Brent Elliott and Roger Bowdler, "The British Cemetery: Architecture, Landscape, Sculpture" (Historic England, 2026)

Roger Bowdler and Brent Elliott’s The British Cemetery: Architecture, Landscape, Sculpture, published by Historic England (2026), traces the history of the cemetery from the 17th century to the present day. The cemetery emerged as a new landscape form in the 19th

century in Britain but had deep roots in earlier churchyard practices

and in fashionable garden landscape design. Cemeteries very quickly

became a locus for the monumental expression of loss, family identity

and social standing. The book offers a clear chronological narrative,

with alternate chapters attending to landscape and monuments. The

authors present unfamiliar primary data and introduce some welcome new

themes including reference to the monumental mason industry and cemetery

infrastructure. The authors draw examples from England, Wales, Scotland

and Northern Ireland and in doing so underline the very particular

nature of Scottish funerary heritage. The book’s principal strength is

its collection of illustrations that include historic and contemporary