And why can’t friends or family pick me up and throw me in the trunk of their car, say, and throw me in a hole on private land?
Who says you can’t?
Because you’re still alive!
This was a riddle, wasn’t it?
You can, but there are rules you have to follow (which vary greatly by country/state/municipality). In a few places it’s pretty simple, in some places it’s very difficult or impossible.
Imagine that you own a house built in 1900. John Smith, the builder of the house, was buried there in 1910. His grave is smack dab in the middle of the yard, and you want to put in a pool. What do you do with his body? What if his family doesn’t want you to disturb his bones? Or what if you didn’t know about the grave, and discovered it while digging the pool? Who would be responsible for re-burying him? Where? What if he didn’t have any existing family? Would he have to be re-buried, or could he be cremated? Is it cool for his family to come onto your property to visit and maintain his grave?
If it wasn’t regulated at all, within a hundred years or so lots of houses would have the (possibly unmarked) grave of some stranger in the backyard. Rather than deal with questions like the ones above that this would bring about, we decided that it’s easier for all involved if for the most part we dispose of the dead in certain designated places.
How large the property is, how long the current family has owned it, and if a there are already people buried on the property are the kinds of things that can factor in to whether you can bury someone on your property.
Worries about contaminating the water table, being buried deeply enough to keep your remains from being scavanged and dragged around by animals and curious youth, zoning regulations, floodplains, easements and rights of way over private lands, riparian rights, etc. all come into play.
Hm. Interesting.
Sure there should be regs (well water, etc.) but the game is way over-regulated.
I’m thinking…
I asked tis once before on the board but never got an answer: In Pennsylvania, tiny family cemeteries from decades past are really common. If I buy a piece of property that has one, what are my obligations, if any, concerning it? When I worked for a funeral parlor in my youth, I once buried a cremation urn containing the ashes of a very, very elderly woman atop her mother in just such a cemetery, but that is my total experience with them.
Plus, if some time in the future they rebuild over the body without actually moving it, the television reception will be for shit.
For Sale: 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom rambler. Quarter acre lot, 2 car detached garage, 2 corpses…
Depends on the particular legal conditions attached (IANAL but I know a family in another Northeastern state that owned and lived on a property that included such a burial ground). In some places the property has to have a “religious easement” requiring that the owners permit access to the graves for maintenance, don’t disturb or build over the graves, etc.
In my area there is a well known grave on private property. Since the property has been graded several times the grave is now about 10 feet above the ground. Its still there in the parking lot of a Loews movie theater. Here is an article about it:
The east end of Long Island was mostly farmland until the mid- to late -20th century, and many family cemeteries were left behind as the area was developed. Most wound up sectioned off as separate, roadside lots, but then there’s the one in the Home Depot parking lot…