Pyramid scheme

In a city as large as London, the problem of where to lay the dead to rest is ever-present. One extraordinary unfulfilled scheme would have made space for five million, finds Jack Watkins

- Jack Watkins

PRIMROSE HILL is a popular green space in north-west London. Gently ascending paths lead to a 210ft summit that offers extensive views across the crowded metropolis. Yet the immediate terrain would have looked different had plans to dig into the hill and erect a so-called 'Death Pyramid' been realised in the early 19th century.

The base of the necropolis, officially to be named the Metropolitan Sepulchre, was intended to occupy an area equivalent to three times the size of Bloomsbury's Russell Square, one of London's largest garden squares. With a volume exceeding that of the Great Pyramid of Giza, its 94 storeys would have risen to four times the height of St Paul's Cathedral (365ft), according to The Literary Gazette.