HEADER PHOTO: The Korean National Cemetery, Seoul. IT CONTAINS THE REMAINS OF SOLDIERS WHO FOUGHT AND DIED IN the KOREAN INDEPENDENCE MOVEMENT, THE Korean War (1950-1953) AND THE VIETNAM WAR, AS WELL AS VETERANS OF THOSE WARS. IT IS A site of national mourning and commemoration. – Courtesy: Dr. John Carman, IRONBRIDGE INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR CULTURAL HERITAGE, University of Birmingham, U.K.

This section of the Dark Matters website deals with cemeteries. The topic is vast and may cross-cut other topics. Thus, we placed the American Battle Monuments Commission (for World War I and World War II battlefield cemeteries) and Britain’s  Commonwealth War Graves Commission (for the Gallipoli battlefield cemeteries) under the “Battlefields” tab because the dead are buried so close to where they fell. But as our header image on this page illustrates, other military cemeteries are not located on battlefields (the same is true of Arlington National Cemetery in the U.S.) yet do constitute a particular class of mortuary treatment. As you pull down the tabs for this “Cemeteries” section, we hope you will learn more.