Month of the Dead - The Mysteries of the Mausolea

Built in 1839 on the model of Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris, Highgate Cemetery was one of the Magnificent Seven cemeteries, opened by the Victorians to relieve the strain on Central London’s overflowing church graveyards. The Egyptian entrance gate, flanked by two enormous obelisks, reflects the contemporary fashion for Egyptology. A tomb-lined avenue leads to the Circle of Lebanon at whose heart is an ancient cedar tree, like a massive bonsai, its base surrounded by a circle of mausolea. The top of the cemetery is dominated by the mausoleum of the Beer family which was modelled on the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Michael Faraday, Lucian Freud, Stella Gibbons and Christina Rossetti are all buried here.

This is a rare opportunity to look at some of the mausolea which the Friends of Highgate Cemetery Trust have restored, and to admire the care and attention which people have devoted to the memory of their loved ones. Led by DR IAN DUNGAVELL, architectural historian and chief executive of Highgate Cemetery.