The Lychgate
Consider the Lychgate

On the moors in West Yorkshire, there are some stones, two placed together, with crosses marked on them. Many people have thought that they were boundary or marker stones, and in so far as they marked the way towards the oldest church in that area, they were. To be more exact, the oldest churchyard.

In ages past bodies were carried by hand, sometimes over long distances, and there were restrictions placed on where they could be laid to allow the bearers to rest. These two stones were ‘resting’ stones.

When a body arrived at the church for burial, it would again be put down while the administrative formalities were carried out, and again the bearers could rest. So a resting stone was placed at the edge or start of the consecrated land around the church. lychgate
The priest conducting the funeral would meet the cortege here, not originally out of respect, but rather to receive the required legal certificate for burial before he allowed them to enter the church grounds.

Because of rain and wind it was usually sheltered, and benches were built for the bearers. There would also be a cross within the construction to signify the start of holy land. This is what today we call the ‘lych-gate’; lych coming from the anglo-saxon word lich or lic, related to the modern German word leiche, all meaning corpse.

Few old lychgates remain today as many were destroyed or damaged after the Reformation, and most of those that survived were constructed of timber and have since decayed.

In the eighteenth century when the use for the resting stones and thus lychgates declined many were removed and replaced with gates, often retaining the shelter as it continued to be a meeting place for the priest to receive funeral parties.
 

updated December 2007

updated December 2007