 Buck Owens Perhaps the most recognizable country artist of the 20th century died in 2006 after a heart attack and was buried in Bakersfield, California, and his mausoleum leaves no doubt that the musician is buried there.

9. Jim Morrison The musician's grave is one of the most visited attractions in Paris, and it is notable for graffiti, commemorative inscriptions and souvenirs left on it by fans. Morrison's tombstone has been stolen and destroyed so many times that it is now under guard.

10 Michael Jackson The remains of the king of pop are kept in an unmarked crypt at the famous Forest Lawn Cemetery near Los Angeles, California. Although it is filled with flowers and other gifts from fans, the crypt is closed to visitors and is constantly guarded.

11. The remains of the writer Jules Verne buried in the Cimetière de la Madeleine cemetery (Amiens, France) and decorated with a rather creepy tombstone.

12. Sir Isaac Newton was so dedicated to science during his lifetime that even by his tombstone it becomes obvious.

14. Tombstone of Edgar Allan Poe, who died in 1849, is crowned with a raven, the symbol of which was invariably present in the writer's work. The grave is also notable for the fact that someone constantly leaves a bottle of booze on it.

15. Grave of John F. Kennedy, killed in 1963, looks stern and majestic in the company of "eternal flame".

16. Merv Griffin. It is not the tombstone of the TV star itself that is noteworthy, but the epitaph on it: “I will not return after this message.”

17. Princess Diana buried at Althorp, North Hampshire, on a beautiful island surrounded by a small lake inhabited by four swans.

18. This is the gravestone of Oscar Wilde in Paris.

19. At some point, a tradition appeared to leave the writer a “kiss” on the wall of the tomb.

20. The body of Irish writer James Joyce buried in a grave next to his wife and son, who is watched over by his own statue.

21. Bob Marley died of cancer in 1981 at the age of 36. His grave is placed in a vast mausoleum, set just a few feet from his childhood home in the village of Nine Mile. The whole structure resembles a small house rather than a burial place.

22. Monument to Bruce Lee Lakeview Cemetery in Seattle attracts people from all over the world.

23. Fashion star Coco Chanel buried in the Swiss city of Lausanne, and her elegant tombstone is complemented by a floral arrangement made in the shape of the Chanel logo.

24. Although John Lennon and was cremated with the fate of his ashes a mystery, people flock to the Strawberry Fields Memorial in New York's Central Park to pay their respects.

25. Veteran actor Joe Mafela was buried at Westpark Cemetery in Johannesburg, and his tombstone is a replica of a living room with a plasma TV, coffee table and sofa.

26. This is the tombstone of the musician and actor Fernand Arbelo., who died in 1990 and was buried in Paris at the Père Lachaise cemetery, and his tombstone depicts him holding his wife's face, as the actor wished to look at him for eternity.

7. Actress Carrie Fisher was buried in Hollywood next to her mother, Debbie Reynolds. Their graves are adorned with a combined headstone designed to show the depth of their emotional connection.

28. This tombstone belongs to Jack Crowell, who owned the last wooden clothespin factory in the United States.

29. Comedian Jack Lemmon and after his death did not lose his sense of humor: on his tombstone is the inscription: "Jack Lemmon inside."

30. Bob Hope. An American comedian, theater and film actor rests under a gravestone in the form of a stage.

31. Victor Mature. The tomb of the Hollywood legend is crowned with a statue of a sobbing angel.

32. Johnny Ramone A member of The Ramones is depicted on a grave statue giving a concert.

33. Tomb of Karl Marx looks monumental, and the statue accompanies the call "Proletarians of all countries unite."

34. Belgian writer Georges Rodenbach buried under a gravestone, from which his bronze copy appears to come out with a rose in one hand.

35. Grave of French journalist Victor Noir has become an unspoken symbol of love and fertility. Tradition says: if you want to find a beautiful lover, you must kiss the statue on the lips, if you want to get pregnant, just touch his right foot, if you want to have twins, touch his left foot. Well, another organ is also quite often touched by visitors.

36. Grave of Frederic Chopin with a gentle, like his music, sculpture.

37. Theodore Géricault. The tomb of the French painter in Pere Lachaise is decorated with his bronze statue with a brush and palette in his hands, and on one side is a bronze version of his painting "The Raft of the Medusa".

38. Fedor Chaliapin died on April 12, 1938, was buried at the Batignolles cemetery, but in October 1984 his ashes were transferred to the Novodevichy cemetery in Moscow, where they opened a monument made by sculptor Alexei Yeletsky.

39. Nikita Bogoslovsky. The composer's music can be heard in many Soviet films, and his tombstone at the Novodevichy Cemetery is made in the form of a piano lid.

40. Archil Gomiashvili. Many consider the actor "the best Ostap Bender of all time." He was buried at the Troekurovsky cemetery, and it is the sculpture in the image of the Great Combinator that adorns his grave.

41. And this is the gravestone of Savely Kramarov.

42. Anna Politkovskaya. Perhaps the most unusual and figurative tombstone of a celebrity at the Troekurovsky cemetery...

43. And this is a monument to Micah, leader of the Jumanji group.

44. Those lying in these graves were not celebrities and became famous precisely because of the tombstones. A Catholic woman and her Protestant husband were not allowed to be buried together ( Roermond, Netherlands, 1880 and 1888 - Mariinsk). And two hands connect the graves through the wall.

45. And this unique monument depicts a boy who has been tied to a wheelchair all his life. The boy's name was Matthew Stanford Robison (Matthew Stanford Robinson), born September 23, 1988 Died: February 21, 1999, was paralyzed, blind and spoke only a few words. The sculpture - as a symbol of the son's liberation from earthly burdens, was installed by the father in 2000.

Of course, the tombstones of not all departed celebrities are shown here. But you can add in your comments...

I propose to take a walk around the Novodevichy cemetery, which is located on the territory of the current Resurrection Novodevichy Convent. Many do not even suspect the existence of the Novodevichy cemetery in St. Petersburg, believing that a cemetery and a monastery under this name exist only in Moscow. Nevertheless, today the St. Petersburg Novodevichy Cemetery is beginning to revive, tombstones are being restored here, interesting excursions are being conducted (both ordinary tourist and special pilgrimage ones), and more and more people are learning about this place.

Before the revolution, the Novodevichy Cemetery was one of the most expensive and prestigious in St. Petersburg, and although it suffered greatly during the Soviet period, it remains a valuable historical necropolis to this day. A walk around the Novodevichy cemetery will be of interest both to those who like to study the biographies of prominent people, and to connoisseurs of artistic tombstones. There are also shrines here, where people come to pray or just make a wish. You can read about famous people buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery in a separate note. In the meantime, we will talk about the most beautiful and unusual tombstones of the Novodevichy cemetery, and also get acquainted with its history (and the history of the monastery itself).

The most beautiful and unusual tombstones of the Novodevichy cemetery in St. Petersburg

Among the tombstones at the Novodevichy Cemetery there are sarcophagi, obelisks, slabs, steles with crosses, pedestals, hills with large chips, monuments in the form of an oncoming wave, chapels, miniature churches ... There are also monuments with portraits of the deceased, but they are quite few, since busts, bas-reliefs and other similar details suffered during the destruction of the cemetery in the first place.

Although a significant part of the pre-revolutionary burials have not survived to this day, we can still admire the surviving monuments of the 19th - early 20th centuries, which are of undoubted historical and artistic value.

Many headstones are made from valuable materials, including rare marbles and granites. On some, you can still read the names of the owners of the workshops where they were made.

From the point of view of artistic merit, family chapels-tombs stand out especially.

Unfortunately, all of them are ruined and are unlikely to be restored to their former splendor, however, even today they amaze with the quality and variety of design.

Perhaps the most beautiful is the Art Nouveau tomb of Lucia Gilse Van der Pals, née Johansen.

The massive chapel with a decorative frieze is a stylization of an ancient Egyptian tomb.

The tomb was built in 1904 according to the design of the architect V. Yu. Johansen in the workshop of Yu. P. Korsak. Its walls are made of Radom sandstone, the plinth is made of granite, and the floor is marble.

Inside the tomb, a marble bas-relief by the Piedmontese sculptor Pietro Canonica (1869-1959) (sometimes spelled "Canonicus" or "Canonico") has survived. During his long life, the master managed to work fruitfully in Russia, Italy, England, Turkey ... Not everyone knows that once on Manezhnaya Square in St. Petersburg there was an equestrian monument to Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolayevich by Pietro Canonica (1914). In 1918, the “ugly idol” was demolished, however, in the House-Museum of Canonica, in the Villa Borghese park in Rome, to this day you can see the models created for the monument. From other works of Canonica, we know the sculpture of the nun “After taking a vow” (currently one of the options is on display at the St. Petersburg Museum of the History of Religion).

Buried in such an exquisite chapel, Lucia (Lucy) was the daughter of a Danish professor at the St. Petersburg Conservatory, Julius Johansen, and the wife of a Dutch consul, co-director of the Russian-American Manufactory of Rubber Products (the future Red Triangle), philanthropist and philanthropist Heinrich van Gilse van der Pals. Many people are familiar with the luxurious mansion of G. G. Gilze van der Pals on English Avenue (the current military enlistment office). The mansion was built by Lucia's brother, the architect William Yulievich Johansen (who, as was said, designed this magnificent tombstone). From old photographs it can be seen that the rooms of the mansion were decorated with marble statues by Pietro Canonica, including the mentioned figure of a nun. Apparently, Gilse van der Pals was a connoisseur of the work of Canonica, so it is not surprising that he entrusted him with the sculptural decoration of the grave of his beloved wife.

Another interesting burial place from the point of view of artistic merit is the grave of the artillery general Dmitry Sergeevich Mordvinov (1820-1894). This is undoubtedly one of the most famous and beautiful tombstones of the St. Petersburg Novodevichy cemetery. Unfortunately, the side plates with the name of the buried person have been lost, but the artistic metal fence has survived.

The most remarkable detail of the gravestone is the bronze figure of a seated angel over a marble sarcophagus. A live flower is often placed in the hand of an angel.

The sculpture of an angel was created in the workshop of the French sculptor and artist Charles Berto (Karl Avgustovich Berto) (Charles Bertault). Petersburg bronze foundry Berto (former F. Chopin) specialized in the production of small bronze plastics. For participation in the World Exhibition in Paris in 1900, where the products of the factory were awarded a gold medal, Berto received the title of "Supplier of the Court of His Imperial Majesty." Despite this, due to financial difficulties, after two years he had to close the case and return to France.

Sculptural monuments with marble or bronze figures of angels standing or sitting at the tombstone were very common at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries, but few such examples have survived to this day. Therefore, despite the fact that we have before us just a “typical” sample, not related to the individuality of the customer, the tombstone is perceived as a great value.

As for the identity of D.S. Mordvinov buried here, it is known that he served in the artillery from a young age. In 1856 he was appointed head of a separate office of the War Office, and ten years later he became director of the office of the War Office, to which he devoted almost half of his many years of service. In 1872, Mordvinov was granted the adjutant general to His Imperial Majesty; in 1881 he was appointed a member of the Military Council and awarded with diamond badges of the Order of St. Alexander Nevsky. In 1883, Mordvinov was promoted to artillery general, and in 1889 he celebrated his 50th anniversary of service in the officer ranks and received the Order of St. Vladimir, 1st degree.

It is also worth paying attention to the tombstone of the St. Petersburg architect, who, however, is not very well known to the public. This is Ivan Denisovich Chernik (1811-1874), who worked in the military department and built, in particular, the new building of the General Staff and the Kryukov (Naval) barracks.

The burial of I. D. Chernik is one of the most beautiful surviving monuments at the Novodevichy cemetery. It is a magnificent white marble sarcophagus on a high pedestal. The board with the epitaph and the name of the deceased has not survived, but the bas-relief portraits of I. D. Chernik himself and his wife have survived (the latter, unfortunately, was damaged by vandals and cannot be restored due to the specifics of Carrara marble.

The monument was made in the workshop of the Italian sculptor Domenico Carli in Genoa (1878).

One of the most unusual burials at the Novodevichy Cemetery is the grave of a mathematician, professor Vladimir Pavlovich Maksimovich (1850-1889).

Maksimovich was born in St. Petersburg into a noble family and from an early age had outstanding mathematical abilities. Studied in St. Petersburg and Paris, worked at Kazan and Kiev universities. At the beginning of 1889, the mathematician was diagnosed with a severe mental illness, and in the same year he died at the age of 39.

The tombstone of Vladimir Maksimovich is a stone sphere in an artistic metal fence. On the sphere are images of the signs of the zodiac and a quote from Byron's poem "Ephthanasia" (Euthanasia) in English (" Count o "er the joys thine hours have seen...»).

This poem is known in the translations of I. Goltz-Miller and V. Levik (in the arrangement of the latter, this quatrain sounds like this: “He is close, the day that calls for the feast, || Count the blessings of past days, || And you will understand: whoever you were in life, || Not to be, not to live - much more truly").

To be continued...

Colonel J.W.C van Gorcum, who died in 1880, is buried in the Protestant section. And his wife, Lady van Efferden (J.C.P.H van Aefferden) - in Catholic. They married in 1842 when she was 22 and he was 33.

His wife, who belonged to a noble family, did not want to lie in the family tomb, instead she wanted to be closer to her husband and asked to be buried as close to him as possible.

Her wish was granted, and the lovers are still holding hands.

The Recoleta Argentine Cemetery - a famous cemetery located in the homonymous district of Buenos Aires - was the last refuge of Eva Duarte de Peron (Evita Peron) and not only. Many military leaders, presidents, scientists and poets are buried here.

David Alleno was an Italian immigrant and worked as a cemetery caretaker for 29 years. David also dreamed that his body lay in this cemetery. He saved up money to buy himself a place and built his own headstone. He even returned to his homeland to find a stone-cutting artist there who would bring his idea to life. The caretaker wanted the carver to depict him with keys, a broom and a bucket of water. Rumor has it that David put his own life into this work, and as soon as the tombstone was completed, he died.

Others object to this that David did not die until many years later.

The bust of this strict woman is also located in the Recoleta cemetery. The stone statue of a man sitting back to back with a lady is none other than her husband. Unlike the charming Catholic and Protestant couple, these spouses do not hold hands or even look at each other.

The husband died first, and his wife died a few years later. They lived together for 30 years. Without saying a word to each other.

Fernand Arbelot was a musician and actor. He died in 1990 and is buried in the Pere Lachaise cemetery, and before his death, he wanted only one thing - to forever look into the face of his wife.

The boy, who spent most of his young life in a wheelchair, after death was able to break these boundaries and fly - now he is free.

The Pere Lachaise cemetery in Paris can rightly be considered one of the most visited cemeteries in the world, where many of the monuments are real works of art. But perhaps the most dramatic of all comes from a writer that most people have never even heard of.

Georges Rodenbach (Georges Rodenbach) - Belgian writer of the XIX century, the author of the symbolic story "Dead Bruges" (Bruges-la-Morte). The protagonist of the work is Yug Vian, a widower who inconsolably mourns his early wife.

The cemetery in the village of Sapinta, Maramures County, Romania, is known for its cheerful atmosphere. Surely those who asked to be buried in this cemetery had a strong sense of humor.

Graves reflect people's hobbies in life. Some were shepherds, others were soldiers, and still others loved parties and poetry. Some tombstones tell the story of the death of the buried: some were killed by thieves, others were killed in a car accident ...

Perfect sense of humor

Jack Crowell is the owner of the last wooden clothespin factory in the USA. He always wanted children to play on his grave.

When Ray Tse Jr. died at the age of 15, his older brother, a successful businessman, decided to give his brother, who always dreamed of driving a car, a posthumous gift. The stone car cost $250,000, but maybe now Ray is good at driving his own Mercedes Benz. The grave is located at Linden Cemetery in New Jersey.

Perhaps the second most popular French cemetery, Montparnasse, has become a haven for the inventor Charles Pigeon, who rises on the bed where he lay with his wife and looks around in search of an angel.

In fact, people are scared in most cemeteries, because this is the place where they remember death, including their own death. But these cemeteries are teeming with ghost stories and odd facts! Want to tickle your nerves? That way.

You might be surprised that the first cemetery photo on this list is of an airport. However, this is really a cemetery! Under runway number 10 are the graves of the Dotson couple, a married couple who used to live in a house on the site of the airport and were buried in the area next to it. The airport repeatedly negotiated with Dotson's relatives about the transfer of the remains, but they did not agree, and without the consent of relatives in the United States, this is not allowed.

The architectural splendor of the Recoleta cemetery is amazing, but it was not included in this list because of it, but because of a number of terrible and unusual stories about those who are buried there: next to the grave of Evita Peron, on which there are always fresh flowers, Rufina Cambaceres is buried , a girl who was buried alive and came out of a coma right in the coffin, and David Alleno, a poor gravedigger who saved money for a burial site for thirty years, and having saved up, committed suicide.

We are used to the fact that cemeteries are underground, but the Filipino Igorot tribe buries their dead ... in the air. Cemeteries always hang over the heads of people from this tribe. For example, this rock covered with coffins looks creepy!

This cemetery is a popular tourist attraction in the Romanian village of Sapinta. The monuments of the cemetery, painted in bright colors, take us away from the mourning atmosphere of the place, and the epitaphs on them can be both funny and even satirical.

This is perhaps one of the most famous cemeteries in England. Every crypt and every statue here is an architectural masterpiece. But, beyond that, the graveyard is known for its abundance of ghosts - for example, a tall Highgate vampire with a hypnotic gaze. Another well-known ghost is an insane woman running around the cemetery looking for the children she killed.

Greyfriars Cemetery is an old cemetery with a rich history. It was founded in the 1560s. at the local prison. Of the 1200 prisoners, only 257 left it alive - the rest remained here forever. Now a rare brave man will dare to enter the gates of Greyfriars at night - the souls of the innocently killed will not give him rest.

People are afraid to visit even ordinary cemeteries. What would you say about the whole island of the dead? He is in Venice! When it was found that burials in the main territory of Venice lead to unsanitary conditions, the dead began to be taken out to San Michele. This is still done in a gondola specially designated for this.

The mining towns of La Noria and Humberstone are located in the middle of the desert in Chile. The history of these towns is a terrible story about the violence of the masters over their slave miners. Sometimes they were simply brutally killed, not sparing even the children. They were buried in the cemetery of La Noria; now, when you are in this cemetery, the feeling of the otherworldly environment around does not leave. There are many open and dug graves in the cemetery, from which skeletons even show up!

4. Chiesa dei Morti (Church of the Dead), Urbino, Italy

The Church of the Dead is famous not only for its big name, but also for the exposition of mummies. Behind the classic baroque arch, you have a great view of most of them. Each of the 18 preserved mummies is in its own alcove. The church was built, which is characteristic, the Brotherhood of the Good Death.

3. Bachelors Grove Cemetery, Chicago, Illinois, USA

This place is legendary as one of the most haunted cemeteries in America. Eyewitnesses confirm the appearance of strange figures in the cemetery. One of the famous ghosts is a white lady with a child in her arms. Also in the 1950s so many visitors to the cemetery have reported a ghostly house. In addition, a farmer with a horse appeared in the cemetery, killed nearby, and a black dog.

The number of "inhabitants" of the catacombs of Paris is almost three times the number of Parisians living above - almost 6 million corpses are buried here. The ebullient life of the chic "upper Paris" is terribly different from the gloomy city of the dead underground. Here you can find whole corridors of skulls and bones. The Parisian catacombs are huge, and no one knows how confusing their labyrinth is: it is quite possible to get lost here forever.

The Crypt of the Capuchins are 6 rooms located under the church of Santa Maria della Concezione in Italy. It contains 3,700 skeletons of monks of the Capuchin brotherhood. When their remains were brought here in 1631, they took 300 wagons and were buried in earth specially brought from Jerusalem. After 30 years, the remains were exhumed and displayed in the hall. But the worst thing is not the mummies themselves, but the “message of the brotherhood”, translated into 5 languages: “We were what you are. You will be what we are."

Often, people who have lost loved ones come up with the idea to perpetuate their memory in some non-trivial way. The unusual shape of the tombstone will make it possible to distinguish the grave from the mass of the same type of cemetery structures. By ordering a monument of a non-standard form, you can emphasize the uniqueness of the deceased person, show how much he did for you during his lifetime, how talented and wonderful he was. Although the death of loved ones always causes excruciating and sharp pain, regardless of his achievements in worldly life.

Non-standard monuments

Strange tombstones in the cemetery and simply unusual graves in Russia are becoming increasingly popular, because it seems to many that a standard tombstone will not be able to express all their pain and bitterness from the loss that has occurred. The specialists of our company understand this desire and help to decorate the grave in a manner corresponding to the dignity of a person in his lifetime. In these cases, we offer the relatives of the deceased a catalog with photos of amazing tombstones, which presents a wide range of complex, unusual and. We always keep ready-made designs of special architectural forms in stock, and we also have all the possibilities for making tombstones according to individual sketches. In you can order a monument to the cemetery from any materials, as well as their combinations: granite, marble, metal.

The main feature of non-standard tombstones is the material, because, as a rule, quite expensive types of stone with an unusual color and pattern are used in the manufacturing process. The processing of such products is carried out by the most experienced craftsmen who are able to invest in the creation of a masterpiece not only their knowledge and experience, but also their soul. The most unusual monument in a cemetery can be made of several types of stone and complemented with handmade decorations. Also, the specialists of our workshop apply