Common Gravestone Icons and Symbols
These are some of the most common and defined icons you may encounter in a cemetery or graveyard (source unknown).
- Anchor – Hope (Hope is the anchor of the soul).
- Angel – Messenger between God and man; guide.
- Angel (flying) – rebirth.
- Angel (trumpeting) – A call to resurrection.
- Angel (weeping) – Grief.
- Arrows or darts – Mortality, the dart of death.
- Birds – The soul.
- Coffins – Mortality.
- Column (broken) – Sorrow, a life cut short.
- Cross – Salvation.
- Dove – Holy Ghost.
- Father Time – Mortality.
- Flame (burning) – Life.
- Flower – The frailty of life.
- Flower (broken) – Death.
- Garland – Victory in death.
- Gourds – The coming to be and the passing away of earthly matters; the mortal body.
- Hand (pointing upward) – Ascension to heaven.
- Handshake – Farewell to earthly existence.
- Heart – The abode of the soul; love of Christ; the soul in bliss.
- Ivy – Memory, and fidelity.
- Lamb – Christ the Redeemer; meekness; sacrifice; innocence.
- Laurel – Victory.
- Lilly – Resurrection, purity.
- Palls/drapery – Mortality.
- Pomegranate – Immortality.
- Portals – Passageways to the eternal journey.
- Rose – Sorrow.
- Scallop shell – The resurrection, a pilgrim’s journey, the baptism of Christ.
- Scythe – Time or time cut short.
- Skull (winged) – The flight of the soul from the mortal body.
- Skulls and crossbones – Death.
- Sun (rising) – Renewed life.
- Sun (setting) – Eternal death.
- Sword – Martyrdom, courage.
- Torch (burning) – Immortality, truth, wisdom.
- Urn – Mortality (a receptacle for the bodily remains).
- Wheat – time; the divine harvest (often used to denote old age).
- Willow – Grief.
