Chiese battesimali e funerarie altomedievali della Liguria occidentale. Alcuni casi studio

In northern Italy burying the dead in religious structures has been a common practice since the 4th century and represents an important change in the funerary customs of the local population which, up to that time, had been buried in suburban cemeteries or in rural necropolises linked to Roman villae or to villages. In western Liguria the tradition of burying the dead in churches or in their immediate vicinity must be considered in relation to the inception of Christian collective cemeteries in the 3rd century thanks to the economic development of the Christian communities, which facilitated the creation and management of the first common funerary areas. In addition, archaeological data would seem to confirm that starting in the 4th century, when distinct forms of self-representation that characterised the Late Antique aristocratic world began to develop, funerary chapels became the burial context of choice of the new Germanic aristocracies.