Working on the Land

[eyesup]

If you did request a naked burial, would being naked at the burial ceremony break a law? If you are dead, can you break a law? A legal court document, the Last Will and Testament, that specifies a naked burial would make it legal?

If it was against the law would the government be responsible for re-animation AND prosecution?

Just wonderin'

Duane

[ric]

normally the body is in a biodegradable covering of somekind , wicker basket, cardboard coffin , canvas shroud or basic wooden box.

not sure a naked dead body , possibly after injury or autopsie would be right for the mourners.

nowt to stop the mourners being naked either at the ceremony or subsequent visits

the above applies at our nearby rural green burial site.

[Peter S]

As I understand Duane's question, don't Americans favour open-coffin funerals? Over here it's more often a closed-top affair.

Peter

[jbeegoode]

Ah Ha, I want a nude memorial service! I could become famous in death. I've never heard of that one!
Jbee

[Greenbare Woods]

If you did request a naked burial, would being naked at the burial ceremony break a law? If you are dead, can you break a law? A legal court document, the Last Will and Testament, that specifies a naked burial would make it legal?
Duane

In many places the undertaker industry is as regulated and licensed as any other industry that GOVERNMENT controls.  It has to be a licensed cemetery and a licensed undertaker or mortician.  In many places the body has to be "embalmed" with toxic chemicals to delay decomposition and then placed into a box meeting standards.  Its all licensed and controlled to raise the cost and provide kickbacks to politicians. 

Yes, it would break the law to be buried naked in many places. 

[ric]

not the same in the uk

we buried my father in the green burial ground a couple of years ago, obviously i know the chairwoman of the charity that run it quite well so dont get any bullshit.

dad died in a nursing home , a doctor has to write a death certificate with the cause of death on it,   any doubt , or unexpected sudden death an autopsy has to be done to determine cod.  death cert then has to be taken to the registrare of deaths who then issues a green form ... permission to dispose of the body. which gets given to the burial ground or crematorium.

the body is removed from the place of death within hours of death , theres no rules on where it goes or who does it .   i could have turned up with a van , wheeled him out and brought him home.   
the green burial ground have a tame grave digger but dont insist hes used,  we could have dug the hole ourselves.  thers no requirement for any sort of religious or official ceremony of any sort .

in practise we employed a local undertaker to remove the body , store it whilst arrangements were made , got the grave digger to dig and fill the hole . undertakers delivered the coffin and lowered it into the hole. with just the undertakers staff , my self and the mrs and our children present. 

no service , no singing of half remembered hymes and no crowds of rellies and "friends" that havnt been seen for decades.

i didnt even tell my cousins till after the event.... aint seen or heard anything from them since my aunts funeral some ten years ago

[eyesup]

Yes, it would break the law to be buried naked in many places.

Illegal to be buried naked or illegal to be drawn,  quartered and buried or both?

Duane
Sorry, Bob, I’m not making light of your comment, I tend to agree with you, but I just couldn’t resist.

[eyesup]

ric, are there special requirements or restrictions if death was because of some communicable disease? Would they be worried about microbes?

Several years ago we watched a PBS special, ‘Death and the Civil War.’ It’s about how 2.4% of the population, mainly men, boys, husbands, fathers and brothers died over a period of 4 years in the Civil War. Today, that percentage of America would be 7.4m, mostly male, deaths. It was about how the nation dealt with that much death in the male population in such a short period. They had no experience or point of reference to draw upon.
Death and the Civil War, PBS.
Death and the Civil War, NY Times.
Not for the faint of heart.
We watched it, virtually silent.

Duane
How did we end up on such a morbid discussion?

[ric]

ive no idea about any restrictions for communicable diseases or microbes.

funny thing is the field next to the burial ground has allways been rumoured to be the site of the local plauge pit , where the victims of the black death ended up in the middle ages

[eyesup]

I’ve read about those sites and also read some fantastical fiction about them.
I’ve wondered if those microbes can remain viable that long underground.

Duane

[Peter S]

I recall a few years ago, during one of the global flu scares, there was a plan to exhume some folk killed in the infamous 1918 flu epidemic (credited with killing more people than the preceding war) to see if anything could be learned from their flu bugs. Seems there were some who'd been buried in the cold bits of Scandinavia who'd therefore be better preserved than elsewhere. I don't remember hearing whether it went ahead or whether anything was actually learned - such is the shortness of the news cycle attention span. But "they" obviously thought there was a good chance of learning something, so perhaps they expected the bugs to still be viable. There's also the ongoing Jurassic Park idea of being able to recover Dino-DNA from prehistoric mosquitoes trapped in amber.

So maybe some of these bugs do live on underground.

Peter

[ric]

rain forcast for today

this morning was overcast so i went out to the blackcurrant bushes and chopped of the branches that needed pruning ....took all the cuttings into the poly tunnel as it started to rain and spent the next couple of hours naked  in a balmy 24 degrees stripping the ripe currants of the prunings whilst the rain pattered on the plastic cover

where theres a will theres a way

[eyesup]

The 1918 Flu Epidemic is sometimes referred to as “The Forgotton Plague”. Depending on which source you are reading, it killed from 20 to 100 million people worldwide. It altered the American economy and stalled the birthrate for years following the war.

The virus that caused the Black Plague of the 14th century has mutated over the years just like we have and is still deadly, but not like it was. Plus anyone that survived that disease has passed on the immunity to many people.

If that or any other bug from those times was unearthed it might still wreak havoc, but the only good thing about a plague is that the very nature of it’s success is it’s own undoing. It creates immunity as it proceeds. It just might not be as bad today.

There is another little known plague called The Plague of Justinian (ca. 540 AD). It is believed to have been critical to the final blow to the resurging Holy Roman Empire. The other natural disaster that affected that outcome was the eruption of the super-volcano Prot-Krakatau (ca. 535 AD) in Indonesia. Talk about how nature affects the outcomes of human endeavor.

They have postulated that the volcano created a nuclear winter scenario which dropped temperatures worldwide which caused crop failures in Europe and the Mediterranean which caused famine which caused disruption in the food chain which caused famine to spread which compromised people's ability to fight disease which assisited the spread of the plague. Remove those two events from history and imagine what might exist today.

More than likely no one in Europe had even heard of Indonesia. An ultimate butterfly effect.

Duane

[Greenbare Woods]

They have postulated that the volcano created a nuclear winter scenario which dropped temperatures worldwide which caused crop failures in Europe and the Mediterranean which caused famine which caused disruption in the food chain which caused famine to spread which compromised people's ability to fight disease which assisited the spread of the plague. Remove those two events from history and imagine what might exist today.
Duane

Humans thrive during natural warm cycles and die in large numbers during cold cycles. 

The Roman Empire coincided with a natural warm cycle several degrees warmer than the 20th Century.  It was probably about as hot as the "disaster" we were threatened with by "global warming" alarmists.

The Roman Empire ended during a significant drop in global temperatures that lasted a few hundred years.  Blaming it on this volcano or that volcano ignores the huge hot object in our sky that keeps our planet warm.  Variations in solar output have far more effects on the earth temperature than anything else.  Deaths are often blamed on famine and or some disease, both of which are the result of global cooling. 

There was a medieval warm period during which most of Europe did well, and so did so-called Vikings from north lands that prospered during warm the warm period.  Populations across Europe and Asia greatly increased.

Then there was what is called the "little ice age" which lasted from the 15th century until the 18th century.  Global temperatures dropped.  Widespread famine killed many across Europe.  Starving people are much more susceptible to disease so the plague found easy target.   The British quit being wine merchants and became brewers of beer.

The little ice age ended about the 19th century and warm continues today, although we may be seeing an end of the warm times.  Scientists write papers alleging causes such as volcanoes and such. Human activity always gets blamed, witches, corporations, whatever scapegoat they can point to.   Most probably its the sun that causes it all and none of the scapegoats have ever been responsible for any of it. 

We should all be hoping for global warming because humans always thrive, but unfortunately we or our children are more likely to see famine and disease caused by a solar cooling cycle. 

Bob

[reubenT]

in rural TN here a friend who works on ambulance did a little research and found if he gets the right permits he can bury on his own land in a natural box without embalming.    So he has a small cemetery where reside several relatives and family friends.   Very cheap funeral that way,  services at the church,  we dig hole with a machine and drop the home made box in.   Last one was a big guy,   real big,    probably weighed at least 400 lb.    The pine box was set into the hole with our track hoe.      But without embalming an open box funeral is out I think.     And so naked is just fine but nobody but those who put the body in the box would know.