My future mother-in-law has asked me to try and find out the name of a word that she had heard recently on the History Channel. As I’m hoping to impress her, but have had no luck discovering this word yet on my own, I’m turning to you fine hypereducated people.
The word in question is the one you would use to describe the (Medieveal English, I believe) process of boiling the body of a deceased king/nobleman, waiting for the flesh to fall off, and then having nice clean bones available for transport.
In my internet searching, all I’ve been able to turn up was “Yes, that happened.” King Henry V is the name I was able to turn up the most, though I believe it may have happened to one of the Richard’s (I or II) also.
I don’t have much else to go on other than that she heard it on some unnamed piece on the History Channel within the last month or so.
Any help or clues would be most appreciated.
~Dan
Yikes! I’ve heard that the only way the English know how to cook meat is by boiling it, but I never knew this is where they got the idea. What did they do with the, um, leftovers?
FUN!
How about “disgusting”? [insert grossed-out smile here]
Hi and welcome to SDMB. I simply could not resist my last suggestion, but I wonder if thiso link is any use at all.
It is nicely gruesome anway!
The only word I can think of that comes close is ‘flense’, but that’s not quite the same thing.
:eek: And I thought that ‘quicksand porn’ was the strangest thing I’d seen on the SDMB…
Methinks we need the input from some cooking experts around here now.
The weirdest thing about this is that I bet it would smell pretty good.
It reminds me a bit of “rendering,” but that’s not really the same, either.
Careful, though–
“Persons cutting up the bodies of the dead, barbarously cooking them in order that the bones being separated from the flesh may be carried for burial into their own countries are by the very fact excommunicated.”
“De Sepulturis” Boniface VIII, 1300
(at least according to The Catholic Encyclopedia)
Dang. There go my plans for the weekend.
I believe the word they used for this in my college physical anthropology class was “macerate”. It was in the context of some research work someone was doing with bones/skulls; fortunately I don’t remember the details.
Maceration is a general term for soaking (specifically, to soften or break down by soaking in liquid). It’s a fancy name for making tea, also. It crossed my mind, but I didn’t think it fit, although I guess it could take on a special meaning when talking about bones.
There’s “excarnation”. The Death Dictionary says it means “The use of animals to dispose of human remains or to strip off flesh.” Other sites seem to use it more generally for getting rid of the flesh before burial.
:eek: They NEEDED a word??
How about “the King was, de-peaus’d”?
Or in Italian, La Carne Nobile’?
Maybe to… “Sir Render”?
I can’t remember the word, but I remember it was used in one of Ellis Peters’ Brother Cadfael mystery books, “The Pilgrim of Hate.” I don’t own a copy, and I can’t find anything online with the term in question.
Does this help anyone else to come up with the answer?
Excoriation -to strip off or remove the skin from ?
I haven’t found an answer, but this question has led to some of the more unusual Google searches I’ve ever done.
Hits have included:
“illustration depicts cherubs assisting in the retention of urine.”
A group selling ‘secret government mind-control devices’
Some guy who thinks Bonsai Kitten is real
And lots and lots of recipies.
I agree. The OED has the definition for excarnate
And a quotation from 1709