St Andrews Cathedral Museum

Posted 25 November 2012 by Jane

St Andrews’ Cathedral is full of interesting graves. Entering the museum the gravestones, or graveslabs, become particularly intriguing. I’ve always been fascinated by graves with skulls on them, something that was once the norm can seem a little distasteful in modern times. One large room of the St Andrews Cathedral Museum is dedicated to them. Skeletons and skulls appear with hourglasses (representing the passage of time), the grim reaper with his scythe, crossed bones and even grave digging tools. They mostly come from a period after the reformation in the 1560s and we are told that the carvings were “a reminder of mortality and the need to live a virtuous life to be sure of salvation”. They remind me that our attitude to death, tradition and ceremony can change quickly over a relatively short period of time.