ossuary
[osh-oo-er-ee, os-]
- a place or receptacle for the bones of the dead.
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Also ossuarium.
Origin of ossuary
1650–60; < Late Latin ossuārium, variant of ossārium, equivalent to oss- (stem of os) bone + -ārium -ary
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for ossuary
Contemporary Examples
The French cemetery at Notre Dame de Lorette has 20,000 named graves and an ossuary with 20,000 unknown dead.
Historical Examples
The Magdalenians have passed through this ossuary and have drawn out all the canine teeth to make ornaments of them.
Men of the Old Stone AgeHenry Fairfield Osborn
Ossuary, os′ū-ar-i, n. a place where the bones of the dead are deposited: a charnel-house.
I love to go to his ossuary of dead transactions, as I would visit the catacombs of Rome or Paris.
The Poet at the Breakfast TableOliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
After a time the body is taken up, the bones cleaned, and deposited in an ossuary called the Quiogozon.
Bonaparte stopped near the Ossuary, and desired to be shown the spot where the battle of Morat was fought.
Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, CompleteLouis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
ossuary
- any container for the burial of human bones, such as an urn or vault
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Word Origin
C17: from Late Latin ossuārium, from Latin os bone
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
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Word Origin and History for ossuary
n.
"urn for the bones of the dead," 1650s, from Late Latin ossuarium "charnel house," from neuter of Latin ossuarius "of bones," from Latin os (plural ossua) "bone" (see osseous) on model of mortuarium.
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper