Evesham vicar defends medieval market held 'on top of graves'

Battle Of Evesham defended its decision to hold the medieval market earlier this month despite the coronavirus outbreak saying it was “promoting some of the best of Evesham.”

But some were concerned about the market which was held in Evesham Church Grounds on September 12-13.

Stephanie Ballinger said: “It was a lovely show but I think the fact that it was held in the church ground on top of graves has annoyed a lot of people.

“Also it was quite busy in such a small area. It should have been held somewhere with bigger space really.”

Paula Thomas said: “This kind of event should not of happened due to Covid. But also I am not happy it was held in the churchyard and tents were all over the place disrespecting the dead. My father being one of them.”

The Revd Andrew Spurr, the Vicar of Evesham said: “We have hosted a number of similar events in the churchyard over the years, which have attracted little comment.

“We are very pleased to support the Medieval Market as a fundraiser for the Battle of Evesham pageant each summer. The merchants both used the space with respect and left it spotless when the market concluded. We always stipulate that the area in which ashes are interred is not included in whatever installations are set up, during any given festival.

“The Parochial Church Council is deliberating on how to make that boundary explicit, in a way that sets the area apart while not impeding maintenance.”

“It is not possible to purchase a grave space in a churchyard, like you can in a civic cemetery. A churchyard burial plot is considered to be reusable after 70 years. There has been no bodily interment in that churchyard in over 100 years and most for considerably longer. “

“Most medieval churchyards like ours have been re-used many times over, which is why their area has not grown over the hundreds of years that they have been in existence. Every square metre of the open grassy area of that churchyard has seen several interments over the centuries.”

“You may have seen old postcards of Evesham churchyard where the paths were bordered by railings, between which the spaces were crammed with memorial stones. These were cleared in 1967 by my predecessor Bertie Webb, decades after the churchyard was closed for burials.

“They chose to leave a few stones here and there to indicate what kind of space it had been. But that’s how the space came to be the public amenity it now is. Every square metre of it was an interment site at some point in the last 600 years.”

He added: “While it is a sad fact of life that some people are more comfortable with the notions of dead spaces as sacred rather than living ones, as a Christian priest I am bound to assert that the fundamental conviction of Christian faith, and therefore of a Christian funeral, is that the deceased is not there, they are risen.”