in antiquity, a kind of officers in the eastern church, whose business was to inter the dead.

Ciaconius relates, that Constantine created 950 fos- saries, whom he took out of the divers colleges or com- panies of tradesmen: he adds, that they were exempted from taxes, services, burdensome offices, &c.

F. Goar, in his notes on the Greek Euchologion, in- simulates that the fossarii were established in the times of the apostles; and that the young men, who carried off the body of Ananias, and those persons full of the fear of God who interred St Stephen, were of the num- ber.

St Jerome assures us, that the rank of fossarii held the first place among the clerks; but he is to be understood of those clerks only who had the direction and inten- dence of the interment of the devout.