Introducing the World’s First Lesbian Cemetery (Berlin)

Introducing the World’s First Lesbian Cemetery
May 28, 2014.
By Laura Secorun Palet

On a sunny April morning, dozens of elderly women gathered at a graveyard in Berlin. But it was not a sad occasion. In fact, they were celebrating a historic event: the opening of the world’s first lesbian-only cemetery.

A 4,300-square-foot area has been made available in one of the German capital’s oldest burial grounds, the Lutheran Georgen Parochial cemetery, and will serve as the final resting place for up to 80 gay women.

The women cheering and applauding among the tombstones that day were members of SAFIA, a German association of older lesbians who came up with the initiative as a way for their community to stay together in the afterlife.

“We are the first real generation of emancipated, feminist, open lesbians, and we need somewhere to be buried,” explains Astrid Osterland, a 69-year-old SAFIA member. “Lots of us don’t have families to be buried with. Instead, we want to lie with those we’ve fought alongside, loved and lived with.”

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