ABSTRACT
Death is never isolated from other realms of cultural expression nor is it ever constrained by them. Practices and beliefs surrounding death and memorialisation are explored through embodied rituals and gravestone records. Native language was only gradually challenged by the introduction of a new linguistic culture of death in this capacity. Except for mosque yards where the dead were ostensibly all Muslim, the living did not deem it necessary to define the death scape in exclusive terms. Burial is the adopted mode of disposing of the dead in both Islamic and local Christian traditions. This was aided by the Ottoman policy of burying the dead outside city walls so many existing remote locations continued accommodating the dead, including those who had embraced Islam. Rejecting the assumption that tombstone is only valuable for social historians because of the biographical data it contains, the study foregrounds tombstone's significance for reconstructing history of religious and cultural identities.
