Columbarium

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /ˌkɒləmˈbɛəɹi.əm/

Definitions

1. A building or wall with niches designed to hold cremated remains inside urns
2. A monument or chamber specifically designed to contain and protect ashes in containers
3. An architectural construction featuring compartments to store urns holding cremated ashes

Etymology: The Romans gave this word to the world as a joke about pigeons. A "columbarium" was a niche-filled wall or chamber, and the name came from "columba", the Latin for pigeon, plus "-arium", a suffix meaning a place for something. The pigeon connection came from the appearance: the rows of small recesses resembled a dovecote, and the same term was applied to the cavities in a pigeon loft. The Roman columbaria were vaulted chambers, often underground, lined with rows of little niches. Each niche held a cinerary urn containing the ashes of a deceased person, frequently a household slave or freedman, and sometimes the cremated remains of several people shared a single compartment. The name stuck to these chambers because the walls looked like the nesting boxes of a dovecote. English borrowed the word directly from Latin, keeping its meaning of a structure for storing ashes. Its modern use in English still refers to that same kind of niche wall in a crematorium or cemetery, so the pigeon loft that inspired it has been left behind.

Synonyms: urn, mausoleum, sepulcher, tomb, crypt

Antonyms: INVALID