Crossword clues for catafalque
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Catafalque \Cat"a*falque`\, n. [F., fr. It. catafalco, scaffold, funeral canopy; of uncertain origin; cf. Sp. catafalso, cadahalso, cadalso, Pr. casafalc, OF. chafaut. Cf. Scaffold.] A temporary structure sometimes used in the funeral solemnities of eminent persons, for the public exhibition of the remains, or their conveyance to the place of burial.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
1640s, from French catafalque (17c.), from Italian catafalco "scaffold," from Vulgar Latin *catafalicum, from Greek kata- "down" (see cata-), used in Medieval Latin with a sense of "beside, alongside" + fala "scaffolding, wooden siege tower," a word said to be of Etruscan origin. The Medieval Latin word also yielded Old French chaffaut, chafaud (Modern French échafaud) "scaffold."
Wiktionary
n. A platform used to display or convey a coffin during a funeral, often ornate.
WordNet
n. a decorated bier on which a coffin rests in state during a funeral
Wikipedia
A catafalque is a raised bier, box, or similar platform, often movable, that is used to support the casket, coffin, or body of the deceased during a funeral or memorial service. Following a Roman Catholic Requiem Mass, a catafalque may be used to stand in place of the body at the Absolution of the dead or used during Masses of the Dead and All Souls Day.
The term originates from the Italian catafalco, which means scaffolding. The most notable Italian catafalque was the one designed for Michelangelo by his fellow artists in 1564. An elaborate and highly decorated roofed surround for a catafalque, common for grand funerals of the Baroque era, may also be called a castrum doloris.
Usage examples of "catafalque".
Lees Obol dead, and none caring that he lay all alone on the catafalque in the ceremonial square.
The body was deposited upon a catafalque in the Church of the Santissimi Apostoli, where the funeral was celebrated by all the artists and Florentines in Rome.
With a growing, grating roar, it canted over on the stony rubble and rattled out into the room: a black catafalque whose upthrust electrum arms held aloft a coffin and several scepters for a few impressive moments before toppling over on its side and crashing into and through the floor.
One arm spat a scepter intact out onto the dust-choked pave an instant before failing protective magics flickered the length of the coffin, hung silent and grappling in the air for a long, tense time of silence, then collapsed in a small but sharp explosion that transformed coffin, catafalque, and all into dark dust and hurled it in all directions.
As soon as he became accustomed to the light of the room he distinguished the big bed with its azure-andgold hangings, in the middle of the great room, looking like a catafalque in which love was buried, for the princess was no longer young.
Ogden, the gaunt senator for Landicon, who had been lying on his couch as if on a catafalque, sat up and pointed a bony arm.
His gaze strayed to where Weir's catafalque had been and where the late Director's remains had been projected out into the Infinite a few hours earlier.
Get down to work fresh start don't let other things interfere avoid stress doors closing settle in, spread out like a prison like a tomb where the bed's the catafalque made by God the bed-maker in the last book of The Republic, talk about avoiding stress.
At the far end of the huge chamber he found Lyam sitting next to the catafalque that supported his father's stone coffin.
In the midst of the choir, protected by double barriers, was placed a catafalque even more stately than that provided in the chapel of the palace at Westminster, with a lofty canopy, the valance whereof was fringed with black silk and gold, and the sides garnished with pensils, escutcheons, and bannerols.
Within, they could see at least a half-dozen marble catafalques, upon which stone coffins rested.
Three sets of three catafalques dominated the floor of the crypt and both men knew that crouched behind one of them was the Vampire Lord.
In every direction, even behind them, a vast marble floor stretched away, upon which rows of catafalques were arrayed.
He walked between the ancient forebears of his line, entombed in the walls and upon great catafalques Kings and queens, princes and princesses, scoundrels and rogues, saints and scholars lined his way.
In the midst of the sacred apartment, surrounded by barriers, clothed with black, with a smaller altar at its foot, adorned like the high altar with plate and jewels, was set a superb catafalque, garnished with pensils and escutcheons, and having at each corner the banner of a saint beaten in fine gold upon damask.