We may have a long tradition of taking about death, and reflecting upon it in our poems and songs, but it took until 2023 before Ireland opened its first museum focused on death.

“It’s the only one in Ireland dedicated to the history and tradition of funerals,” says Cliona Purcell, head curator of the Irish Wake Museum, adding that the idea had been in gestation for some idea, with the idea of adding a companion museum to Waterford’s Museum of Time.

“For when time runs out,” says Purcell.

But it took until 2023 for the museum to open.

“It’s quite quirky,” says Purcell, adding that it appeals to fans of dark tourism, which is a growing trend focused on visiting places traditionally associated with death and tragedy, and the macabre. Think of the Paris catacombs, or Belfast’s Titanic museum, or the 9/11 museum in New York.

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“It’s the element of tourism that’s about peeking behind the curtain from the nice side of things,” says Purcell. “People are looking for slightly darker stuff sometimes.”

Waterford may be the only Irish museum dedicated to our funeral rites, but it isn’t the only one in the world. In Vienna the Funeral Museum at the Austrian city’s Central Cemetery gives insights into the funeral and cemetery culture of past centuries, and