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{{trope}}
[[File:Rites_921Rites 921.jpg|frame|Giving dues: [[Star Trek: The Next Generation|Klingons howling to the afterlife to warn of a warrior's approach]], [[Return of the Jedi|Luke burning Vader's body on a pyre]], [[Six Feet Under|a typical Christian burial service]]]]
 
{{quote|''And such were the funeral rites of Hector, tamer of horses.''|'''[[Homer]]''', ''[[The Iliad]]''}}
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One mark that distinguishes humans from nonhumans - aside from elephants - is that humans have funeral rites; they regard something as due to the dead and have for a long time. Indeed, since burials leave archeological evidence, we know that they occurred as long as 300,000 years ago, as a practice among the Neanderthals.
 
Unsurprisingly, this has been incorporated in art as a trope, as a mark of character, and is [[Older Than Feudalism]]. '''Evil''' characters will violate proper treatment of a corpse by mutilating, reanimating, or even eating the dead, though [['''Due to the Dead]]''' is one of the most common [[Even Evil Has Standards|standards villains maintain]]. '''Good''' characters will (rarely!) do the same to a dead [[Complete Monster]] or the like, but usually are marked by their proper respect for the dead, down to even letting [[Revenge]] end when the villain is dead; if they have to destroy bodies to contain a plague, or display it to prove that he is really dead, they will often find it [[Dirty Business]].
 
Even when you put [[The Fun in Funeral]], and [[Hilarity Ensues]], the humor tends to be dark and the characters nasty.
 
A wide variety of practices are possible, as in [[Real Life]]. Cremation and burial are the most common, but such practices as exposing to the dead to vultures and other unusual methods can be done in fiction as in life. Even slicing up the body -- usuallybody—usually regarded as mutilation and proof of evil -- hasevil—has been done in [[Real Life]] as a means to free the soul from the body and has featured so in fiction. Preserving parts (usually bones) of the dead can be the mark of a [[Necromancer]] or of respect, depending on how used; see the [[Sub-Trope]] of [[Dead Guy on Display]].
 
One funeral practice, however, will put the characters on the evil side, no matter how respectfully they carry it out: [[Human Sacrifice]].
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However, no matter how beloved the dead, excessive mourning may be decried. Ghosts may complain that it is keeping them from peace, or characters may be criticized for neglecting their duties to the living.
 
Observing this may be necessary to prevent [[Our Ghosts Are Different|ghosts]] or other forms of [[The Undead]] -- which—which may take the form of an [[Indian Burial Ground]].
 
'''[[No Real Life Examples, Please]].'''
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All alone the grave I made, and all alone the tears I shed
And all alone the bell I rang, and all alone the psalm I sang'' }}
* In the [[Child Ballad]] ''The Unquiet Grave'', the true love is mourned for a year and a day -- thoughday—though after that time, the dead have a new demand:
{{quote|''[[A Year and a Day|The twelvemonth and a day]] being up,<br />
The dead began to speak:<br />
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* Done very well in ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Mirage|Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles]]'' (original Mirage continuity) Volume 4 with the death of {{spoiler|Splinter from old age}}. His funeral is very simple and his body is laid in a casket, drifted onto a lake and set alight.
* Played with in one [[Wolverine]] story, in which a trio of generic bad guys hunt him down [[They Have the Scent|with dogs]]. First he runs then, when an [[Innocent Bystander]] is killed in the crossfire, he slaughters them. He then takes a while to dig graves before he moves on... and is shown placing the two dogs' collars and the bystander's hat on the three graves, and leaving the dead men for the scavengers. (Interesting side note, this particular story wasn't written by a Marvel writer, but rather by a fan who entered it in "Write an Issue of Wolverine" contest the company held.)
* In ''[[Booster Gold]]'', Booster's motive for pulling up his socks was to pay tribute to [[Blue Beetle]]. Later, in a scene where he returned to Blue Beetle's funeral, Booster got up to eulogize him, and was unable to speak. [[Tears of Remorse]] ensued: what sort of friend would be unable to pay his [[Due to the Dead]]?
* In the ''[[Usagi Yojimbo]]'' story "Broken Ritual" (plot by [[Sergio Aragones]]), a village is haunted by the ghost of a general whose ''[[Seppuku]]'' attempt is interrupted by a squad of enemy soldiers. The ghost is exorcised when Usagi waits for its next appearance and helps complete the ritual.
* A disturbing example happens in ''[[Sin City]]'' in which Kevin, the cannibal serial killer keeps his victims' heads mounted on the wall in his basement. At first, this could be seen as trophies but since his surrogate father mentioned he was filled with guilt, it may have different connotations.
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* In "[http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/cinderella/stories/birch.html The Wonderful Birch]", after a [[Wicked Witch]] had [[Involuntary Transformation|turned the mother into a sheep]], [[Grand Theft Me|taken on her shape]], and gotten the father to agree to kill the sheep, the daughter tells the mother that, and the mother tells her not to eat any part of her, but to bury her bones. A birch tree grows from her grave and helps the daughter.
* In [[The Brothers Grimm (creator)|The Brothers Grimm]]'s "[http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/authors/grimms/47junipertree.html The Juniper Tree]" and [[Joseph Jacobs]]'s "[http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/hanselgretel/stories/rosetree.html The Rose Tree]", when the stepmother kills the stepchild, the little half-sibling refused to eat the dish she makes of it, and buries the bones.
* In "[http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/firebird/stories/birdgrip.html The Bird Grip]", the hero arranges for a man's burial and acquires a fox companion -- whocompanion—who reveals, in due course, that he is a ghost.
** More fairy tales of this type are found [http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/type0505.html here].
 
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== Legends & Myths ==
* In Norse legends, Skald or Scef [[Moses in the Bulrushes|drifted ashore as a child]] and became king. When he died many years later, his people sent back to sea on a ship laden with treasure -- describedtreasure—described as not less than he had been sent with.
 
 
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* In [[J. R. R. Tolkien|JRR Tolkien]]'s Middle-earth, people generally try to give the dead as adequate a funeral as possible with the means at hand, be it a burial, a cairn, or something else, and bemoan the fact if the dead had to go unburied. In ''[[The Lord of the Rings]]'', having no other options, they put {{spoiler|Boromir's}} body in a boat and send it down a waterfall, as the river would keep the orcs from it.
** In the Appendices, Tolkien recounts the story of a battle after which the dwarves had to cremate their dead, being too numerous to bury them in the traditional stone tombs, and earth burials being unacceptable. As a consequence, to say of one's father that "He was a burned dwarf" came to be a boast that he had fought and died in this battle.
** It's made very clear that in the eyes of Men, Orcs do ''not'' merit [[Due to the Dead]]: at one point the characters encounter a battlefield where the victorious Rohirrim have piled the vanquished Orcs' bodies up and burned them, leaving an Orc's severed head on a spike. (It's interesting to compare this to Tolkien's depiction of the siege at Minas Tirith, where the bombarding of the fortress with severed ''human'' heads is portrayed in very emotive terms as a particularly horrifying and barbaric act.)
*** And Orcs don't practise [[Due to the Dead]] either; as well as the example cited above, one reason why Saruman fails to beguile Theoden in the chapter "The Voice of Saruman" is that the King is irate about the mistreatment of doorwarden Hama's corpse in the Helm's Deep battle.
** In ''[[The Silmarillion]]'' heroes like Tùrin Turambar are given great burial mounds. In "The Akallabêth" Númenórëans start to build great tombs for their dead after their decline and fall to pride.
* In [[Ben Counter]]'s ''[[Grey Knights]]'', Alaric gets permission to go where {{spoiler|Ligeia}} died in order to say a prayer commending her soul to the Emperor.
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* In the medieval [[Chivalric Romance]] ''Sir Amadas'', Sir Amadas pays a dead man's debts so that he can be buried. A White Knight appears to help him. After Sir Amadas has married a princess, the knight reveals that he is the ghost of the dead man, come to aid him as a reward for his deed.
* In [[Sandy Mitchell]]'s [[Ciaphas Cain]] novel ''Caves of Ice'', Cain has to tell the troopers they cannot return with the body of a fallen soldier but must destroy it. Even Cain seems [[Dirty Business|disturbed]] by the necessity; recording it, decades later, causes him to reflect sadly on the number of dead he knew, and whom no one else would remember as soon as he died.
** In ''Death and Glory'', Felicia Tayber carefully lays a vox communicator to rest -- outrest—out of respect to its machine spirit.
* In [[James Swallow]]'s [[Blood Angels]] novels, ''Deus Encarmine'' begins on, and ''Deus Sanguinius'' ends on, shrine worlds that the Blood Angels have dedicated to the graves of their dead. In between, Rafen goes to personally pay his respects to the dead {{spoiler|Koris}}; the chaplain permits it, because while he carries out the proper rites, he is aware that many wish to do such for their friends. {{spoiler|Rafen, [[Talking to the Dead]], [[Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane|has Koris's communicator fall to his hand]]. He uses it, though aware that using a dead man's equipment is forbidden except under the gravest of circumstances; when he confesses to this, his superiors are grave, even though they concede that it was the gravest of circumstances and they must put the question aside until those circumstances are dealt with.}} Later, he goes to the ship to personally write {{spoiler|Koris's}} name in the Book of the Fallen, which is usually done by the Sanguinary Priests, but is sometimes done by [[Fire-Forged Friends|friends]] -- and—and it's done in their own blood.
** In ''Red Fury'', a Blood Angel whose forbidden experiments had unleashed mutants was executed, and at the suggestion that his geneseed be removed, Rafen orders him merely cremated, as part of his sentence; later, Rafen and his squad are awe-struck to be in the presence of Sanguinius's tomb and are willing to fight to the death to protect it from mutants, and afterward, one of them is [[Dirty Business|troubled]] that their Chapter Master opened the doors to let the mutants in, though it was necessary; and votive rolls hang in the Blood Angels chapel for all who died in the defense of the tomb, regardless of chapter, and though no one but Blood Angels had received that honor in living memory, it is nonetheless regarded as fitting, because they all died in defense of their common primarch's tomb.
** In ''Black Tide'', Rafen and his companions must leave a body, having not a grenade to burn it. Rafen assured him, dying, that he would tell his brothers that he lived to see the death of his foe.
** In "The Returned", Tarikus, who had wondered why he was forgotten, sees he was properly commerated with rites for the dead -- whichdead—which is a problem, since his Chapter holds that ghosts do not walk their citadel. {{spoiler|Once declared free of taint, his first act is to break the memorial and use the knife there to cross out his name.}}
* In [[Andre Norton]]'s ''[[Witch World]]'', when Simon Tregarth is told that Koris went to bury the two men who died in the shipwreck, he feels ashamed of himself for not realizing that [[A Father to His Men|Koris]] would do that.
** In ''The Year of the Unicorn'', the Were-Riders laid out Herrel and Gillian's bodies with all honor -- excepthonor—except their spirits made it back and revived themselves. Herrel is unmoved; they never respected him like that when he was alive.
** In '''Ware Hawk'', the heroine nearly stops to bury the dead before going on because they had found one survivor who had to take precedence.
** In ''Ice Crown'', the heroine sees the queen and her attendants in full mourning. Her ability to describe this clinches the accuracy of the vision in question.
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* In [[Plato]]'s ''Phaedo'', when Crito asks Socrates how they should bury him, Socrates jests that they will have to catch him to do that, and then explains that they can't bury him, but only his corpse.
{{quote|''Be of good cheer, then, my dear Crito, and say that you are burying my body only, and do with that whatever is usual, and what you think best.''}}
* In [[H. Beam Piper]]'s ''[[Little Fuzzy]]'', a human kills one of the Fuzzies and claims she was just an animal and attacked him. Then the other Fuzzies gather up her body, dig a grave, and gently bury her. A policeman who arrived in time to see the burial -- andburial—and took off his beret in respect until it was over -- takesover—takes this as evidence that the human should be arrested for murder.
* In [[Lois McMaster Bujold]]'s ''[[Vorkosigan Saga|The Warrior's Apprentice]]'', [[Miles Vorkosigan]] insists on burying {{spoiler|Sergeant Bothari}}'s body in a grave he dug himself. He explains to his mother that {{spoiler|Bothari}} told him that "blood washes away sin," and he feels responsible for the death, so he literally works until his hands bleed.
** Cordelia's relative silence is interesting, given that {{spoiler|''she'' was the one who told Bothari that, in a very different context--to help him recover after he'd saved her life by killing his sadistic commander.}}
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*** When Miles burns an offering to his grandfather (with a bit of [[Rage Against the Heavens]], as he's including his proof that he graduated the military academy, and yells "Are you happy now?");
*** An attempt to burn an offering to the same infant in ''Memory'' helps spark Miles's recovery from his life going off-kilter;
*** We hear in ''Komarr'' that prior to that book, Miles went with Duv Galeni to burn an offering at the site of the Solstice Massacre--whereMassacre—where Duv's aunt died, and for which Miles's father was (mostly unjustly) blamed.
** ''Cetaganda'' takes place during the funeral rites of the Empress Dowager of Cetaganda. Miles and Ivan were sent to pay proper respects.
** In ''Civil Campaign'', after some advice from Cordelia, Ekaterin gets Miles to agree to a small wedding: since she's a widow, they would have to wait for a large one.
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* In [[Dan Abnett]]'s [[Gaunt's Ghosts]] novel ''Sabbat Martyr'', Gaunt insists on a naalwood coffin for {{spoiler|Corbec}}.
** In ''Blood Pact'', the planet's major industry is commerating the dead. Gaunt muses on why Ayatani Zweil is their chaplain; a big reason is his care for [[Dying Alone|the dying]] and the dead. Later, Gaunt proves his identity by recounting how he had covered {{spoiler|Sturm}}'s face with a cloth after his death, as a mark of respect. Eyl contemplates how he must treat a dead man's mask with respect, to appease the ghost and the spirits. And at the end {{spoiler|Dorden asks Gaunt to have his body brought back to a chapel and buried there}}.
* In [[Dan Abnett]]'s ''Malleus'', [[Eisenhorn]] at the end recounts the funeral rites for all those who died at the climax -- variedclimax—varied, because of their varied cultures.
** Ranging from a vast library and institution dedicated to the name of one veteran inquisitor, to a single small headstone in a lonely, wind-swept mass grave for a Cadian Inquisitor. (It's a planet where ~90% of the population are in the military, and the graves are exhumed once the names are too weathered to read, to make room for more. Quite a depressing contrast.)
* In [[Stephen Hunt]]'s ''The Court of the Air'', after a tortured and murdered steam man was thrown into the river, his body was retrieved and given funeral rites before King Steam. Steam men's true names can be pronounced at these rites, though otherwise they remain unknown except to the bearer and King Steam. Thereafter they are recalled in the hymns of their people. When Slowstack laments that the steammen will not believe how the Hexamachina chose him, Molly promises to [[Famed in Story|tell his story in penny dreadfuls]] to make them.
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* In [[Ben Counter]]'s ''[[Soul Drinkers]]'' novel ''Chapter War'', the Howling Griffins have the names of their dead engraved on the wall and carefully kept illuminated at all times.
* In the ''Last Chancer'' novels, Colonel Schaeffer scrupulously pardons all the dead of his penal legion. Not only does it give their families succor, it frees their souls before the Golden Throne.
* [[William Faulkner]]'s ''[[As I Lay Dying]]'' -- the—the entire plot
* In [[Marion Zimmer Bradley]]'s [[Darkover]] novel ''The Spell Sword'', Damon regrets the dead bodies left out on the road; Ellemir consoles him with a proverb to the effect that if they are in Heaven, they cannot be grieved by it, and if they are in Hell, they have too much else to grieve for.
* In [[C. S. Lewis|CS Lewis]]'s ''[[The Great Divorce]]'', one damned woman grieved so excessively over her dead son -- keepingson—keeping everything in his room the same, etc. -- that her husband and daughter revolted. She is convinced that this was merely proper mourning.
* Jane Yolen's ''The Cards of Grief'' depicts a culture where commemorating the dead ''is'' the central practice. (The corpses of the dead are exposed, and eaten by vulture-like birds.)
* In ''[[Animorphs]]'', when the Andalites recover {{spoiler|Rachel's}} body, they wrapped it up in a soft cloth as a gesture of respect, before bringing it back for {{spoiler|Cassie and Naomi}} to identify. Compare to Visser Three, who {{spoiler|killed his enemy, Elfangor, by EATING HIM.}}
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** Colonel Strum tells van Droi that the men who died in a tank that fell over a cliff will be properly commerated.
** When his squad admit to Wulfe that they knew about the [[Dead Person Conversation]] that saved their lives, and that [[Remember That You Trust Me|they were hurt that he didn't trust them with it]], one says that they could have joined him in praying for the dead man.
* In Matt Farrer's "After Desh'ea" (in the [[Horus Heresy]] book ''Tales of Heresy''), Angron is enraged that he cannot get dirt from where he lost to add to his "rope" -- how—how can he properly commerate the dead?
* In C. S. Goto's [[Blood Ravens]] trilogy, Jonas characterizes the rite "Beacon Psykana" as an honor paid to the dead.
* In ''[[Dune]]'', the Fremen place the bodies of the dead into machines which render them down and recover their body's water, which is then added to the tribe's stockpiles. This is regarded as not only practical (since water is so scarce on Arrakis that to let the water in a corpse go to waste is pointlessly foolish) but also a way of honouring the fallen Fremen, since they get to continue to serve the tribe even in death. It is considered a particular honour to be allowed to take the water of a non-Fremen, and the Fremen often dishonour enemies by either slitting their throats (thus wasting their water) or otherwise not reclaiming it since it is their way of saying that a fallen foe's water is not worthy of being drunk by the Fremen.
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* [[Nero Wolfe]] by [[Rex Stout]]:
** When Nero's friend Marko is murdered at the beginning of "The Black Mountain", Wolfe asks the coroner for permission to honor an old promise he'd make Marko. When permission is given, Wolfe places two small coins on his friend's eyes. (He then heads off to Montenegro to hunt down the murderer, but that's [[Revenge|a different trope]].)
** In ''Fer-de-lance'' when Maria Maffei goes to Wolfe to ask him to find her missing brother, she tells him that she has over a thousand dollars saved up, and that if he finds Carlo alive she will pay him all of it, but if Carlo is dead, she will pay less, because "First [she}] will pay for the funeral." Wolfe not only considers this perfectly reasonable, he commends her for it and says she is "a woman of honor".
** In the novella "Cordially Invited To Meet Death", (published in the [[Omnibus]] volume ''Black Orchids'') Wolfe sends a spray of extremely rare <ref>only three plants exist</ref> black orchids to the funeral of a client whose murder he could not prevent.
* In [[Karl May]]'s travel Story "Durchs Wilde Kurdistan" (Through the wild Kurdistan), a religious leader of zoroastric sect is killed and everybody helps in building a cairn, sort of, to bury him. This includes the very pious muslim Hadschi Halef Omar, the servant, protector and friend of Karl May.
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* In Suzanne Collins's ''[[The Hunger Games]]'', Katniss adorns {{spoiler|her ally Rue's corpse}} in wildflowers. Considering the blasé way the tributes' deaths are usually treated, this also serves as a wicked [[Take That]] to the Capitol, humanizing the fallen competitor in the normally disconnected Games.
* In [[John C. Wright]]'s ''[[Chronicles of Chaos|Orphans of Chaos]]'', Quentin insists on burying bodies properly.
** In ''Fugitives of Chaos'', Morpheus [[Talking in Your Dreams|recounts]] how he has performed, over the eons, the rites for his knights who died in the war -- andwar—and how an enemy tried to incite his vassals to revolt, even though it would result in the death of Morpheus's son, with the promise that the son would receive full honors.
** In ''[[Hermetic Millenium|Count to a Trillion]]'', this is the one element of religion that Menelaus admires.
* In [[Dan Abnett]]'s [[Horus Heresy]] novel ''Horus Rising'', the planet Murder had trees on which the aliens threw dead bodies before they ate them. One Marine was so horrified by the desecration of the corpses that he blew up some trees.
* In Andy Hoare's [[White Scars]] novel ''Hunt for Voldorius'', the White Scar scouts find unburied bodies and are distressed by the lack of respect for the dead; one wishes to bury the dead -- evendead—even hesitating over a direct order -- andorder—and his sergeant admits they should, but they cannot.
* In [[Homer]]'s ''[[The Iliad]]'', Patrocles's funeral -- andfuneral—and Hector's, once Achilles gave it up.
** Achilles abuses and mangles the corpse of Hector after killing him, in revenge for the death of his friend/lover Patroclus, making this [[Older Than Feudalism]]. Achilles' attempt to mutilate Hector's corpse by dragging it behind his chariot three laps around the city was stopped by the [[Classical Mythology|Greek Gods]] themselves, who used their powers to keep the body untouched. They don't agree on much else, but proper treatment of the honorable dead is very high on their standards of behavior.
* In [[Robert E. Howard]]'s [[Conan the Barbarian]] story "[[Iron Shadows in the Moon|Shadows in The Moonlight]]", in [[Dreaming of Times Gone By|Olivia's dream]], the [[Physical God]], [[You Are Too Late|arriving too late]] to save his son, retrieves his body.
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** [[Proud Warrior Race|Klingons]] will hold open the eyes of a dying warrior and howl at the moment of death as a warning to the afterlife. After keeping watch over the body for a night (to protect it from predators), once the spirit has had time to make the trip to Stovakor, they then just dump the body, believing it to be an empty shell, but will celebrate the honorable dead with feasting, drinking and singing.
** One species on ''[[Star Trek: Voyager|Star Trek Voyager]]'' reproduce by reanimating the dead as members of their own race. Harry Kim becomes angry when he discovers they did this to the body of his love interest; her alien "father" is equally angry that they would have just "abandoned" her into space.
** The Romulan comander in "Balance of Terror" orders the dead Centurion's body dumped into space along with a bunch of debris to [[Playing Possum|make it seem that his ship has been destroyed]] -- but—but he is clearly distressed about it, and [[Talking to the Dead|asks his late friend to forgive him]].
* ''[[Rome]]'' has several accurate representations of ancient Roman funeral customs. Niobe is cremated and her ashes buried. Caesar is, of course, burned on a huge pyre in the Forum. Eirene asks not to be burned, but buried with hers and Pullo's child, which he does. Pullo later strangles Gaia after she confesses to killing Eirene, and Pullo unceremoniously dumps her body in the river, thus condemning her spirit to unrest.
** Also, after the conquered leader of the Gauls is finally executed during Caesar's Triumph, his body is unceremoniously dumped, but we see some Gauls living in Rome retrieve it, dress it and burn it on a pyre hidden in the woods somewhere.
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* ''[[Warhammer 40000]]'' Space Marines go to great lengths to recover their dead brothers, and the individual chapters have additional and often elaborate practices to remember their dead. However, the body itself is not really important, the important things are the progenoid glands, that generate and store the geneseed necessary to create new Space Marines, and the expensive and in some cases outright irreplacable weapons and armor.
* Not a burial place, but the "San Angelo" setting for 4th edition [[Champions]] has the Liberty Square plaza. Memorials to several fallen heroes, including the WWII-era team the Liberty Corps, are placed here. Most supers in San Angelo, regardless of where they fall on the hero - villain scale, refuse to fight here out of respect to the dead.
* ''[[Exalted]]'' presents a strong incentive to give proper [[Due to the Dead]], since failure to provide proper rites will usually anger the corpse's Hungry Ghost (one of the person's souls that remains behind to protect the body) and send it on a rampage. In certain areas, it's also possible to encounter a person's [[Our Ghosts Are Different|other ghost]], who will also likely be pissed off if they didn't receive a proper funeral.
 
 
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** Oswald in ''[[King Lear]]'', after being mortally wounded by Edgar:
{{quote|''Slave, thou hast slain me: villain, take my purse:
If ever thou wilt thrive, [[Due to the Dead|bury my body]];'' }}
** ''[[Julius Caesar (theatre)|Julius Caesar]]'', after Brutus dies, his enemies, Antony and Octavian agree on giving him a respectful burial.
{{quote|'''Octavius:''' According to his virtue let us use him
[[Due to the Dead|With all respect and rites of burial]].<br />
Within my tent his bones to-night shall lie,<br />
Most like a soldier, order'd honorably. }}
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** Visiting the blasted ruins of Trabia Garden in ''[[Final Fantasy VIII]]'' can be a [[Tear Jerker]] if you take the time to visit the makeshift graveyard, and speak to the NPCs whose friends perished in the attack.
** In ''[[Final Fantasy IX]]'', Black Mages are typically mindless automatons crafted from the supernatural Mist. Thus, the few that have achieved sentience have no concept of death, only that their friends have "stopped moving." One of them buries his friend in the ground in hopes that he'll wake up soon, and thinks of washing him at the river when he does.
** In ''[[Final Fantasy X]]'', people killed in the midst of tragedy or negative emotions run the risk of becoming Fiends. Therefore, Summoners are entrusted with the task of the Sending --castingSending—casting their souls to the Farplane to find peaceful rest. [[Tear Jerker|One of the most striking scenes in the game]] involves Yuna performing a Sending for the innocent victims of [[Eldritch Abomination|Sin]]'s rampage on the little town of Kilika.
* At the end of ''[[Halo 3]]'', the game shows the Pelican wing that has been improvised into a memorial with the number "117" marked on it in tribute to the Master Chief (MIA).
* In ''[[Jeanne D'Arc]]'', the final scene post-credits is of {{spoiler|Jeanne and Roger visiting Domremy's chapel to pray for Liane's soul}}.
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* [[Tear Jerker|The funeral of]] {{spoiler|[[Sacrificial Lion|Shinjiro Aragaki]]}} in ''[[Persona 3]]''. Although the school's headmaster and a few schoolmates couldn't care less for the person (and get called out on it by the heroes,) {{spoiler|Akihiko}}'s [[Crowning Moment of Heartwarming|visit to the memorial is one of the most poignant scenes in the franchise]].
* The Nobodies of ''[[Kingdom Hearts]]'', pitiable creatures who vanish into nothingness upon death, erected monuments called "Proof of Existence" in the deepest sanctum of their fortress, simply so they could be remembered. The fact these monuments are shaped like gravestones and slabs, bearing their owner's description and [[Weapon of Choice]], is no coincidence.
* In a somewhat odd reversal of this trope ''[[Skies of Arcadia]]'' has the [[Big Bad]] Galcian killing off [[Worthy Opponent]] Gregorio after the latter performs a [[Heel Face Turn]] to let the heroes escape. Galcian orders the corpse preserved and shipped back to Valua -- theirValua—their homeland, which he just defected from -- forfrom—for a proper burial, stating to the soldier responsible that the corpse is more valuable than the man's own life.
* In ''[[Ace Combat]] 5'', an allied flight performs a missing man flyby over the November City after {{spoiler|Chopper}} is shot down.
* You can save two little orphan ghosts who died during a town's flood by getting their orphanage master to bury their bones in ''[[Jade Empire]]''.
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* After being killed by monsters, {{spoiler|Briggs is buried at sea}} in ''[[Golden Sun: Dark Dawn]]''.
* Dwarves in ''[[Dwarf Fortress]]'' get unhappy thoughts if their dead pets or comrades are left to rot. {{spoiler|In more recent updates, dwarves that didn't receive a proper burial or memorial now come back as ghosts to haunt the living.}}
* An [[Blue and Orange Morality|odd]] version of this appears in ''[[Dragon Age II]]''. The Qunari don't have traditional funeral rites because they believe that once a person dies the body is just a piece of rotting flesh and nothing more -- itmore—it isn't that person anymore. They treat the fallen's ''swords'' with much more respect since they believe that their swords are manifestations of their souls. In Act III {{spoiler|after you foil the Qunari invasion}} a Qunari asks you to retrieve several lost Qunari blades so that he may return them to their homeland. Do this without asking for money in return and he thanks you by giving you your own personal Qunari weapon and tells you to treat it as your own soul.
* In ''[[Darwinia]]'', if you see a bunch of Darwinians get killed, chances are pretty good that you'll see a bunch of kites launched as the souls drift upwards off the playing field.
* In ''[[No More Heroes]]: Desperate Struggle,'' Travis refuses to let Sylvia and company "clean up" the body of the third-ranked assassin, a cosmonaut who had returned to Earth for the first time in decades. Travis insists that he be left where he is, to be with the Earth he had so missed, [[Together in Death|finally with her once more in death.]]
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** Indeed, more generally this trope is a persistent theme in horror films. One example: ''[[The Amityville Horror]]'', where the basis for the haunted nature of the house is (eventually) revealed to be the fact it was built on an ancient [[Indian Burial Ground]].
*** Not ''just'' an [[Indian Burial Ground]], but one used for Indians who were [[Ax Crazy|insane]] or had some lingering illness. And then later it was used by [[Evil Sorceror|devil worshipping witches]]. And ''then'' [[Too Dumb to Live|someone built a house there]].
* In ''[[The Searchers]]'', one of the big clues that Ethan Edwards is [[Anti-Hero|not John Wayne's usual role]] is the scene where he uncovers a dead Comanche warrior and shoots his eyes. As he explains, the Comanche believe that you need your eyes to enter the spirit world -- byworld—by shooting the eyes out, he'd just condemned that warrior to wander the Earth as a ghost.
* ''Charade'' plays this semi-humorously: Audrey Hepburn is attending the lying-in-state of her husband when three former associates show up, one by one. One begins sneezing violently, causing the widow's best friend to remark that he must've known the dead man very well: he's allergic to him. Another holds a mirror to the corpse's nostrils to check for breathing. And the third slams open the church door, strides in fiercely, and jabs a pin into the dead man's hand. Audrey's wide-eyed look is hilarious.
* The eponymous [[Predator]] prizes the skulls of worthy prey as valuable trophies, honoring their prey/victim in a bizarre inversion of the trope.
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** In ''Two Towers'' when Theoden throws off Saruman's enchanting voice, he cites the mutilation of Hama's corpse (along with the [[Children Are Innocent|dead children]]) as proof that Saruman does not deserve peace.
* In [[Dan Abnett]]'s [[Gaunt's Ghosts]] novel ''Ghostmaker'', patrolling Ghosts find one of their number not only dead but mutilated.
** In ''Blood Pact'', Chaos forces unpack; they had used corpses and blood to seal up what they shipped -- someshipped—some of it inside the corpses. Later, Gaunt recounts how Slaydo's body had been mutilated after his death.
* In L. M. Montgomery's ''Emily of New Moon'' books, the founders of a family, a couple, were immigrating, until the woman declared that she would not get back on the ship: "Here I stay." When she died, her husband had it written on her gravestone. (His family have therefore made it a rule that you ''never'' hold grudges against the dead, and always attend the funeral and the like.)
* In [[Andre Norton]]'s ''The Time Traders'', the prehistoric tribe is set to cremate their chief with great honor. Too great: they intend to kill Ross Murdock on it as a sacrifice.
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** He likely recognizes that it's how Fereldens honour their dead and believes that the respect should be given, regardless of how it's done.
* Some of [[Big Bad|Harbinger's]] lines in ''[[Mass Effect 2]]'' involve leaving the dead where they fall, in addition to [[Large Ham|yelling]] about how [[We Have Reserves]].
** He will also command his [[Mook|mooksmook]]s to try to preserve Shepard's body. It is doubtful that he simply wants to give [[Worthy Opponent|Shepard]] a proper burial.
* Some ''[[Left 4 Dead]]'' players amount {{spoiler|using Bill's gun off his dead body}} to this.
* [[Played for Laughs]] with [[Duke Nukem]], who even shits down a dead alien's neck.
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