History of the Cemetery of Felanitx

Until the 9th of January 1814, burials took place in the parish church, the Sant Agustí convent and the surrounding cemeteries. In 1805, the city council considered building a cemetery on the site known as "Corral d'en Nofret", but the decision was not put into practice.

On the 7th of December 1813, the town council received a notice from the political high command which prohibited burials within the town area. In response thereto they built a cemetery behind the mill hill, completed on the 7th of January 1814. As time was pressing, they dug a large hole to bury the dead. But all the work on the cemetery in that area was useless, because the ground consisted of clay and the corpses did not decompose; so, they decided to build a new cemetery on the land of Jaume Pujals. On the 9th of January, a man named Juan Barceló Capblanc, married to Xisca Garcies and with the nickname Cavaller, was buried. In fact, Juan Barceló is the 5th name in the book number 18 of the Deceased in 1814, on page 152, buried in the new cemetery.

People buried in this cemetery until the end of May of the same year; then, after the abolition of the Constitution of 1812 and with the return of King Ferdinand VII, the dead were again interred in the old graves and the churches. "On the 21st of May they laid the foundation stone of the constitution and on the 22nd of the same month they buried an abbot in the monastery, the son of Antonio Manresa and Sebastiana Binimelis, and the churchyard was already ready". On page 160 of book number 18 of the Deceased, of the same year, it is written: "68-Micaela (sic) Adrover, single, daughter of Bartolomé and Catalina Grimalt... died without sHistory of the Cemetery of Felanitx

Until the 9th of January 1814, burials took place in the parish church, the Sant Agustí convent and the surrounding cemeteries. In 1805, the city council considered building a cemetery on the site known as "Corral d'en Nofret", but the decision was not put into practice.

On the 7th of December 1813, the town council received a notice from the political high command which prohibited burials within the town area. In response thereto they built a cemetery behind the mill hill, completed on the 7th of January 1814. As time was pressing, they dug a large hole to bury the dead. But all the work on the cemetery in that area was useless, because the ground consisted of clay and the corpses did not decompose; so, they decided to build a new cemetery on the land of Jaume Pujals. On the 9th of January, a man named Juan Barceló Capblanc, married to Xisca Garcies and with the nickname Cavaller, was buried. In fact, Juan Barceló is the 5th name in the book number 18 of the Deceased in 1814, on page 152, buried in the new cemetery.

People buried in this cemetery until the end of May of the same year; then, after the abolition of the Constitution of 1812 and with the return of King Ferdinand VII, the dead were again interred in the old graves and the churches. "On the 21st of May they laid the foundation stone of the constitution and on the 22nd of the same month they buried an abbot in the monastery, the son of Antonio Manresa and Sebastiana Binimelis, and the cacraments on 23 May 1814 in Can Verro de Marina at the age of 10..., was the first to be buried in this (parish)church in the tomb of Our Lady of the Rosary".

In March 1820, the Constitution of 1812 was reinstated, and in June of the same year, burials were held again in the cemetery, which had been inaugurated in 1814 and accommodated only 63 corpses. The first one who deceased was "Antoni Adrover, son of Miguel and Antonia Antich, widower of Isabel Vaquer..., passed away near Pou del Bobot on 2 June 1820...".

As early as 1821 they deemed it necessary to expand the cemetery. Therefore the city council appointed a commission which started work immediately. Thanks to the records in the municipal archives of Felanitx, we know many details of the works they carried out: "Duly certified account of the cost of the works on the rural cemetery of the township of Felanitx, started on the 26th of July 1821"; "Primarily, expenditure continues on the temporary enlargement of the cemetery, which exists since 1814, as it is not sufficient to accommodate the corpses in the time required until the final one is completed" (AMF 457).

The supervisor or master stonemason of these works was Lorenzo Rovira, who worked on a daily wage, from the 26th of July 1821 to May 1822. The costs for that first part of the works amounted to 1,784 Mallorcan pounds.

In May 1822 the Town Council decided to change the work procedure and commissioned Lorenzo Rovira to complete the work on a piecework basis, paying him 180 pounds.

The works were completed on the 27th of October of the same year. The priest Joaquín Verd consecrated the entirely completed cemetery and the chapel.

In 1823 the Town Council had the burial site levelled, in order to avoid that the old practice of burying in the church could be resumed. They decided to convert this area into a square and they removed loads of earth and bones, filling the graves or receptacles of the parish church and the monastery. In the municipal archives, one can view the expenses for those works: "Weekly account, with the appropriate receipts, of the expenses incurred in relation to the clearance of the old graveyard adjoining the parish church, the reburial of the deceased in the graves of the church, and the construction of a granary in the former hospital..."; "Muleteers, to transport the remains of the deceased to the graves of the closed monastery..."; "Me, the innkeeper Onofre Llodrá who signs below, received from the storekeeper three pounds ten solides for oil, wine and brandy, which were served the nights when the remains of the deceased were transferred from the cemetery to the church graves"; "On said day (23rd February 1823) me, who signs below, acknowledge that Benito Pinya received from the storekeeper four pounds and four solids for the torches, which were used in the nights they worked at the old cemetery" (AMF 427).

The rural cemetery, as it was called in official books and writings of that time, was the work of the constitutional town authorities, and the supporters of the absolutist regime regarded it with distaste. In the periods of 1823 and 1833, when the absolutists ruled, the cemetery was desecrated and between the end of 1823 and the beginning of 1824, again there were burials in the parish church and in the monastery. In April 1824 they resumed the interments in the cemetery and the burials in the church and the pits became less and less frequent. In 1837 the liberal municipal administration, back in power, ordered to restore the cemetery to as it was before the overthrow of the constitutional system in 1823.

Since then, the cemetery was extended several times. The first time was towards the end of the century, and the works progressed very slowly: they started in 1893 and were not completed until 1905. On Sunday, the 26th of February, at three o'clock in the afternoon, the clergyman of the parish went to the cemetery, with his cross raised. In the presence of the municipal councillors and a large number of worshippers, the parish priest Sebastià Planas bestowed the blessing and delivered a sermon.

The second enlargement took place in 1930. On this occasion, the architect Francesc Roca i Simó designed and built a new entrance and modified the adjacent rooms, since the original entrance gate had not been centred. On the evening of the 19th of September 1930, a Sunday, Archbishop Josep Miralles, who was on a pastoral visit to Felanitx, consecrated the new part of the cemetery and the works carried out there.

In 1944 a monument was raised in memory of the victims of that fateful Palm Sunday, the 31st of March 1844, who lost their lives when Sa Timba collapsed. On the occasion of the centenary, the commemorative monument was placed on the old cemetery grounds. The angel made of Santanyí stone, a work by Joan Maimó, marks the site where "the dead of La Encontrada" were buried.

In 1969 the Germans Fossers, Merciful Brothers of the Morticians, arrived and brought great appreciation to the tombs and all the premises, graves and gardens. The Brotherhood of Morticians remained for thirty years, until they left in 1999 due to a lack of vocations.

In 1985 they expanded the cemetery again and created plots for chapels. They also designed a green space.

More recently, in 2010, they carried out a new extension and created a number of new niche tombs and chapels. At present, the municipality holds enough space to create new burial facilities if needed.

In January 2014 they celebrated the 200th anniversary of the inauguration of the municipal cemetery.

Bibliography from Cosme Bauçà Adrover and Pere Xamena Fiol.