You've been had. Read "The American Way Of Death" by one of the Mitford sisters. My dad wanted a plain pine box. Was told by the funeral company it wasn't possible. That was in 1970. Since then, it is not only possible, but they're still making a profit (which is the underlying motive) on coffins. I checked and a plain pine box was $1600???????

Regulations and laws are one thing. Cemetery requirements as private property owners are another. It gets complicated. the general idea behind some of the laws was to keep groundwater safe. That has in turn segued into yet another quagmire. On your own property, you can have a "green" burial. There are cemeteries as indicated, that are promoting this.

At least the US has space for cemeteries. Europe has long had rental of burial spaces followed by whatever after the time period is up and I do mean whatever, and that has been since the Medieval period.

Lyle Browning

On Sep 9, 2014, at 4:26 PM, Craig Kilby <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Martha,
> 
> MOST interesting. I was under the impression that embalmment was required by law, regardless. Please expound on this. 
> 
> A good non-Jewish friend of mine (now dead) once said she was going to specify that she NOT be embalmed (for her own reasons), but I never asked if that was really an option. Is there a religious exemption to this law? If so, we've all been had by the funeral directors lobby!
> 
> Craig
> 
> On Sep 9, 2014, at 4:16 PM, Martha Katz-Hyman wrote:
> 
>> Just a note on this from the Jewish perspective, since that seems not to
>> have come up yet in this discussion.
>> 
>> Traditional Jewish burial in this country is usually in a plain pine/wood
>> coffin with no embalming except in relatively rare cases, and the same with
>> vaults, except where the water table requires. Bodies are wrapped in
>> shrouds within the coffin. In Israel, bodies are laid to rest directly in
>> the ground, wrapped in shrouds.
>> 
>> These two websites might be useful to those interested in learning more.
>> https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/death.html
>> http://myjewishlearning.com/life/Life_Events/Death_and_Mourning.shtml
>> 
>> Martha Katz-Hyman
>> Curator
>> Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation
>> Williamsburg, VA
>> 
> 
> ______________________________________
> To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe please see the instructions at
> http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html

______________________________________
To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe please see the instructions at
http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html