‘Most of the gravestones I’ve highlighted this month have been created with some artistic intent, no matter how imperfectly realized.  Today’s gravestone, for little Hasadiah Houghton, was crafted with only utilitarian goals.

HASADIAH

THE DAUGHTER OF

HENRY AND

ABIGAIL HO

UGHTON

AGE 2 * Y

2 * M * D

1711

Hasadiah is buried in Lancaster, Massachusetts’ Old Settler’s Burying Ground next to her mother who died that same year, an out of the way little spot that is worth the hike through the woods to see.  See all of the inscriptions here.  Their stones seem to have been carved by the same person at the same time.

This marker is what is generally referred to as a “field stone”, from the assumption the stones were not quarried but rather just taken from the nearby ground and carved on the spot.  While the stones are minimally worked, I suspect a little more care was taken in finding an appropriately shape stone like these, even if they ran out of space for the inscriptions.