in Roman antiquity, gladiators who fought about the bustum or funeral pile of a person of distinction, that the blood which was spilt might serve as a sacrifice to the infernal gods, and render them more propitious to the manes of the deceased. This custom was introduced in the room of the more inhuma... BUT

BUSTUM, in antiquity, denotes a pyramid or pile of wood, whereon were anciently placed the bodies of the deceased, in order to be burnt.

The Romans borrowed the custom of burning their dead from the Greeks. The deceased, crowned with flowers, and dressed in his richest habits, was laid on the butum. Some authors say, it was only called butum, after the burning, quae bene utrum; before the burning it was more properly called pyra; during it, rogus; and afterwards, butum. When the body was only burnt there, and buried elsewhere, the place was not properly called butum, but ufrina, or ufrinum.