Today we took a short trip from our campground in Palmer to visit an old historic Russian Orthodox cemetery located near the small fish camp village of Eklutna. The old original church (now used as a museum) as well as the newer church (services still held in newer church) were both located on the same site as the cemetery. A picture of the old original log structure church is shown above.
The above picture is representative of the scene found throughout the cemetery. The tradition of placing houses atop the grave site is because the natives believed that the soul of the deceased would remain above the grave site for the first year after death and they were providing a place for the deceased individuals soul to reside.
The houses were of varying sizes, but they were typically about the size of an adult coffin, with some being smaller when it appeared that the house was for a child. The various colors of the houses were all done as a means to identify the clan from which the deceased individual was born into. The red & white striped represented a particular clan, the red, white & blue striped represented another clan, the red, green & yellow another clan, etc.
This house was by far the most elaborate one that we saw. It is actually about six feet wide and about 4 feet high. The headstone located to the right of the house indicated that it was the grave site of a middle aged woman. The cemetery is still being used for burials as we noted several grave sites that were for individuals that had died within the past several years, with the most recent one having been in April 2010.
We were able to get a brief history and tour of both churches from a Russian Orthodox priest who was on site during our visit. It was definitely an interesting and educational experience.
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