Memory and Material in Early Modern England

For early modern thinkers preoccupied with the relationship between memory and materiality, burial and mourning rituals were natural areas of interest. Early proto-anthropological works like John Weever’s Ancient Funeral Monuments examined the material conditions of earlier burial practices, while printing presses churned out funeral sermons, turning a memorial ritual into a material text. This section showcases writers who respond to this interest in three different genres: Thomas Elyot’s medicinal advice for avoiding excess grief; Thomas Browne’s reflections on the discovery of Roman burial urns in Norfolk, and Margaret Cavendish’s imagining of her burial among the material instruments of her writing career.