What Is the Glasgow Necropolis?
The Glasgow Necropolis is a Victorian cemetery in the city. It’s on a low but prominent hill next to the Glasgow Cathedral. About 50,000 individuals have been buried at the cemetery. Only a small percentage of these individuals are named on monuments and not every grave has a stone.
With the creation of the Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, it required a change in the laws to allow burial for profit. This meant there needed to be a place for an alternate solution for burial. The planning for the cemetery began in 1831 in anticipation of the law change.
The cemetery is laid out as an informal park, just like most early Victorian cemeteries, and lacks the formal grid layout of later cemeteries. The layout is also enchanted by the complex topography. The paths will go uphill toward the summit. This is where many of the larger moments are and there is a cluster around a statue of John Know that dates from 1825.