In this piece Abbi Flint (Newcastle University), Rebecca Lovell (University of Exeter) and Sonia Overall (Canterbury Christ Church University) reflect on the range of formal and informal signs seen along rights of way and what these might convey, in terms of both meaning and affect, to those who encounter them.
Source: Reading the signs — In All Our Footsteps
corpse road
Also known as corpse way, coffin route, coffin road, coffin path, churchway path, bier road, burial road, lyke-way or lych-way. “Now is the time of night, That the graves all gaping wide, Every one lets forth his sprite, In the church-way paths to glide” – Puck in Midsummer Night’s Dream. A path used in medieval times to take the dead from a remote parish to the ‘mother’ church for burial. Coffin rests or wayside crosses lined the route of many where the procession would stop for a while to sing a hymn or say a prayer. There was a strong belief that once a body was taken over a field or fell that route would forever be a public footpath which may explain why so many corpse roads survive today as public footpaths. They are known through the UK.
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