When most people die, they are either cremated or buried in a cemetery plot. While headstones can be expensive (anywhere from $250-$6,000) your standard marker has nothing on these 5 extravagant gravesites.
Marjorie Merriwether Post
Marjorie Merriwether Post was one of the wealthiest women of the 20th century. She inherited much of her wealth from the Post Cereal company and continued to acquire food brands to build her wealth. Marjorie was a collector and loved to surround herself with rare and expensive works of art and historical artifacts. After her death in 1973, Marjorie was cremated and her ashes were placed in an urn carved from rare purple porphyry. Her urn is sat high atop a marble pillar in the garden of her Washington D.C. home and can be visited by anyone who visits the Hillwood Estate, Museum and Gardens. The base of the pillar is carved with her coat of arms and the Latin phrase “In me mea spes omnis” which translates to “all my hopes rest in me.” The urn overlooks the estate and the graves of all of her pets buried nearby.
The Davis Memorial
In the Mount Hope Cemetery in Hiawatha, Kansas sits a massive Tomb. The memorial was built by John Milburn Davis for Sarah Hart Davis who was his wife of 50 years. After she died in 1930, John Davis placed a simple gravestone to mark where she was laid to rest. He decided it wasn’t enough and commissioned a local monument dealer named Horace England to continue to make the gravesite more extravagant. John spent 7 years and almost all of his wealth adding 11 Italian marble life size statues of him and his wife, stone urns, a solid marble canopy, and a marble and granite wall surrounding the grave.
Image: Kansastravel.org
Fernand Arbelot
Very little is known about musician and actor Fernand Arbelot, but his grave has drawn visitors from all over the world. Located in Paris’ Pere LAchaise Cemetery, Fernand is sculpted laying down and holding up the disembodied face of his wife. The epitaph on the grave says “Ils furent emerveilles du beau voyage qui les mean jusq'au buot de la vie” which translates in English to “They marveled at the beauty of the journey that brought them to the end of life.” The monument was designed by Belgian sculptor Adolphe Wansart and installed in 1946, 4 years after Fernand’s death. Nobody knows the name or place of burial of his wife.
Image: serafinamia on Findagrave
Nicholas Cage
Although actor Nicholas Cage is not yet deceased, he is planning on resting in style in a 9 foot tall stone pyramid mausoleum.The actor purchased 2 plots in the St. Louis Cemetery in New Orleans and had the pyramid built in one of them. The cemetery is where New Orleans Voodoo practitioner Marie Laveau is laid to rest, whose historic home is also owned by Cage. The tomb stands in stark contrast to the crumbling mausoleums around it. Inscribed on its’ front is the latin phrase “Omnia Ab Uno” which translates to “Everything From One.”. The actor has not commented on why his future grave is styled how it is, but several rumors have circulated that it is an homage to the movie “National Treasure” which he starred in.
Image: Britt Reints
The Panteon De Oriente Cemetery
Located in Durango, Mexico this cemetery also functions as a museum that displays hundreds of unique tombs sculpted by quarry master Benigo Montoya from 1898 to 1929. Each one of the over 300 gravestones and chapels sculpted by Montoya are unique. He was known for sculpting realistic angels in the likenesses of people buried there. Along with beautiful gravestones, he also sculpted chapels that hold Durango’s most wealthy 19th century families. These ornate chapels have their own symbolism and ornamentation that symbolizes the families buried within them.
