Cemetery of San Joan 

• Established after 1776 when Valencia prohibited burials within Town walls. •
  
• Excavations at the hermitage of Sant Joan bring to light 30 nineteenth century graves 

The Municipal Museum of Archaeology and Ethnography (Soler Blasco) of Xàbia has conducted an  archaeological dig inside the hermitage of Sant Joan, adjacent to the old cemetery. The construction of  the nearby cemetery in 1817, converted the chapel into a funeral chapel, a function which it held until  the 1980's The excavation aimed to study the possible structures preserved in the subsurface of the  chapel and to try to determine its date, in addition to recovering this interesting municipally owned  building so that it could be known and visited in the future. The archaeological works documented an  important set of 30 more or less rectangular tombs, carved into the natural "gleba"soil. Twenty-seven  kept an east-west orientation (with head pointing east, except for two, which were located west), and  only three were oriented north-south. 

Most burials were performed in coffins, with bodies in a supine position, and arms folded over the  chest or abdomen, except for some of the children, whose arms were bent with the hands beneath the  face, in a sleeping position. Of the thirty graves found, nineteen belonged to adults, and the remaining  eleven burials were children. Six were empty, while the rest belonged to four adult males aged between 40 and 70, six women between 20 and 65, and three individuals for whom it was not possible to  determine the sex because of the poor state of preservation. The children buried have been identified as  being between 1 and 2 months and 5 or 6 years old. Most were buried between 1817 and 1849, when  the cemetery was expanded becoming about the current size. 

Archaeological intervention has affected virtually the entire inner surface of the rectangular building  which is 14 meters long and 7.30 meters wide, with a single nave divided into three regular sections  about 4.25 meters long. 

The hermitage of Sant Joan was originally a building for religious use on the outskirts of Javea, at the  junction of the roads leading out of the village towards Pedreguer, Denia, Gata and Poblenou. This  building is a clear and interesting example of those known as "chapels of conquest", buildings with a  single nave supported by diaphragm arches. In this case, there are two arches (one covered and re converted into an arch in the middle of the nineteenth century) that divide the rectangular space of the  chapel into three regular sections. There is not much documentation about Sant Joan and the oldest  known story is from the mid-eventeenth century, when it seems that it was used as an auction room, or  "Almudí" of the town. Thanks to the Book of Sacristan of Xàbia Parish, written in 1769, we know it  was used for religious purposes at least on the day of Saint John the Evangelist (December 27),  "... ..Finished high Mass the Clergy will sing a Mass at the Hermitage of San Juan ... ", and the day of  Saint John the Baptist (June 24)" ... John the Baptist Day, this day Clergy to sing a Mass at his  hermitage ...... " 
This excavation has been possible thanks to the participation of the EMCORP program which enabled  the hiring of an archaeologist. Also participating were the municipal works and the local topogrpahica  department. The anthropological study was conducted by Dr. Francisco Gómez Bellard. 

(English version of text from: http://www.elperiodic.com/xabia/noticias/92832_excavaciones-ermita sant-joan-sacan-tumbas-siglo.html 28/10/10 - Las excavaciones en la ermita de Sant Joan sacan a la luz 30 tumbas del siglo XIX )