✣ St Paul’s UCC of Indianland ✣
This cemetery sits on a sloping plot of land with pastoral views of the surrounding valley and Blue Mountain in the distance, punctuated by the dip of the Lehigh Gap. It’s been in continuous use since the mid-1700s, so there is a cross section of styles represented, progressing through the centuries. The church’s website includes a lot of historical information, including a database of those buried in the cemetery. There’s also a sign conveniently posted which details some important milestones for the graveyard (see second photo). ➺ St Paul's UCC Indianland history - the burial directories can be downloaded from the links at the bottom of the page
➺ Find A Grave
My favorites are the oldest headstones which are in the Pennsylvania German vernacular. These are located at the base of the hill, close to the brick church. Before visiting this cemetery, I hadn’t realized how exuberant and wonderful Deitsch tombstones could be. Comparing these early gravestones to a more recent example located at Huff’s Church, Preston A. Barba opined that the “[v]igor of concept and execution have given way to weak prettiness,” and that the imagery “has become decorative rather than symbolical.” (Pennsylvania German Tombstones: A Study in Folk Art. The Pennsylvania German Folklore Society, 1954.) I can’t say I disagree with that assessment, although I still enjoy the decorative quality of the later, more restrained examples. I visited in the early afternoon and the sun was not in my favor to photograph the front of the headstones where the inscriptions are (I’m going to need to visit again). Luckily for me though, it highlighted the back of the stones, which were generally more dimensional and ornamented than the front. This set of photos feature headstones adorned with a tree of life motif. Most are incised with the design, but the last one is carved in relief. The six-point compass star is on nearly all of them, save for the one in the third photo which instead has one five-point and two four-point compass stars.
A small sampling of hearts from this cemetery. There are more featured on the fronts of older stones, but sadly I could not get decent photos of them on this visit. I found the last stone interesting because even though it is a later, marble headstone, the carvers chose to hearken back to the older style and adorn the reverse. I wonder if that detail was at the request of the family or just artistic license on the part of the carver.
This series of photos highlight some of the more abstracted designs on the reverse of headstones. The first three images seem to be geometric variations on a tree of life motif, and I feel the presence of the strong vertical, central element lends to them reading as a tree rather than as a bouquet.
Stars and panels are featured in this set. The compass star isn’t the only six-pointed one adorning older headstones. There is another variation which recurs in this cemetery, reminiscent of a Moravian star, although as they often have a circular indentation at their center perhaps they were intended to be solar rather than stellar references. ✣ 787 Almond Road Walnutport, PA 18088 • Lehigh Township, Northampton County ✣
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