A lychgate (from Old English līc, corpse) or resurrection gate[1] is a covered gateway found at the entrance to a traditional English or English-style churchyard.
In the Middle Ages, before mortuaries, and at a time when most people died at home, the dead were placed on a bier and taken to the lychgate where they remained, often attended against bodysnatchers, until the funeral service, which may have been a day or two later. The lychgate kept the rain off, and often had seats for the vigil watchers. Bodies at that time were buried in just shrouds rather than coffins. At the funeral, the priest conducted the first part of the service under the shelter of the lychgate.
TIL…
Taken from Wikipedia
l now also learned that the word “lych” is connected to the German word “Leiche”, just meaning “corpse”.
Makes sense, when you think about it…What would bodysnatchers do with the corpses?
Selling them on the grey market to universities and medical schools for research and to perform educational obductions.
In England at the beginning of the 19th century there was an estimated need of 500-1000 corpses per year that could not be met by legal sources. Easy money…OK yeah I heard about this, but we’re talking about the Middle-Ages…
Good point.
You might start a discussion about that on the lychgate Wikipedia article discussion page.
There might be an inconsistency in the description.
Back then I think it was more that they were interested in potential jewellery the deceased would be buried with than the body itself.
Before the Anatomy Act 1832 (2 & 3 Will. 4. c. 75), the only legal supply of corpses for anatomical purposes in the UK were those condemned to death and dissection by the courts. Dissections, the main way doctors aimed to gain understanding, required fresh corpses.[6] Those who were sentenced to dissection by the courts were often guilty of capital crimes, such as murder, burglary, rape, and arson.[7] However, in 1832, Parliament of the United Kingdom passed the Anatomy Act 1832, which gave doctors and medical students the right to dissect donated bodies for education and research purposes.[8] Although this act was created to stop the illegal tradeoff of corpses, it did not provide near enough corpses needed by medical schools annually, which could be up to 500 in number.[6] This led to increased numbers of body snatching in the United Kingdom.
So probably steal corpses and pass them off as dead criminals
I don’t think that’s applicable to the Middle-Ages though.
Probably also where the mad scientist trope came from or at least a contributing actor. Also how Viktor Frankesntein received parts for his creature. Knowing that there were a lot of bodysnatchers out there snatching an average of more than 1 corpse per night would have made Frankenstein scarier than we view it today.
Is that what that is? To keep liches out? Can’t find any references apart from Warhammer
A lich isn’t a creature from traditional folklore, it’s a DnD invention. The word is an archaic word for a corpse, which is the relevance here - it’s the route by which a body was taken for burial, and sometimes kept while waiting for burial.
A bunch of old churches in the UK have them.
And now everybody who gets married at a church that has one of these has to have photos of them standing in it.
Smiling rn
“Ha ha lych my balls dead ppl”
