Photo by Andreas Brunn on Unsplash
When someone dies in Irish culture, the traditional response has been to gather—not to hide death away or to process grief privately, but to bring the community together around the deceased, to maintain vigil over the body, to grieve communally, to eat and drink together, to share stories and memories. This gathering, called a wake, has been central to Irish death ritual for centuries, and while modern funeral practices have changed, the wake remains an important element of how Irish communities process death and support those who are grieving.
The wake is not merely a funeral service or a brief gathering at the graveyard. Traditionally, it’s an extended vigil, often lasting through the night or multiple nights, during which the body is kept in the home, visible to those who come to pay respects. During the wake, community members gather, engage in conversation and sometimes in ritualized keening (wailing and lamentation), share food and drink, tell stories about the deceased, and create space for grief to be expressed and witnessed. The wake transforms death from a private family tragedy into a communal event, making the death real for the entire community and ensuring that the deceased is properly honored and remembered.
Understanding the wake provides insight into how Irish culture approaches death—not as something to be hidden or avoided, but as a significant community event. The wake reveals values about community responsibility, about the importance of ritual, about honoring the dead, and about how grief is shared and processed collectively. For Americans interested in Irish heritage and culture, understanding the wake offers not only cultural insight but also a different model for how communities can respond to death and loss.
The Historical Development: The Wake Through Time
The Irish wake as a formalized practice likely developed over centuries, though its exact origins are not entirely clear. References to wake-like practices appear in medieval Irish texts, though these accounts may describe practices that look somewhat different from the wakes of later centuries. What’s clear is that by the early modern period, the wake was an established and widespread practice in Irish culture.
In medieval and early modern Ireland, the wake involved the body being kept in the home, with community members gathering to watch over it, to pray for the deceased’s soul (in Christian contexts), and to participate in ritualized mourning. In some accounts, wakes involved multiple nights of vigil, with the community taking turns watching the body. Keening women would wail and lament. Food and drink would be provided. The atmosphere was simultaneously solemn (because of the death) and festive (because the community was gathered and eating together).
The history of the wake is also tied to the history of Irish Catholicism. As Ireland became Christian, the wake was incorporated into Christian funeral practice, reinterpreted as a prayer vigil for the soul of the deceased. Priests would lead prayers; the community would recite the rosary. The explicitly pagan elements of pre-Christian wakes (if they existed) would have been replaced or reinterpreted through a Christian lens. Yet the basic structure—community gathering, extended vigil, keening and lamentation, shared food and drink—persisted, now framed within Christian understanding of death and afterlife.
By the 19th and 20th centuries, the wake was a firmly established Irish tradition, practiced widely across rural Ireland and maintained in Irish-American communities. The wake was understood as essential to the proper treatment of the deceased and to the processing of grief by the community. To not hold a wake, or to hold an inadequate wake, was understood as failing in one’s obligation to the deceased and to the community.
The Traditional Wake: Structure and Elements
A traditional Irish wake, as practiced particularly in rural Ireland through much of the 20th century, followed a consistent structure and included recognizable elements:
The body: The deceased was laid out in the home, typically in the best room. The body would be washed, dressed in best clothing (often religious clothing, such as a habit), and prepared with care. The body would be visible to those coming to pay respects. The presence of the visible body was central to the wake—it made the death undeniably real and created a focal point for the gathered community.
The vigil: Community members would gather and maintain vigil over the body, often through the night or over multiple nights. The vigil involved prayer (particularly the rosary, recited collectively), conversation, and watching. The vigil was understood as keeping the deceased company, supporting the family, and praying for the deceased’s soul.
The keening: Skilled keening women would engage in ritualized wailing and lamentation. As discussed in a previous article on keening, the keen was a formalized artistic expression of grief that transformed private sorrow into communal acknowledgment. Other family members and community members might join the keening, adding their voices to the expression of grief.
Food and drink: The wake involved feasting—traditionally, particular foods would be served, and drink (particularly whiskey or tea) would be provided. The feasting served multiple purposes: it expressed hospitality to those gathered, it provided sustenance for those keeping vigil, it created a festive atmosphere that acknowledged both the solemnity of death and the pleasure of community gathering, and it sometimes involved specific ritual foods associated with the wake.
Stories and conversation: During the wake, people would share stories about the deceased—their achievements, their character, funny incidents from their lives, their relationships with others. This storytelling served to honor the deceased by ensuring their life was remembered and their memory was preserved. It also served to teach younger people about the deceased and to reinforce community bonds and shared memory.
Games and entertainment: In some accounts, wakes included games, music, or other entertainment. While this might seem incongruous with the solemnity of death, it reflects an understanding that the community gathering was both about grief and about affirming life and community bonds.
Prayers and religious elements: In Christian contexts, the wake included prayers, particularly the rosary (repeated prayer using prayer beads). Priests might come to lead prayers. The wake was understood as both a community gathering and as a religious prayer vigil for the deceased’s soul.
The funeral procession: At the conclusion of the wake, the body would be taken to the church for a funeral mass, and then to the graveyard for burial. The funeral procession would be a community event, with many people following the body to the grave, affirming the deceased’s importance and the community’s participation in ensuring proper burial.
The Functions of the Wake: What It Accomplished
Beyond its literal function of keeping vigil over the body and performing funeral ritual, the wake served multiple important functions:
Processing grief: The wake provided a structured context for community members to express and witness grief. The ritualization of grief through keening, through prayer, through storytelling, through gathering itself, allowed grief to be expressed publicly and to be witnessed by others. This communal witnessing of grief can be psychologically significant, as it validates and honors the grief being experienced.
Honoring the deceased: The wake ensured that the deceased was honored, that their life was remembered, that they were not simply disposed of but were properly acknowledged and mourned. The community’s gathering was a way of saying: this person mattered; their death is significant; we will take time to honor them.
Supporting the bereaved: The family’s loss was witnessed and supported by the community. The presence of community members, their participation in the vigil, their offers of food and help—all of these were ways the community supported the family in their grief. The burden of grief was shared rather than borne by the family alone.
Affirming community bonds: The wake brought the community together around a shared event. People who might not otherwise gather would come together to participate in the wake. Bonds of kinship, friendship, and community obligation were affirmed through participation.
Ritualizing the transition: Death represented a significant transition—from life to death, from presence to absence, from the deceased being part of the living community to being part of the remembered dead. The wake provided ritual structure for this transition, making it a community event rather than a private tragedy.
Ensuring social memory: Through the stories told at the wake, the deceased’s life was preserved in community memory. Younger people learned about the deceased and about community history. The wake ensured that the dead were not forgotten but remained present in communal memory.
The Modern Wake: Continuity and Change
In contemporary times, the wake has evolved significantly while maintaining core elements. Modern Irish wakes often differ from traditional wakes in several ways:
Duration: Traditional wakes often lasted through multiple nights. Modern wakes are typically shorter, often lasting a single evening or night, or sometimes just a few hours.
Location: Traditionally, the wake took place in the deceased’s home with the body present. In many contemporary contexts, the wake takes place in a funeral home or funeral parlor, with professional funeral directors managing the arrangements. Some traditional home wakes continue to be practiced, particularly in rural areas and in more traditional communities.
Professionalization: The involvement of professional funeral directors in contemporary funerals represents a significant change from traditional practice. The body is cared for by professionals rather than by family members. The funeral arrangements are handled by professionals rather than by the community. This professionalization changes the character of the wake, making it more organized and controlled, but potentially less participatory than traditional wakes.
Keening: The practice of ritualized keening has largely disappeared from contemporary wakes, though emotional expression and crying are still present. The formalized artistic expression of grief has been replaced by more spontaneous expressions of emotion.
Prayer and religious elements: In Catholic contexts, the rosary and prayers remain part of the wake, though they may be less central than in traditional practice. In secular or less religious contexts, the religious elements may be reduced or absent.
Food and drink: The feasting element of the wake often continues, though in modified form. In funeral homes, this might involve refreshments provided in a viewing room. In home wakes, the traditional practice of providing food and drink for the gathered community often continues.
Community participation: The extent of community participation varies. In tight-knit communities, wakes may still draw large numbers of people who feel obligated to attend. In more anonymous urban contexts, attendance at wakes may be limited to family and close friends.
Despite these changes, core elements persist: the gathering of community, the visible presence of the body (in most cases), the expression of grief, the sharing of stories, the support of family by community. The wake continues to serve similar functions in contemporary Irish culture, though in modified and adapted forms.
The Irish-American Wake: Continuity Across the Atlantic
Irish immigrants brought the wake tradition to America, and it persisted in Irish-American communities. The Irish-American wake often adapted to American contexts while maintaining core Irish elements. Irish-American funeral practices sometimes integrated American funeral home practices (body viewing in funeral parlors) with Irish elements (gathering, sharing food, storytelling).
In contemporary Irish-American communities, the wake tradition continues to be practiced, though it varies by community and by individual family tradition. Some Irish-American families maintain wakes that closely resemble traditional Irish practice. Others have integrated American and Irish traditions. Still others have adopted more standard American funeral practices while maintaining some Irish cultural elements.
For Irish-Americans, the wake tradition remains an important way of maintaining connection to Irish heritage and culture. The practice of gathering to wake the dead, of sharing stories, of supporting the bereaved through community presence—these continue to be valued as distinctively Irish elements of funeral practice.
The Wake’s Psychological and Social Significance
From a contemporary psychological and social perspective, the wake represents a sophisticated understanding of grief and loss. The structured gathering, the visible presence of the body, the ritualized expression of grief, the communal witnessing and support—all of these elements address genuine psychological and social needs around death and grief.
Contemporary grief counseling and thanatology (the study of death) increasingly recognize that:
Community support is essential for healthy grief processing. Isolating the bereaved or discouraging communal response to death can be psychologically harmful. The wake’s emphasis on community gathering and support addresses real needs.
Ritualization of grief provides psychological containment. Structured ritual provides a form for grief, allowing it to be expressed and witnessed in a manageable way. Without ritual, grief can feel overwhelming and uncontainable.
Seeing the body and having tangible rituals helps people accept the reality of death. Modern medical practice often separates people from the body and minimizes death-related ritual, which can actually complicate grief and delay acceptance of death.
Storytelling and memory-keeping are important for integrating loss. By telling stories about the deceased, the bereaved help process the loss and integrate it into their ongoing understanding of life and self.
The presence of others in grief is healing. Grief, while often experienced as isolation, is also shared human experience. Community witness and support can be deeply meaningful and healing.
In these respects, the traditional wake—even if not consciously designed with psychological understanding—addressed genuine human needs around death and grief. It’s notable that as modern Western culture has moved away from communal death rituals and has emphasized private processing of grief, depression, anxiety, and complicated grief have increased. Whether these phenomena are causally related is debated, but there’s reason to think that the ritual structures of wakes and similar practices may serve important psychological functions.
Conclusion: The Wake as Expression of Values
The wake, in its traditional forms and in its contemporary adaptations, represents a distinctive approach to death and grief rooted in Irish cultural values. The wake emphasizes community over individual isolation, ritual over spontaneity, honoring the dead over ignoring death, shared grief over private processing, and the integration of death into community life rather than the sequestration of death away from ordinary life.
For Irish people and for Irish-Americans, the wake tradition remains an important way of honoring the dead and supporting the bereaved. For those interested in Irish culture and heritage, understanding the wake provides insight into Irish values, into how Irish communities understand death and grief, and into the role of ritual in human experience.
The wake also offers something valuable to broader American culture and to other Western cultures that have largely abandoned ritualized approaches to death. The wake demonstrates that communities can respond to death in ways that honor the deceased, that support the bereaved, that bring community together, and that help people integrate death into their lives. As contemporary Western culture increasingly questions whether our medical and funeral industry approaches to death serve genuine human needs, the example of the traditional wake offers a model of how community, ritual, and honest engagement with death might work.
Whether practiced in traditional form or adapted to contemporary contexts, the wake remains a significant element of Irish culture, a practice that honors the dead, supports the bereaved, and affirms community bonds in the face of loss.
Author: jonathan
Jonathan is the publisher of Irishtopia.net, Anglotopia.net, and Londontopia.net. He's passionate about travel and learning about other cultures. He's been to Ireland several times, and uses his travel expertise for Irishtopia!
