"French and Russian Soldiers to be reburied with honors" Topic

Obsèques en Russie de grognards napoléoniens et de soldats tsaristes

Quelque 126 dépouilles découvertes dans une fosse commune entre Smolensk et Moscou doivent être enterrées ce samedi avec les honneurs.

From Le Figaro:

link

It's nice to see this done properly.

If they would only do the same at Mt St Jean and take the Hanoverian chap out of his glass case and give him a decent burial. Same for the French hussar at Le Caillou of course.

+1 deadhead. Their continued presence is a disgrace when they could easily be replaced with plaster casts, with no loss of educational value.

I agree, both of those men's remains should be buried properly. It's barbaric.

I agree, both of those men's remains should be buried properly. It's barbaric.

What about Pete Marsh in the British Museum? What about mummies of dead Egyptians that are 3,000 years old?

Personally, if I had any awareness after my death, I might find the fact that people in the future found my body of such historical interest that they put it on display in a museum rather flattering.

But since my intention is to arrange a cheaper, simple cremation of my carcase, it will never happen!

I think it was Sir Flinders Petrie--certainly it was an Egyptologist--who explained that corpses could be manhandled once they stopped stinking because the soul had departed.

Some peoples' souls, anyway.

I'd specified cremation, but with the right incentives I can just see the Next Generation donating my skull to the Smithsonian as an example of krautus americanus--typically thick, and with the dent where the bump of creativity ought to be.

"What about Pete Marsh in the British Museum? What about mummies of dead Egyptians that are 3,000 years old?"

It's a fair point but I think there is a resaonable distinction to be made in the case of individuals are representative of thousands killed on a filed of mass slaughter.

It's certainly true that in the case of the Bog burials and Egyptian entombments, the individuals – however they came by their deaths- were given a ritual interrment denied the dead of Waterloo and countless other battles.

Being on display for the masses to gawp at is not the most dignified fate, perhaps, but it might be argued that being displayed in the context of learned study and professional preservation perhaps constitutes a form of reverence not in evidence at Waterloo.