Morgue

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mortuary (right) in the middle of the Arosa settlement area . In the background the Arosa Dolomites

In the morgue (also: morgue or morgue , outdated parentation hall , from Parentation “funeral speech”, “funeral speech”) the deceased are laid out before burial. Different uses have led to different designs for the morgues.

Mortuary at the cemetery in Vrin .
Architect: Gion A. Caminada
Mortuary of the Vorwerker cemetery in Lübeck (1906)

graveyard

Morgues are mostly located in cemeteries . A transfer to a morgue may only take place if the death has been determined with certainty by the examination of the corpse . In 1791 Germany's first morgue was built in Weimar , inspired by the respected doctor Christoph Wilhelm Hufeland . A morgue was also opened in Berlin in 1795. At the beginning of the 19th century, the construction of further morgues began, for example in 1805 in Mainz, 1808 in Munich, 1828 in Frankfurt am Main and 1830 in Eisenach. The reasons, in addition to the increasing fear of being buried alive in the 18th century, are to be found in the increased hygienic awareness of the time. Too many possibilities of infection were associated with laying out in private rooms and the spread of epidemics in this way was great. The use of morgues was initially voluntary. The situation was different with contagious diseases such as dysentery , smallpox , scarlet fever , cholera or diphtheria . In many cases, this resulted in forced deliveries to the morgues. For practical reasons, too, the laying out of the deceased in a morgue or cemetery chapel finally prevailed: Since the cities had grown rapidly since the mid-19th century, the distance between the deceased's home and the cemetery became so great that the funeral procession was too long In many cases, the living conditions also no longer allowed laying out in the apartment for reasons of space. In the meantime, the mentality in dealing with death has also changed, for the relatives it is usually no longer imaginable to live for several days with a deceased person in the apartment.

Often the morgues are connected to a hall for the funeral ceremony , in which relatives and friends can say goodbye to the deceased.

Criminology

The first step in investigating violent crimes is identifying the victim. In the 19th century, the bodies of unknown murder victims began to be brought to a central cold store , the so-called municipal morgue. In this, relatives and acquaintances can identify the still unknown person and give him his name back. After the identity and cause of death have been determined , the remains are released for burial .

The first building built specifically for this purpose was the morgue opened in Paris in 1864 on the Quai de l'Archevêché, initially accessible to everyone. Due to the influx of onlookers, Police Prefect Louis Lépine took measures in 1907 to prevent bystanders from entering the premises. This functional morgue des Quai de l'Archevêché - which moved to today's forensic medicine institute (Institut medico-légal) in 1913 - was preceded by two other public places in which the corpses of people who died and drowned on the street were taken, examined and shared with them Clothes were put on public display in the hope that the public would induce their identification (see: The Stranger from the Seine ). The first, already called Morgue, had been in the Grand Châtelet since at least 1718 and was described by Heinrich Sander in his diary kept during his trip through France in 1776, the second was housed from 1804 in an old slaughterhouse in Marché-Neuf, converted in 1836.

The crumbling morgue of the Flensburg-Mürwik naval hospital in winter 2015.

medicine

It is not always possible to cure patients in hospitals. Therefore, morgues also exist in hospitals. Corpses are also opened in hospitals and medical faculties for training, investigating the cause of death and researching human anatomy . This takes place in a special building or part of a building. This is divided into two sections: the refrigerator and the dissecting room. The deceased can be stored in the cold store for several days, rarely years, if they have to be examined in the pathology department .

See also

literature

  • A. Hinterberger: Some things about morgues . In: The Architect. Viennese monthly books for construction and decorative arts . Volume 7.1901. Schroll, Vienna 1901, pp. 9–12. 
  • Barbara Happe: Order and hygiene. Cemeteries in the Enlightenment and the Communalization of the Cemetery System. In: Working group cemetery and memorial: Space for the dead. Braunschweig 2003 ISBN 3-87815-174-8
  • Christoph Wilhelm Hufeland: About the uncertainty of death and the only infallible means to convince yourself of its reality and to make it impossible to bury alive; along with news of the construction of a morgue in Weimar. Weimar 1791.

Web links

Commons : Morgues  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Wiktionary: Mortuary  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations
Wiktionary: Morgue  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. Zeno: Parentation Hall. Retrieved September 6, 2017 .
  2. ^ Manfred Wenzel: Morgues. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin and New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , p. 836 f.
  3. ^ The Morbidity of the Paris Morgue , accessed December 31, 2012
  4. ^ Building description , in the Centralblatt der Bauverwaltung , No. 39, September 27, 1884, p. 399 and 400, accessed on December 31, 2012
  5. See entry morgue in the Dictionnaire de l'Académie , 1718
  6. Heinrich Sanders description of his travels through France, the Netherlands ... , 1st part, Friedrich Gotthold Jacobäer and Son, Leipzig, 1783, p. 35 ( online )
  7. L'Institut médico-légal à travers les âges , Préfecture de Police de Paris ( online ) (English)
  8. Permalink Austrian Library Association .  - text online. ( ANNO ).