History of Funeral Service
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b_scruggs07 on October 7, 2010
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Terms | Definitions |
|---|---|
 Adaptive Funeral | funeral rite that is adjusted to the needs and wants of those directly involved; altered to suit the trends of the times. |
| American Board of Funeral Service Education | The agency charged with developing curriculum and accreditation standards for funeral service education programs in the United States. |
| Animistic View | early Roman view of the afterlife which emphasizes the soul as the vital principle. The soul at death hovered around the place of burial and required constant attention of the descendents to be happy. Neglect would bring evil upon them. |
| Anthropoid | human shaped; some early coffins were described as anthropoidal shaped. |
| Anubis | Egyptian god of embalming said to be of human form with the head of a jackal. |
| Babylonians | culture associated with the practice of immersing the body of the dead in earthern jars filled with honey or wax. |
| Barber-surgeon | approximately 1540-1745 were the sole agency permitted to embalm and perform anatomical dissections in the city of London. |
| Bier | forerunner of today's hearse; a hand stretcher on which the uncoffined body was carried to the grave. |
| Bloodletting | belief or practice of draining a quantity of blood to cure illness or disease. |
| Burial case | generic term used in America to designate all burial receptacles as new variations of the coffin were being offered. |
| Burial club | created in 1800's London by the 'poor' people as a means to afford funerals; costs were shared by others via weekly collections; were the forerunners of industrial insurance. |
| Burial in Woolen Act of 1666 | required that woolen cloth be substituted for linen in the shroud and lining of the coffin; was an attempt to shift the use of imported linen to the expanding paper industry of England and provide customers for the wool industry. Heavy fines were assessed for violation; not repealed until 1814. |
| Burial vault | outer enclosure for caskets placed in the grave; originally intended to prevent grave robbery. |
| Canopic Jars | used by the Egyptians; four jars, usually made of alabaster, limestone, clay or basalt, whose tops were surmounted by the images of the four children of Horus, each held a specific portion of the viscera of the deceased. |
| Casket | from the French term 'casse' meaning 'jewel box' or container for something valuable; came into dominant use in patent literature for burial receptacles in 1890's in America; a rigid container which is designed for the encasement of human remains and which is usually constructed of wood, metal, fiberglass, plastic, or like material, and ornamented and lined with fabric. |
| Casket Manufacturers Association | organization of the casket manufacturers intended to facilitate sharing of information (now known as the Casket and Funeral Supply Association). |
| Catacombs | originated in ancient Rome as excavated cemeteries cut out of soft rock for the tombs of wealthy Christians; later became a place for religious rites to avoid persecution. |
| Catafalque | raised platform (with or without a canopy) used for a body to lie in state. |
| Chadwick's report | 1840's reported on unsanitary conditions in London created by intramural burials, the high cost of funerals and the 1st use of the death certificate. |
| Edwin Chadwick | English investigator of mass corruption in regard to English burial practices who recommended that cemeteries be municipalized and that religious rites be simplified and standardized in 1842. |
| Circle of Necessity | in Egyptian culture, the journey to the Sun and back which required 3,000 years to complete. |
| Joseph Henry Clarke | founded Clarke School of Embalming at Cincinnati (now Cincinnati College) in 1882. Author and holder of several patents. |
| Coffin | from the Greek word 'kofinos'; utilitarian container designed to hold human remains, often anthropoidal in shape. |
| Conference of Funeral Service Examining Boards | organization of licensing agencies in North America; responsible for the national licensing exam known as the National Board Exam; established in St. Louis in 1904. |
| Cooling Board | portable table on which the body was placed while the corpse cooler was in use; later became the embalming table when embalming was done in the home of the deceased. |
| Corpse Cooler | type of ice chest placed over the torso the body to slow down the process of decomp prior to the funeral. It was typically a responsibility of the undertaker to provide ice and change the ice when it melted. |
| Cortege | funeral procession |
| Cremation | method of disposing of the dead body via fire; first attributed to the ancient Greeks. |
| Cremation Association of North America | Founded in 1913, CANA is an international organization of cemeterians, cremationists, funeral directors, industry suppliers, and consultants. CANA was originally formed to promote cremation as a modern, safe and hygienic way of dealing with a dead human body. |
| Crier | English custom of Middle Ages which lasted until 19th century; person who walked the street calling out the name of the deceased and asking people to pray for the soul of the departed. |
| Designator | master of ceremonies and director of the ancient Roman funeral procession. |
| Direct disposition | disposition of human remains without any rites or ceremonies. |
| Drummers | traveling salesmen who went from town to town selling their products. Early embalmers often obtained their products and training in this manner. |
| Effigy | a life sized, waxen recreation (dummy) of the deceased; often used at state funerals because the body of the deceased should be present for the funeral but could not be preserved for that length of time. |
| Elysian fields | in Greek mythology, the Greek version of heaven. |
| Extramural burial | burial outside the walls of the city; concept introduced during the ancient Roman times. |
| Fisk metallic coffin | patented in 1848 as form-fitting, airtight metallic coffin designed to improve ability to preserve the body; also had a glass plate to allow for viewing of the face. |
| Funeralis | Latin for torchlight procession; word 'funeral' is derived from this |
| Funeral feast | in Middle Ages the wake also served as a feast to welcome the principal heir to his new estate; for the ancient Greeks, funeral feasts ended the fast of the bereaved. |
| Funeral trolley car | a specially designed train car run on a city's trolley line to transport casket and mourners to cemeteries on the outskirts of the city. |
| Funeral undertaker | provided services of organizing and facilitating funeral details as an occupations; aka undertaker, different from furnishing undertaker. |
| Furnishing undertaker | provided supplies and merchandise to funeral undertakers who were dealing directly with the public. Furnishing undertakers filled the role of middle man. |
| Jean N. Gannal | French chemist who developed early embalming methods including injection through the carotid arteries. Author of History of Embalming. |
| J. Anthony Gaussardia | patented a process of embalming involving the injection of an arsenic-alcohol mixture. |
| Gravity injector | apparatus used to inject arterial fluid during the vascular (arterial) phase of the embalming process; relies on gravity to create the pressure required to deliver the fluid. |
| hand pump | method to apply a continuous flow of embalming solution via manual manipulation of a handheld mechanism. |
| Richard Harlan | translated Gannal's History of Embalming; responsible for bringing the European embalming techniques to the US. |
| Dr. William Harvey | Discovered the circulation of blood. |
| Dr. Thomas Holmes | "Father of Modern Embalming in the US" |
| John Hunter | Scottish anatomist credited with the discovery of "Hunters Canal" |
| August Hoffman | credited with the discovery of formaldehyde. |
| Inviter to funerals | a specialty connected with funerals in colonial America; called personally upon those expected to attend funerals; often a municipal appointment. |
| Jewish Funeral Directors of America | chartered in 1928 to secure harmony in the profession among Jewish funeral directors and elevate the practice of the profession. |
| Layers out of the dead | became an occupational specialty in many larger US cities by the end of the 18th century; predecessor to the undertaker. |
| Leagues of Prayer | formed in Middle Ages by lay persons to bury the dead and to pray for the souls of the faithful departed. |
| Anton von Leeuwenhoek | inventor of the microscope "Father of Microbiology." |
| Libitina | ancient Roman goddess of corpses and funerals. |
| Libitinarius | head unertaker in ancient Rome; the secular role model for today's funeral director; conducted his business at the temple of Libitina where death were also registered. |
| Life signals | due to the fear of pre-mature burial, many early American coffins were designed and patented with a method to alert the living if someone was buried alive. |
| Marcello Malpighi | "Father of Histology," the study of tissues. |
| Mound burial | ancient Viking custom; after deceased was placed in his boat with items necessary for the spirit to maintain the position held on earth, all was cremated and the pyre then covered with Earth. |
| mystery cults | religious/ philosphical belief of the ancient Greeks and Oriental East emphasizing spiritual aspects of the afterlife and the hope of joining the cult god in a wonderful existence in eternity. |
| National Association of Colleges of Mortuary Science | established in 1942 as an organization for privately sponsored schools with tthe goal of advancement of mortuary education. |
| National Foundation of Funeral Service | established in 1945 as a non-profit educational trust to advance the education of the profession; currently merged with the NFDA as Funeral Service Foundatio. |
| National Funeral Directors Association (NFDA) | a professional association of funeral directors and embalmers organized in 1882. It is the oldest and largest national funeral service organization in the world. NFDA currently provides advocacy, education, information, products, programs and services to help members enhance the quality of services to families. |
| National Funeral Directors and Morticians Association | incorporated in 1938 as National Negro Funeral Directors and Morticians Association; present name adopted in 1957; established to represent specific interest of African-American funeral directors. |
| National Selected Morticians (NSM) | limited membership funeral service organization formed in 1917 on the basis of one member firm per city; now known as Select Independent Funeral Homes. |
| Natron | salt obtained from the dry lakes of the desert used by the Egyptians in the mummification process. It was once thought that the body was covered in natron for 70 days. Modern translations of the Book of the Dead state that the body was covered for only 20 days. |
| Necropolis | in Egyptian history, the walled suburb of a major city where embalming was performed. aka "The City of the Dead". |
| Obsequires | historic term for funeral ceremonies. |
| Ogee design | innovation introduced to square sided caskets in order to reduce the exccess space and weight, particularly of metal caskets' characterized by a "S" shaped curvature. |
| Order of the Golden Rule | association established in 1928; committed to quality services and high standards; membership limited to one independently owned funeral home per community; |
| Osiris | Egyptian god of the underworld and judge of the dead. |
| Pagan | one who has little or no religion and who delights in sensual pleasures and material goods |
| Pollinctores | name of the ancient Roman embalmers. Were either slaves or employees of Libitinarius. |
| Praeco | aka crier, special funeral functionary in ancient Rome who summoned participants to a public funeral. |
| Professional mourners | due to fear that the dead might be jealous, the ancient Romans and Greeks hire persons (often women), to shriek, tear their hair and rend garments, in order to insure adequate display of emotion. |
| Purgatorial Doctrine | Catholic belief that those whose souls are not perfectly cleansed undergo a process of cleansing before they can enter heaven. |
| Dr. Auguste Renouard | author of The Undertaker's Manual, the first book published specifically as an embalming textbook in the US. |
| Frederick Ruysch | considered the "father of embalming" first to refine the technique of arterial injection of a preservative into the vascular system. |
| Sarcophagus | early Egyptians cut massive coffins from a single mass of stone to protect from grave robbers. Same term is applied today to massive copper and bronze caskets. sarco for flesh and phagus for eaters because when opened, bodies inside were found to be in a state of decay. |
| Sexton | church caretaker who had responsibility for church property, ringing of bells and digging grave in the churchyard cemtery. During Middle ages, most funeral practices were under the direction of church officials. |
| Soul shot | mortuary fee paid to insure entrance of the decedent's soul into heaven. |
| Style 'E' state coffin | cloth covered coffin designed for ex-President US Grant by Stein Coffin Co. in 1885 helped elevate acceptance of cloth covered caskets. |
| Trade embalmer | embalmer to the trade; term originated when some of the original graduates of early embalming courses gave up regular employment with a single firm to provide embalming service to firms which had no trained embalmer. |
| Trocar | long hollow tube patented in 1868 by Samuel Rogers of Philadelphia; used by embalmers to inject fluids into cavities and remove excess liquids. |
| Undertaker's buggy | name given to the vehicle used by undertakers to transport the necessary mortuary paraphernalia to the homes where funerals were typically held. |
| Undertakers Mutual Protective Association | 1st formal organization of undertakers; kept a black book of objectionable and delinquent customers to be shared among members only. |
| University Mortuary Science Education Association | organization of college and university based funeral service programs established in 1961. |
| Wake | originated as an ancient Hebrew practice, family and friends sit with the deceased as a precaution against premature burial |
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