mortician
Americannoun
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of mortician
An Americanism dating back to 1890–95; mort(uary) + -ician
Explanation
Lots of kids want to grow up to be astronauts, firefighters, or doctors. Not too many want to be morticians, which makes sense: a mortician runs a funeral home. One of the saddest facts of life is that we all die, but that fact is a little less sad if you're a mortician — their business depends on death. Morticians — also called undertakers and funeral directors — do various jobs, such as planning a funeral, helping people pick a coffin, and preparing the body of the person who died. Morticians also need to be skilled at comforting, because they are constantly working with people who are sad and angry at the death of their family or friends.
Vocabulary lists containing mortician
I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter
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A Lesson Before Dying
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Vocabulary Video Contest (2013) - List 1
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Gebbai the mortician spoke with steely-eyed resolve, but it began to crack when he remembered one young man.
From Barron's ● Apr. 27, 2026
"We go from service to lifesaving to mortician, dealing with dead bodies and then doing crowd control," the 40-year-old says.
From BBC ● Mar. 9, 2025
I learned that in August 2023 from a mortician preparing to cremate my mother.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 17, 2025
The once unidentified man was in jail accused of being a thief, and he was accidentally mummified by a mortician experimenting with new embalming techniques.
From Reuters ● Oct. 7, 2023
The cheeks had fallen back to the ears and a solicitous mortician had put lipstick on the black mouth.
From "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" by Maya Angelou
Fellow morticians were also alarmed at the uptick in the number of bodies cremated by the Lamb Funeral Home, a respected, family-run establishment and pillar of the Southern California mortuary business for generations.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 1, 2025
In keeping with her mother’s request, the morticians wrapped the body in cotton — no embalmment — and put it in a pine box.
From New York Times ● Mar. 18, 2023
Someone joked that morticians always had money and she’d thought about her interests—architecture, computers, landscape design.
From Slate ● Apr. 30, 2022
Ordinarily, a decedent is released from the state medical examiner’s office within a few days of a death, allowing morticians time to properly prepare for services.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 14, 2022
The Catholic calendar in my bedroom was printed by W. F. Gormley and Sons, morticians.
From "Hunger of Memory" by Richard Rodriguez
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
