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A potter's field is a place for the burial of unknown or indigent people.


ORIGIN

The term apparently comes from verse in the New Testament of the Bible , in which priests take 30 pieces of silver returned by a repentant Judas and "used the money to buy the potter's field as a burial place for foreigners." It was not called "the potter's field" because a Potter owned it, but rather because the land was not good for growing crops, and therefore could only be used by potters to dig clay.


NEW YORK CITY

  • Washington Square Park and Bryant Park in New York City were originally potter's fields. ---The city's current facility of this type is on Hart Island .

  • Potter's Field also describes a small cove of the East River just below the Williamsburg Bridge on the Brooklyn side, where bodies that have ended up in the river from November through the winter season surface in April as the rising temperature causes their bodies to decompose and rise to the surface. The fluid dynamics of the East River causes a collection of these bodies every year off the docks of the above-mentioned location, Potter's Field.



SEE ALSO



POPULAR CULTURE

  • ''From Potter's Field'' is the name of a novel by Patricia Cornwell .

  • Potter's Field is the name of an album by the rock band 12 Stones .

  • On the title track to '', the lyrics include a reference to "the potter's ground" as a metaphor for dying without salvation.

  • "Potter's Field" is also the name of a song by heavy metal band Anthrax .

  • Hart Island (New York) , the Potter's Field in New York City is featured in the film Don't Say A Word .

  • Tom Waits makes references to Potter's Field in several of his songs.

  • ''The Potter's Field'' is the name of one of the ''brother Cadfael'' detective books by Ellis Peters.



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