embalm
Other forms: embalmed; embalming; embalms
To embalm is to prepare a body for a funeral or burial. Part of a funeral director's job is to embalm the bodies of people who have died.
Various traditions of death and burial require a dead body to be preserved with chemicals, and when someone does this, she's said to embalm the body. Occasionally, there are also medical research or educational reasons to embalm a body. Embalm has an Old French root, embaumer, "preserve a corpse with spices."
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preserve a dead body
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Vocabulary lists containing embalm
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