cerement
/ˈsɪəm(ə)nt
/noun [mass noun]
(also cerements) historical Waxed cloth for wrapping a corpse.The coffin was forced, the cerements torn, and the melancholy relics, clad in sackcloth, after being rattled for hours on moonless byways, were at length exposed to uttermost indignities before a class of gaping boys....
- More dramatic yet is the tomb of General William Hargrave, also in Westminster Abbey, by Louis - Francois Roubiliac, in which the deceased is shown breaking free of his cerements, apparently already confident of his salvation.
- In an early scene, Hamlet begs the ghost to tell ‘Why thy canoniz'd bones… Have burst their cerements.’
Origin
Early 17th century (first used by Shakespeare in Hamlet, 1602): from cere (see cerecloth).
- Graves, Robert
- gravestone
- Gravettian
- graveyard
- graveyard shift
- gravid
- gravimeter
- gravimetric
- gravimetry
- graving dock
- gravitas
- gravitate
- gravitation
- gravitational
- gravitational constant
- gravitational field
- gravitational lens
- gravitationally
- gravitino
- graviton
- gravity
- gravity-fed
- gravity feed
- gravity wave
- gravlax