Meaning & use
pall bearer
Last updated
Meaning
nouncountable
A person who helps carry a coffin at a funeral or walks beside it as an honor.
Grammar: Countable: a pall bearer, six pall bearers.
Patterns
- serve as a pall bearer
- a pall bearer for someone
He was honored to be a pall bearer at his grandfather's funeral.
Six pall bearers lifted the coffin and carried it slowly to the hearse.
The family asked an old friend to be a pall bearer.
Word forms
| plural | pall bearers |
|---|
Common combinations
- serve as a pall bearer
- She agreed to serve as a pall bearer for her uncle.
- honorary pall bearer
- An honorary pall bearer walks beside the coffin without carrying it.
- act as pall bearer
- His sons acted as pall bearer at the service.
- chosen as a pall bearer
- He was chosen as a pall bearer by the family.
- pall bearer duties
- Pall bearer duties include lifting the coffin steadily.
Synonyms and how they differ
- coffin bearer
- Coffin bearer is a plain description of the same role, while pall bearer is the traditional term.
- mourner
- A mourner is anyone attending to grieve, but a pall bearer has the specific job of carrying the coffin.
- usher
- An usher guides guests to seats, while a pall bearer helps carry the coffin.
Word family
- pall noun
- a cloth spread over a coffin
- pallbearer noun
- the usual one-word spelling
- funeral noun
- a ceremony for a dead person
- casket noun
- a coffin, especially in American English
Commonly confused: pall bearer or pole bearer? pall bearer or pall?
pall bearer vs pole bearer
A pole bearer carries a pole or banner, which is a different job. The word pall in pall bearer refers to the cloth over a coffin.
pall bearer vs pall
Pall also means to become boring (the excitement began to pall), which is unrelated to the funeral cloth.
Practice
What does a pall bearer do?
Choose one answer.
A pall bearer helps carry the coffin. Reading a eulogy, playing music and collecting flowers are other funeral roles.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “pall bearer”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.