[Funeral rites in memory of the elderly].

This a phenomenologial study rites in the memory of elderly people, originated from the discomfort lived by the authors in their professional life dealing with death and dying. Verbal information from elderly people was collected with the objective of recovery and decoding mortuary rites. Nine themes originated from these informations: feelings and meanings in relation to death, the time of death, the annunciation death, the body's preparations, the watcher, the funeral procession, the grave, the return to home, the remembered death. The results gave the authors opportunity to understand better the attitudes of health professionals in caring for patients and their families in this existential experience of to-be-for-death. The death rationalized by scientific knowledge and nonpersonal technological care hides new rites, transmuted by new representations which the society built.