Opened in the 1820s, the New North Cemetery is an extension of the Old North Cemetery located across New Lane. The Old North Cemetery was originally the private burial ground of the Gardner family with remaining grave markers dating back to 1746. The Nantucket Historical Association and town are responsible for the area’s upkeep, but unfortunately budget cuts have left the area a bit overgrown and in a state of disrepair.
Grave Stone Symbology
Anchor: Grounded hope, strong faith, steadfastness, eternal life, sailor’s grave
Arc: Passage to heaven
Arrow: Mortality, darts of death, or martyrdom
Bird: Messenger of God
Bones: Death mortality
Broken Branch or flower bud: untimely premature death
Drapery: Mourning
Hourglass: Passage of time
Ivy: Friendship
Lamb: Innocence, death of child
Laurel: “Evergreen” memory of the deceased
Lily of the Valley: Purity, innocence, virginity
Moon: Rebirth, afterlife, heaven
Morning Glory:
Oak leaf: Long Life
Owl: Wisdom, watchfulness
Ox: Patience and Strength
Palm: Spiritual victory, heavenly reward, eternal peace
Peacock: Resurrection
Pitcher: Virtue and control
Poppy: Eternal sleep
Rabbit: Humility, gentleness, self sacrifice
Rooster: Symbolizes an awakening, calling attention to death, or vigilance
Rose: Beauty
Scales: Someone who worked at the legal profession, weighing of souls
Scroll: The scriptures
Scythe: Reaping of life
Shell: Baptism or rebirth
Ship: Grave of sailor, person may have died at sea, or symbolizes Noah’s ark
Skull: Death, reminder of mortality.
Skull with wings: The ascension of the dead into Heaven
Skull and Cross Bones: Mortality and death
Sleeping Child: Victorian symbol for death
Snake: Round, biting its tail: eternal life, no end
Snake with apple: Sin
Snake: Death
Sword: Military service
Tree, trunk, Stump: A life cut short
Tulip: Life, love, passionate devotion, thornless vulnerability, grows after cut
Urn: Classic symbol of death, the soul
Weeping Woman: Sadness
Wheat: Harvest, person lived a long life
Willow Tree: Sandness or mourning
Why do most early headstones face East in New England?
The earliest settlers had their feet pointing toward the east and the head of the coffin toward the west, ready to rise up and face the "new day" (the sun) when "the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised" or when Christ would appear and they would be reborn. Early graves were seldom in the neat rows that we are used to seeing. Burials were more haphazard, more medieval in their irregularity; families didn't own plots and burial spaces were often reused. The north side of the cemetery was considered less desirable and is often the last part of the burying ground to be used, or you may find the north side set aside for slaves, servants, suicides, "unknowns," etc. In many burial grounds graves face all four points on the compass. Sometimes a hilly site will have stones facing all four directions. With the coming of the Rural Cemetery Movement in the 1830s and 40s, an entirely new style of burial became popular. The ideal of winding roads and irregular terrain dictated the orientation of the monuments to a large degree.
Map of Nantucket’s nine cemeteries: http://www.nha.org/library/cemeteries/maps/libcemeterymapisland.htm