The Artifacts of Bygone Lives
Photographs by Terry AdkinsThis article was published online on December 12, 2020.What you are looking at is the afterlife of memories.Memory jugs were funerary objects found in the South on the graves of African Americans through the mid‑20th century. These small stoneware vessels were adorned with fragments—broken china, glass shards—and items beloved by the departed. The ritual is said to have its origins in Central Africa’s Bakongo culture.





























