Mysterious gravestone in Virginia reveals 400-year-old secrets: archaeologists

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John Evenson, a tugboat that sank in 1895, was recently discovered by a team of maritime experts. It was found in Lake Michigan. (Source: Wisconsin Historical Society)

Archaeologists have discovered surprising new details about the oldest tombstone in the United States, which dates back nearly 400 years.

The 1627 tombstone was set up in the Jamestown settlement and belonged to an English knight. But what exactly the tombstone was made of – and where it came from – stumped experts until now.

According to a study published in the International Journal of Historical Archaeology in September, the stone was not North American in origin.

The study, which is titled "Sourcing the Early Colonial Knight’s Black ‘Marble’ Tombstone at Jamestown, Virginia, USA," argues that the black limestone actually came from Europe – and sheds light on the trade routes of the time.

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Experts have uncovered new information about the oldest gravestone in the United States. (Getty Images | Preservation Virginia)

"In seventeenth-century Virginia, USA, one of the ways affluent English colonists exhibited their wealth and memorialized themselves was with engraved tombstones," the article states. "Wealthy colonists in the Tidewater region of the Chesapeake Bay at this time preferentially selected black ‘marble’ for their gravestones that was actually polished, fine-grained, black limestone."

"The iconic knight’s tombstone at Jamestown is one such stone."

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The tombstone dates back to 1627 and belonged to a knight, historians say. (Preservation Virginia)

Rather than being made of a fossil found in the region, the limestone was likely transported from Belgium.

"This supports the conclusions above for transatlantic trade routes from continental Europe to Jamestown," the study explains. "These were undoubtedly not direct, but through London."

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Jamestown, not far from Williamsburg, Virginia, remains a popular tourist attraction. (Getty Images)

"We hypothesize it was quarried and cut to size in Belgium, shipped down the Meuse River, across the English Channel to London where it was carved and the brass inlays installed, and finally shipped on to Jamestown as ballast," the article concludes. "This trade route was a small piece of the rapidly expanding Atlantic world of geopolitical colonial trade."

Historians have not definitively concluded who the grave belonged to, but the study said it most likely belonged to Sir George Yeardley, who was the governor of Virginia at the time of his death in 1627.

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The Jamestown settlement was the first permanent English settlement in North America, following the failed Roanoke Colony. (Getty Images)

"Assuming the knight’s tombstone was George Yeardley’s, then it is the oldest black ‘marble’ tombstone in the Chesapeake Bay region, and may be the oldest surviving tombstone in America," the study says. "It is the only known tombstone in the English colonies with engraved monumental brass inlays."