In many cultures, funeral have significant and particular definition. What common for several on them is the celebration while the difference will be the way they celebrate. Back to my country and my region (West Cameroon), funerals are ceremonies organized by the family after one year. These “small funerals” mark the end of the mourning period and the joyful celebration of the deceased.
They consist of two stages: a short ceremony first makes it possible to remember with pain the one who is celebrated that day; then come the expected rejoicings: banquets and dances serve by their abundance the future veneration of the deceased. To show that he was a “great man” is a condition of access to his ancestrally. At the end of these “small” funerals, alive and dead are appeased. The living no longer cry for their departed, and the latter feels warmly accompanied on his journey to ancestral life.
A few years after the “small funerals”, the “big funerals” take place. When the funeral is celebrated, the head of the deceased is detached from the skeleton and is deposited in a canary (sort of terracotta pot). The dead thus reach the world of the ancestors only after a ritual development, which includes, again, three reversals: the designation and the enthronement of their successor, the funerals that jointly exalt their mortal memory and their status immortal ancestors, finally the separation of the head of the body that disjoins the ancestor of the dead.
Funerals therefore mark the return to a normal order of the world. Death does not prowl any more, since the dead is no longer dead, his successor is appointed, and the void left is filled. The deceased returns to the status of ancestor.
On my side, this weekend I was assisting my friend for his latter dad “big funerals”. His brother was chosen as the successor.
Thank you for reading.
Do you organize funeral ceremony in your country?
Can you share with us some pictures and a little history behind it?