# German seated weddings: a thing? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 3, 2025, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552 "2025-04-03T04:02:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Maserschmidt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/maserschmidt/32/18829_2.png) [@Maserschmidt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maserschmidt)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 10:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/81 "2025-04-05T10:53:34Z")
As is the Levantine Sea. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 11:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/82 "2025-04-05T11:01:00Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Yes, they both are. And before you ask, yes, so’s the Black Sea. I’ll concede that you’re all technically correct, which is the best kind of correct. So oceans are divided into seas, right? Are their parts of the ocean that aren’t a sea? What makes those parts different? And since all the oceans are connected, can you really think of them as separate? Aren’t they just one world ocean? ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 11:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/83 "2025-04-05T11:05:05Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > So oceans are divided into seas, right? Are their parts of the ocean that aren’t a sea? Yes, there are parts that aren’t part of any sea. These are usually called “open ocean”, although there is (AFAIK) one exception - [one part of the Atlantic that would normally be considered open ocean is instead considered a sea](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sargasso_Sea). Other marginal [seas](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea) are partially land-bounded parts of their associated ocean. > [@Alessan](#): > > And since all the oceans are connected, can you really think of them as separate? I … don’t? But “separate” and “has sensible divisions” are not synonyms, to me. > [@Alessan](#): > > Aren’t they just one world ocean? That’s exactly [what it is called](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean#World_Ocean). ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 11:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/84 "2025-04-05T11:11:25Z")
Gotta love the SDMB: “Do Germans sit down at weddings?” Two days later… “The Baltic Sea is part of the Atlantic Ocean.” ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 11:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/85 "2025-04-05T11:14:05Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > Two days later… Don’t forget the side-step into the disposition of ashes. ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 11:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/86 "2025-04-05T11:35:52Z")
My personal highlight of German funeral-related ads is this one, which I’ve seen myself (IIRC in Düsseldorf): [[Album] imgur.com ![](https://i.imgur.com/kfCzTqE.jpeg?fb "imgur.com") ](https://imgur.com/a/BtsTDo5) (The ad suggests river burials, which I suppose involves dropping the coffin into a river, as an alternative for people who find cemeteries to expensive. And it presents the option with exactly this argument.) ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 11:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/87 "2025-04-05T11:51:12Z")
> [@Schnitte](#): > > The ad suggests river burials, which I suppose involves dropping the coffin into a river, as an alternative for people who find cemeteries to expensive. I don’t think a “Flussbestattung” (river burial) means dropping a coffin into a river and I highly doubt that would be allowed for a number of reasons, but dropping the cremated ashes into the water. ---
**Author:** ![Pardel-Lux](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pardel-lux/32/20182_2.png) [@Pardel-Lux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pardel-Lux)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 12:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/88 "2025-04-05T12:30:32Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > Two days later… I love it when a Factual Question gets so far resolved that the thread becomes hijackable with impunity. > [@RivkahChaya](#): > > Germany’s national bird is some kind of eagle, isn’t it? Every country’s national bird is an eagle, I thought, sometimes [bicephalous](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-headed_eagle). Except France’s, which is a cockerel. Much better for lunch. > [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > dropping the cremated ashes into the water. That bit is confusing to me too, because in Germany the _[Bestattungsgesetz](https://www.mymoria.de/bestattung/bestattungsgesetz/)_ (Burial Act) forbids **[that explicitly](https://www.mymoria.de/bestattung/kremationsasche/)**, except in the Land Bremen (yes, funeral ordinances are Ländersache, that is: regulated at the regional level, not federal). Germany is quite restrictive concerning human ashes, as oposite to Spain, for instance, where you can do with the ashes of a relative pretty much what you want. I believe in Germany it is illegal to keep the ashes at home, even in a sealed urn. At least it was 20 years ago. > [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > dropping a coffin into a river Now I picture a coffin walking the plank. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/89 "2025-04-05T13:11:39Z")
> [@Pardel-Lux](#): > > Germany is quite restrictive concerning human ashes I guess the German authorities have watched _that_ scene from “The Big Lebowski” and decided that it’s good practice to disallow handing over the ashes of the cremated to the descendants and letting them do whatever they want with them. ETA: for anyone not having watched the movie, here’s the scene: [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/xmy1AsWgOXY/maxresdefault.jpg "The Big Lebowski (1998) - Donny's Ashes Scene | Movieclips") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmy1AsWgOXY) ---
**Author:** ![Mops](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mops/32/16494_2.png) [@Mops](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mops)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/90 "2025-04-05T13:25:44Z")
> [@Pardel-Lux](#): > > … > Germany is quite restrictive concerning human ashes, … Which is why that company does their river burials in the Netherlands. You can legally export a dead body and deal with it according to the foreign country’s regulations, no problem there. Venue shopping is a thing both with marriages and burials. In the case of marriage, because German law requires foreign citizens to supply a certificate from their country of citizenship that the person fulfils the legal requirements to marry by that country’s law, and most countries do not supply such a certificate, but only send a certificate that the person is not married (which is only a necessary but not sufficient part of ‘fulfilling the legal requirements to marry’). So quite a lot of people pop over to Denmark to get married there, and then have the Danish marriage certificate registered with their local German _Standesamt_. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/91 "2025-04-05T13:35:11Z")
I’ll take your word for this, since you clearly know more about Episcopalians than I do. My point was just that some posters on this thread were calling the member of the clergy who officiated at weddings a priest. In the U.S., about two-thirds of members of Christian churches call their member of the clergy a minister. Only Catholics and Episcopalians ever use the word “priest” for them. You’re right that Episcopalians use a variety of words for the members of the clergy. And then there are lots of weddings officiated by non-Christian clergy (or whatever the overall term should be) in the U.S. I don’t know all the terms that they use for their clergy. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/92 "2025-04-05T13:36:40Z")
> [@Tamerlane](#): > > Bah! If so, stylized or not, they employed a bad artist. Seagulls don’t have wings that look like that while soaring 😉. Exactly. At first i thought it was meant to be a seagull, then i looked at those pinfeathers. They look like eagle wings. (It vulture wings.) ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/93 "2025-04-05T16:16:58Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > Exactly. At first i thought it was meant to be a seagull, then i looked at those pinfeathers. They look like eagle wings. (It vulture wings.) It’s the rare “Mynephewknowsphotoshop” bird. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/94 "2025-04-05T16:29:29Z")
At least some Orthodox Christians also use “priest” ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2025, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/95 "2025-04-05T16:37:55Z")
Thank you. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2025, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/96 "2025-04-06T22:13:31Z")
> [@DPRK](#): > > single-proxy marriage. Australia again: Australia does not do Single Proxy (or Double Proxy) marriages. You have to make a personal declaration in front of the celebrant, witnessed by the celebrant and your witnesses. Of course, legally, Australia only does certification. Certification is presumptive evidence of marriage, but apart from that all the legal status of marriage is independent of certification. ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2025, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/97 "2025-04-07T00:31:26Z")
Back to the OP and German Ghosts what confused me about that episode was that the couple’s wedding coordinator was also the officiant and then Emma accidentallystepped in for him. So was the coordinator somehow also a civil registrar or did they already get married at the standesamt and were just having a ceremony for the guests? If it’s the latter then one bride gettingcold feetdoesn’t make much sense since they’re already married. ---
**Author:** ![SanVito](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sanvito/32/2805_2.png) [@SanVito](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SanVito)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2025, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/98 "2025-04-07T14:35:07Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > Oh, and on TV weddings have dancing at the receptions. Being held in Baptist churches, none of the weddings I’ve attended have had dancing, or alcohol. Good grief, drinking and dancing is the best bit. ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2025, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552/99 "2025-04-07T16:38:44Z")
And, in certain circles, the family punch-up. There’s always someone to take offence at something . There was a comedian here in the UK who had a catchphrase about that:" Mind you, I’m saying nothing - there was enough said at our Edie’s wedding " [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/german-seated-weddings-a-thing/1016552.md?page=4)