This map shows the location of virtually every graveyard in the historic province of Ulster. The term graveyard encompasses burial grounds, cemeteries and churchyards, and for the most part the inclusion of an individual site has been on the basis of the presence of inscribed gravestones.
Some exceptions to this rule have been made. For example, the burial grounds attached to workhouses have been mapped even though they do not contain contemporary memorials.
There are of course many other places of burial within Ulster going back to prehistoric times, and it is undoubtedly the case that there are other burial sites dating from the last five centuries which are no longer identifiable.
The graveyards have been colour-coded on the basis of present-day denominational (or institutional) affiliation and antiquity. Pre-Reformation sites have been distinguished between those without a functioning church today (though there will often be the ruins of a church within them) and those with a current Church of Ireland place of worship within their bounds. A small number of Catholic graveyards stand on a medieval site.
The term ‘Old’ nearly always applies to a graveyard dating from the pre-Reformation period which no longer contains a church in use today. For historical reasons, some graveyards are not easy to categorise, especially if there has been a change in religious affiliation, and in a few instances judgment calls have had to be made.
As with genealogical research in general, it is important to approach the search for an ancestor’s burial place with an open mind. Your ancestors may not have been buried in the churchyard adjoining the place of worship they attended, and they may not have been interred in the graveyard closest to where they lived. Graveyards originating in the pre-Reformation period were nearly always inter-denominational, i.e. used by all sections of the local community regardless of religious profession.
The mapping of graveyards – so far some 1,800 have been identified – is only the first stage in this project. Further stages will provide brief historical notes on the burial grounds, the inclusion of photographs, and the identification of published inscriptions (whether in print or online).