A bone house born of necessity — ossuaries arose when medieval graveyards ran out of room, turning exhumed remains into architecture.
A container, room, or building for holding the bones of the dead, especially after exhumation from a primary burial.
From Late Latin ossuarium meaning charnel house, from Latin os (genitive ossis) meaning bone Key roots: *h₃ost- (Proto-Indo-European: "bone").
The Sedlec Ossuary near Prague contains the bones of approximately 40,000 people, arranged into elaborate decorations including a chandelier containing every bone in the human body. The practice of creating ossuaries arose from a practical problem: medieval churchyards ran out of burial space, so bones were exhumed and stored to make room for new burials.