What was the purpose of a mausoleum?

A mausoleum is an external free-standing building constructed as a monument enclosing the interment space or burial chamber of a deceased person or people. A mausoleum without the person’s remains is called a cenotaph.

How long does a body decompose in a mausoleum?

By 50 years in, your tissues will have liquefied and disappeared, leaving behind mummified skin and tendons. Eventually these too will disintegrate, and after 80 years in that coffin, your bones will crack as the soft collagen inside them deteriorates, leaving nothing but the brittle mineral frame behind.

How does a body decompose in a mausoleum?

While you’re insulating grandma from the outside air, she could be stewing in her own fluids, turning into a slurry from the work of anaerobic bacteria. When the weather turns warm, in some cases, that sealed casket becomes a pressure cooker and bursts from accumulated gases and fluids of the decomposing body.

Can you see the body in a mausoleum?

After funeral services, the body is placed in a small room within the mausoleum, just large enough for the casket. The room is called a crypt, and the process of placing the casket in the crypt is called entombment. Other mausoleums don’t have this option and visitors can only access the outside of the structure.

Do bodies leak in a mausoleum?

Well-kept mausoleums run angled drain pipes from the crypts. So even if there is gas or any other leakage coming from a casket (fun fact: this is known as casket “burping”), it does not cause a problem.

Are ashes buried in a mausoleum?

An alternative to traditional underground burial, a mausoleum is a final resting place above the earth. A space for above-ground entombment, a mausoleum contains one or many crypts, or burial spaces, for both whole body burial and cremated ashes.

What is the difference between a mausoleum and a tomb?

A mausoleum is an independent aboveground structure built to hold the remains of a person or persons. A crypt is a burial spot, built to hold a casket in a concrete or stone chamber. And a tomb is a container which holds the deceased’s remains.

What happens in a mausoleum?

A mausoleum is a building that houses the dead above ground. Such a building can be large and ornate, like the Taj Mahal in India, or small and simple, like mausoleums in cemeteries. Mausoleums can be private, housing only one or a few bodies, or communal, housing as many bodies as space allows.

What is means of burial do cemeteries use?

Most cemeteries allow you to bury an urn containing the cremated remains of a loved one in a traditional burial plot. In some cases, you may be able to bury several urns within one burial plot since they take up less space than a casket. A few cemeteries even have a section devoted to cremated remains.