Alternative Container: An unfinished wood box or other non-metal receptacle without ornamentation, often made of fiberboard, pressed wood or composition materials, and generally lower in cost than caskets. 

Casket/Coffin: A box or chest for burying remains. 

Cemetery Property: A grave, crypt or niche. 

Cemetery Services: Opening and closing graves, crypts or niches; setting grave liners and vaults; setting markers; and long-term maintenance of cemetery grounds and facilities. 

Columbarium: A structure with niches (small spaces) for placing cremated remains in urns or other approved containers. It may be outdoors or part of a mausoleum. 

Cremation: Exposing remains and the container encasing them to extreme heat and flame and processing the resulting bone fragments to a uniform size and consistency. 

Crypt: A space in a mausoleum or other building to hold cremated or whole remains. 

Disposition: The placement of cremated or whole remains in their final resting place. 

Endowment Care Fund: Money collected from cemetery property purchasers and placed in trust for the maintenance and upkeep of the cemetery. 

Entombment: Burial in a mausoleum. 

Funeral Ceremony: A service commemorating the deceased, with the body present. 

Funeral Services: Services provided by a funeral director and staff, which may include consulting with the family on funeral planning; transportation, shelter, refrigeration and embalming of remains; preparing and filing notices; obtaining authorizations and permits; and coordinating with the cemetery, crematory or other third parties. 

Funeral Planning Society: See Memorial Society. 

Grave: A space in the ground in a cemetery for the burial of remains. 

Grave Liner: cover that fits over a casket in a grave. Some liners cover tops and sides of the casket. Others, referred to as vaults, completely enclose the casket. Grave liners minimize ground settling. 

Graveside Service: A service to commemorate the deceased held at the cemetery before burial. 

Headstone: A grave marker or monument marking the gravesite. 

Interment: Burial in the ground, inurnment or entombment. 

Inurnment: The placing of cremated remains in an urn. 

Mausoleum: A building in which remains are buried or entombed. 

Memorial Service: A ceremony commemorating the deceased, without the body present. 

Memorial Society: An organization that provides information about funerals and disposition, but is not part of the state-regulated funeral industry. 

Niche: A space in a columbarium, mausoleum or niche wall to hold an urn. 

Urn: A container to hold cremated remains. It can be placed in a columbarium or mausoleum, or buried in the ground. Vault: A grave liner that completely encloses a casket