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A pet cemetery is a cemetery for pets. Although the veneration and burial of beloved pets has been practiced since ancient times, burial grounds reserved specifically for animals were not common until the late 19th century.
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A pet cemetery is a cemetery for pets. Although the veneration and burial of beloved pets has been practiced since ancient times, burial grounds reserved specifically for animals were not common until the late 19th century.
Many human cultures buried animal remains. For example, the Ancient Egyptians mummified and buried cats, which they considered deities; the oldest known pet cemetery, mainly used for cat burials, was found during the excavation of the Berenice Troglodytica seaport in 2011 and was used between the 1st and 2nd century CE. [1] Archaeologists have found that dogs were buried alongside humans in Siberia as many as 8,000 years ago. [2] The Ashkelon dog cemetery, the largest known dog cemetery in the ancient world, was discovered at the Ashkelon National Park in Ashkelon, Israel. [3]
The Hiran Minar near Lahore, Pakistan is a minaret that was built in approximately 1606 CE by the Mughal Emperor Jahangir in honor of his beloved pet antelope Mansraj. [4]
London's Hyde Park was the site of an informal pet cemetery between 1881 and 1903, in the gatekeeper's garden. [5] From the first burial of "Cherry" until its official closure in 1903, it received 300 burials with miniature headstones, [6] with a final special burial of the Royal Marines mascot dog "Prince" in 1967. [7]
Cimetière des Chiens in Asnières-sur-Seine in Paris, dating from 1899, is an elaborate, sculpted pet cemetery believed to be one of the first public zoological necropolis in the world. [8]
America's largest and oldest pet cemetery is the Hartsdale Pet Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York. It dates from 1896, when a veterinarian working out of Manhattan offered to let a grieving pet owner bury her dog at his hillside apple orchard. Today, it is the final resting place to around 80,000 animals including famous ones like Mariah Carey's cat Clarence and Ming the tiger. [9] [10] The site was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2012. [11] Some other famous American pet cemeteries include Aspin Hill Memorial Park in Silver Spring, Maryland, believed to be the second-oldest in America, [12] [13] as well as the Pet Memorial Cemetery in Calabasas, California, where Hopalong Cassidy's horse, Topper, Steven Spielberg's Jack Russell Terrier, and Rudolph Valentino's dog, Kabar, are buried. [14]
At some cemeteries, such as Aspin Hill Memorial Park, [15] human and animal remains may be interred alongside each other. In January 2010, West Lindsey District Council gave permission for a site in the village of Stainton by Langworth to inter animal remains alongside human remains as part of a "green burial" site, making it the first place in England where pets could be buried alongside their owners. [16] In 2011, New York State formally adopted guidelines to allow human burials in pet cemeteries as long as the cemetery doesn't advertise it or charge a burial fee. [9]
A pet, or companion animal, is an animal kept primarily for a person's company or entertainment rather than as a working animal, livestock, or a laboratory animal. Popular pets are often considered to have attractive/cute appearances, intelligence, and relatable personalities, but some pets may be taken in on an altruistic basis and accepted by the owner regardless of these characteristics.
Zooarchaeology is a hybrid discipline that combines zoology and archaeology. Zooarchaeologists, also called archaeozoologists and faunal analysts, study animal remains from archaeological sites. Faunal remains are the items left behind when an animal dies. These include bones, shells, hair, chitin, scales, hides, proteins and DNA. Bones and shell are the best preserved at archaeological sites. Faunal remains do not usually survive. They may decompose or break because of various circumstances. This can cause difficulties in identifying the remains and interpreting their significance.
Shillourokambos is a Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB) site near Parekklisia, 6 km east of Limassol in southern Cyprus. It is located on a low plateau. Excavations began in 1992. The settlement has four phases and was occupied from the end of the 9th millennium to the second half of the 8th millennium.
The Cimetière des Chiens et Autres Animaux Domestiques is often claimed to be the first zoological necropolis in the modern world. The ancient Ashkelon dog cemetery predates it by thousands of years. It opened in 1899 at 4 pont de Clichy on Île des Ravageurs in Asnières-sur-Seine, Île-de-France.
The dog is a domesticated descendant of the wolf. Also called the domestic dog, it is derived from extinct gray wolves, and the gray wolf is the dog's closest living relative. The dog was the first species to be domesticated by humans. Hunter-gatherers did this, over 15,000 years ago in Oberkassel, Bonn, which was before the development of agriculture. Due to their long association with humans, dogs have expanded to a large number of domestic individuals and gained the ability to thrive on a starch-rich diet that would be inadequate for other canids.
The loss of a pet or an animal to which one has become emotionally bonded oftentimes results in grief which can be comparable with the death of a human loved one, or even greater, depending on the individual. The death can be felt more intensely when the owner has made a decision to end the pet's life through euthanasia. While there is strong evidence that animals can feel such loss for other animals, this article focuses on human feelings, when an animal is lost, dies or otherwise is departed.
Hiran Minar is an early 16th-century Mughal era complex in Sheikhupura, in the Pakistani province of Punjab. It was built at the site of a game reserve in honour of Mughal Emperor Jahangir's beloved antelope, Mansraj. The emperor is remembered for his fondness of nature, and his complex embodies the Mughal relationship between humans, pets and hunting.
Rosa Bonheur Memorial Park is a pet cemetery located in Elkridge, Maryland, USA. The cemetery was established in 1935, and was actively operated until 2002. Approximately 8,000 animals and humans are buried in the cemetery's 11+1⁄2 acres, which is large enough to accommodate about 24,000 pets.
The Key Underwood Coon Dog Memorial Graveyard is a specialized and restricted pet cemetery and memorial in rural Colbert County, Alabama, US. It is reserved specifically for the burials of coon dogs. The cemetery was established by Key Underwood on September 4, 1937. Underwood buried his own dog there, choosing the spot, previously a popular hunting camp where "Troop" did 15 years of service. As of August 2014, more than 300 dogs were buried in the graveyard.
The Philippine Animal Welfare Society (PAWS) is a volunteer-based, non-government organization whose goal is to prevent animal cruelty through education, animal sheltering and advocacy, based in Quezon City, Philippines. It was founded in 1954 by Muriel Jay. PAWS believes that the creation of a more peaceful society starts with the widening of mankind's circle of compassion which includes animals, thereby envisions a nation that respects animals, practices responsible pet ownership and protects wildlife. The volunteer-based organization rehabilitates these animals in the hope of finding them new homes and a second chance at a good life. PAWS does not take in pets of other people, but only victims of cruelty or neglect where the animal offenders are charged with violation of the Animal Welfare Act in court.
Animal mummification was common in ancient Egypt. Animals were an important part of Egyptian culture, not only in their role as food and pets, but also for religious reasons. Many different types of animals were mummified, typically for four main purposes: to allow people's beloved pets to go on to the afterlife, to provide food in the afterlife, to act as offerings to a particular god, and because some were seen as physical manifestations of specific deities that the Egyptians worshipped. Bastet, the cat goddess, is an example of one such deity. In 1888, an Egyptian farmer digging in the sand near Istabl Antar discovered a mass grave of felines, ancient cats that were mummified and buried in pits at great numbers.
Ilford Animal Cemetery is an animal cemetery in Ilford in London, England, United Kingdom that contains over three thousand burials. It was founded in the 1920s and is operated by the People's Dispensary for Sick Animals. The cemetery was closed to new burials in the 1960s and gradually became neglected and overgrown before a £50,000 grant from the National Lottery led to its reopening.
The Egyptian dog Abuwtiyuw, also transcribed as Abutiu, was one of the earliest documented domestic animals whose name is known. He is believed to have been a royal guard dog who lived in the Sixth Dynasty (2345–2181 BC), and received an elaborate ceremonial burial in the Giza Necropolis at the behest of a pharaoh whose name is unknown.
Pet culture in Japan is a phenomenon that has developed over the last few decades.
Hartsdale Pet Cemetery, also known as Hartsdale Canine Cemetery, is a historic pet cemetery located at Hartsdale, Westchester County, New York. It was established in 1896, and contains over 70,000 interments, with 14,000 interment lots and 7,000 memorials. Contributing resources include the groundskeeper's cottage, a house, a public memorial to the dogs of war, a mausoleum, and manmade and natural topographical attributes. It is America's largest and oldest pet cemetery.
The Ashkelon dog cemetery is a burial ground in the city of Ashkelon in Israel where possibly thousands of dogs were interred in the fifth to third centuries BC. The majority of the dogs were puppies; all had similarities to the modern Canaan Dog, perhaps representing the ancestral population from which the modern breed is descended. It is the largest known cemetery of this kind in the ancient world.
Aspin Hill Memorial Park, also known as Aspin Hill Pet Cemetery, is a pet cemetery located in Aspen Hill, Maryland, at the intersection of Georgia Avenue and Aspen Hill Road, 7.5 miles (12.1 km) north of Washington, D.C. The cemetery contains more than 50,000 pet burials, and more than 50 human burials. Aspin Hill Memorial Park is a designated individual site on Montgomery County, Maryland's Master Plan for Preservation.
The Hyde Park pet cemetery is a disused burial ground for animals in Hyde Park, London. It was established in 1880 or 1881 in the garden of Victoria Lodge, home of one of the park keepers. The cemetery became popular after the burial of a dog belonging to Sarah Fairbrother, wife of Prince George, Duke of Cambridge. Some 1,000 burials were carried out before the cemetery was generally closed in 1903; sporadic burials were carried out thereafter until 1976. Most of the animals are dogs, though some cats, monkeys and birds were also buried. The site is owned by the charity The Royal Parks and not open to the public except as part of occasional tours.
Pine Ridge Pet Cemetery is a pet cemetery located in Dedham, Massachusetts. Opened in 1907 and operated by the Animal Rescue League of Boston, it is full with nearly 17,000 animals, including dogs, cats, horses, birds, lizards, and rabbits buried there.
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