Sunday, September 15, 2013

Introduction to New England Gravestones

Hello and welcome to my blog about gravestones of colonial New England!

This blog is for a project in one of my classes at Southeast Missouri State University. My posts will be covering my research on the topic, and hopefully we will learn all about the symbols on gravestones in New England and what they mean.

The reason I chose this topic to research is my passion for art and art history. Although I am not an art major I love creating artwork and studying the symbolism in art. I feel that studying the meanings of the carvings found on gravestones will help me understand people's opinions on the relationship between life and death. I am very excited to understand more about the colonial New England time period.

First, I would like to briefly introduce some major events that took place during this crucial time period between England and the United States. Below is the first map on New England printed in North America. It was made by John Foster in 1677.
 
During the late 17th and early 18th centuries there were many political and military conflicts between England and the new settlers of New England, also known as Puritans. These conflicts, along with the encouragement of French and English officials, caused the French and Indian Wars. The wars caused the Puritans to believe they were being punished by God for their sins, and that lead to witchcraft hysteria (which I will be researching and covering at a later time).
 
Another couple of important events which occurred during this time were the Glorious Revolution in England and the Great Awakening in New England. The Glorious Revolution began in 1689 with the English Bill of Rights, the Toleration Act, and the Mutiny Act. The Great Awakening was a spiritual revival in New England started by minister Jonathan Edwards in 1735.
 
I will touch on more important event and dates later in my blog. Thanks for visiting!

2 comments:

  1. Good start. Get your specific research question into the blog. Also, start to cite when you utilize information from an outside source.

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    1. Thank you! I completely forgot to cite my sources. I will add them.

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