What is a mortcloth?



A mortcloth, or pall, is a funeral cloth used to cover a coffin in the funeral ceremony or the deceased prior to burial.  The deceased’s family usually rented a mortcloth from the local church and after each use, the fabric was washed and readied for use again.  The word comes from the Latin word “pallium” meaning cloak.

The Mortcloth case of 1792 begins:  “For many centuries, and probably up to the 20th, the Church of Scotland was the sole supplier of mortcloths.  As the name would suggest, they were cloths used to cover the dead prior to burial, and after use, were washed ready for rehire. The Church hired these for a few pence, or in some cases loaned out these cloths, until the time of the funeral. The revenue raised by this service, typically around £40 pa, was distributed to the poor of the parish at frequent intervals.”  In the late 1780’s a local Society of Colliers decided to purchase and rent out their own mortcloths preventing the local church from making revenue from the rentals.  (You can read the whole story here)

Morthcloth rental lists were kept and these lists may be used as sources for family history information.  There are 147 keyword results for mortcloth in the Family Search Catalog (1/23/2014)  here:
Heritage Services has copies of the Abbey Parish of Paisley mortcloth records covering the period 1759-1819, currently being indexed, containing the record payments for morthcloths.  here



Sources: 
Collins, Audrey “ Lesser Known Sources for Births, Marriages, and Deaths in the British  Isles” lecture, 3/20/2013 (Church History Museum)
Wikipedia:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pall_%28funeral%29
Greater Liberton Heritage Project, John Rennie, 2005, “The Mortcloth Case of 1792” http://www.greaterlibertonheritageproject.co.uk/story-library/the-mortcloth-case-of-1792

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