graverobber

[greyv-rob-er] /ˈgreɪvˌrɒb ər/

noun

a person who steals valuables from graves and tombs:

Graverobbers had emptied the Mayan tomb before archaeologists could examine its contents.

a person who steals corpses after burial, especially for medical dissection.

Origin of graverobber

grave¹ + robber

Related forms

graverobbing, noun

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2017.
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Examples from the Web for grave-robbing

Historical Examples

Villages, expert in two hundred generations of grave-robbing, cower among the mounds of wastage, and whoop at the daily tourist.

Letters of Travel (1892-1913) Rudyard Kipling
Miss Lowenstein, I have some reason for thinking that you know who is implicated in that grave-robbing business.

Out of a Labyrinth
Lawrence L. Lynch
In the same issue is recorded a mob's assault on a doctor whom they suspected, rightly it seems, of grave-robbing.

An Enquiry into the Causes of the Frequent Executions at Tyburn (1725) Bernard Mandeville

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