Victorian Photographs of the dead - Memento Mori

Victorian’s and the dead.  

Referring back to my post about “The Victorian Home” disease and illness where very common throughout the Victorian Era, from there way of life and surroundings. Death had become an everyday thing, and along with that came there everyday superstitions. Death had almost become ritualistic.

Photographs of the Dead:

To begin this process first they had to dress the dead, a man in his favorite attire, but women were usually dressed in white cashmere gowns. They would dress there dead and then they would pose them with the rest of the family for a post death photograph, as they believed that there spirit lived on through the photographs, which is sad as this would normally be the only photograph that would be taken of you your whole life, they would arrange the deceased in very “living” pose sometimes using a frame to keep the body upright, in some of the photographs you can’t tell who is dead. They would then leave them in pone of the rooms in the house which they had died in, and one family member had to watch them at all times 24/7 until the funeral which would normally be a couple of weeks, it was said they had to be watched just in case they either woke up, as coma’s where very common, but they did not have the equipment to tell either the person was dead or actually in a coma, which resulted in many people being buried alive in the Victorian Era hence why they started installing bells into the coffins so just in case you did wake up you could inform someone. Even worst when it came to the death of a very small infant, the family would be known to keep the baby’s body until it had become mummified then they would dress it up in babies clothes and have it out on display.