Buzz
Death is inevitable, and for most, it means resting in a coffin or urn. However, as Halloween nears, the coffin transforms from a grim symbol of mortality to a stylish resting place for vampires or a prop for zombies to emerge from. This season, let’s explore some historical slang terms for coffins that you might find fitting for the spooky festivities.
Chicago Overcoat
In the slang of Chicago’s mob scene, an overcoat wasn’t something you wore—it was a coffin, often linked to watery graves. According to Green’s Dictionary of Slang, a Chicago overcoat refers to sealing bodies in cement before dumping them at sea. Raymond Chandler referenced it in his 1937 novel, The Big Sleep: ‘Go ahead and blast and see what it gets you.’ ‘A Chicago overcoat is what it would get you, little man.’ Meanwhile, a Chicago piano (or devil’s piano) was slang for a Thompson sub-machinegun, a weapon favored by Chicago mobsters and possibly the last thing you’d see before getting your Chicago overcoat.
Wooden Overcoat and Pine Overcoat
The term wooden overcoat, which feels more intuitive as slang for a coffin compared to Chicago overcoat, originated in the late 19th century. Variations of this phrase exist, such as an 1890 example from an Illinois newspaper: “I joined the Democratic cause at 15, and my commitment will only end when I don my pine overcoat and stop troubling my neighbors.” The phrase pine overcoat still appears occasionally, as evidenced by a 1996 mention in Denver Westword: “Williams was destined for a pine overcoat long before fate would claim someone more virtuous.”
Wooden Doublet
This term, which cleverly combines coffin materials with clothing, appears in Theodosius Forrest’s 1761 work Ways to Kill Care: “Where to find a caretaker for the crying child, should father ... suddenly find himself in a wooden doublet.” (In modern terms, we might humorously refer to a coffin as “the ol’ wooden windbreaker.”) Interestingly, wooden doublet can also refer to human flesh, as seen in this chilling 1794 example: “Our mortal flesh, a sort of Jack-in-the-box, encased in a wooden doublet so snug that it appears alive to all.”
Wooden Kimono
If overcoats and doublets don’t appeal to you, consider this culturally questionable term, which emerged around 1911 and was featured in Mezz Mezzrow and Bernard Wolfe’s 1946 book Really the Blues: “I thought the man would show up ... with his measuring tape to fit me for a wooden kimono.”
Six-foot Bungalow
This lively expression, originating in 1920, initially described a grave, as seen in this example from the San Antonio Evening News: “We believe in giving flowers before death, rather than waiting until they dig the ‘six-foot bungalow’.” By the 1930s, it had also become slang for a coffin.
Meat Basket and Cold Meat Box
According to Green’s, meat basket is defined as “a portable wicker ‘coffin’ used to transport a body to the morgue.” R.L. Bellem used the term in his 1943 work Speed Detective: “A team of morgue workers placed him in a wicker meat basket.”
A related term from the early 1800s is cold meat box, one of many phrases derived from cold meat, which refers to “a corpse.” (We strongly recommend avoiding calling a wake a “cold-meat party.”)
While many coffin terms are euphemistic, these two are dysphemistic. Dysphemisms are the opposite of euphemisms, being blunt and uncomfortably direct, such as referring to a cigarette as a “coffin nail.”
Scold’s Cure
Even coffins weren’t free from sexism. As noted in Green’s, the term scold’s cure, meaning “funeral or coffin,” reflected “the sexist idea that only death could quiet a nagging woman.” The phrase nap the scold’s cure meant “to be laid to rest in a coffin.”
Pillbox
This playful term, defined by the OED as “something likened to a pillbox, especially in size, such as a tiny or cramped space, vehicle, etc.; something trivial or insignificant,” was once used as slang for a coffin in T.C. Haliburton’s 1840 work The Clockmaker: “Neatly tucked away in a snug pill-box in the same cemetery.” That’s a rather snug arrangement for eternity.
Eternity Box
On the topic of eternity, this coffin-related term originates from Francis Grose’s Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, an early slang dictionary from the late 1700s. It offers a unique perspective on coffins, quite different from the next term.
Bone Box and Bonehouse
Initially recorded in Grouse’s dictionary, bone box referred to the mouth. However, by the time it appeared in the 1976 Sydney Slang Dictionary, it had taken on a new meaning: “The Parson is on the highfly in a fantail banger and a milky mill toy. He got the cant of togs from a shickster whose husband’s in a bone-box. [translation] The ‘Parson’ is begging as a poor gentleman in a long broadcloth coat and a white shirt. He convinced a lady, whose husband is buried, to part with her clothes.” A coffin can also be referred to as a “bonehouse” (a term previously used for a mortuary). Like the meat-related terms, these bone-centric expressions lean toward the blunt and uncomfortably direct side of dysphemisms.
Dead Wood
This term offers a fitting twist to the HBO series. Dead wood emerged in the mid-1800s and was featured in Francis A. Durivage and George P. Burnham’s 1846 book Stray Subjects, Arrested and Bound Over in poetic verse: “I no longer ply the trade / I once did before they prepared my bed / With pickaxe and spade, / And I was carried to my final resting place, / And laid in the dead wood.”
