Tuesday, September 06, 2005
The Sedlec Ossuary
This is the chandelier from The Sedlec Ossuary. It is comprised of "every bone in the human body, several times over."
This is not some grim super-goth dorm decoration, but the inside of a church. The bones are moved here so that other bodies may be buried in the ground of the church yard. It was considered especially sacred because the abbot had added to it soil he'd brought soil from Golgotha in Palestine in 1278. So many wished to be buried there, the only way to accomplish it was to dig up the remains after a time, move them indoors, and allow others to use the earth.
You can visit this church yourself, but since it's in Czechoslovakia, I'm just going to content myself with poking through the website...