thanatopraxis means funeral rites; death rituals or practices. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 95 out of 100.
Why “thanatopraxis” is a great word
THANATOPRAXIS — [Noun] The comprehensive rites and procedures for preparing and handling the dead, encompassing both technical mortuary care and ceremonial funeral observances. From the Greek combining form thanato- (from θάνατος, thánatos, "death") and -praxis (from πρᾶξις, prâxis, "action, practice"), chiefly as a calque of French thanatopraxie. Unlike thanatology (the academic study of death) or embalming (a single preservative technique), thanatopraxis is the solemn choreography of final care. It is the meticulous washing of the body, the precise arrangement of limbs upon the bier, and the hushed procession from chapel to graveside—the tangible grammar of respect that translates loss into a series of necessary acts.
noun
- Funeral rites; death rituals or practices.“[I]t is the English version of Western death that seems to be spreading more widely[…], both in the thanatopraxis of cremation which is spreading even in Portugal with the blessing of the Catholic Church and in the cultural ideals of dying […] In the 'symbolic' perspective one studies death through the prism of cosmology and community, collective and individual representations, mortuary rites, the”