FOSSARII, in antiquity, a sort of officers in the eastern church, whose business it was to inter the dead.
St Jerom assures us, that the rank of the fossarii held the first place among the clerks: but he is to be understood of those clerks only who had the direction and intendance of the interment of the devout. Some authors insinuate, that the fossarii were instituted in the time of the apostles.