Forms: 4–5 fertre, (5 fiertre, feretre, fe(e)rtir, -yr, fertur(e, feratour), 5–6 fertour, feretorye, (6 fer(t)ter, fereture, -tery, fer(r)etorie, 8–9 fer(r)etry, 8– feretory. [The current form is a perversion (by assimilation to various names of objects used in ritual) of ME. fertre, a. OF. fiertre:—L. feretrum, ad. Gr. φέρετρον, f. φερειν to bear.]

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  1.  A portable or stationary shrine, often made of or adorned with costly materials, in which were deposited the remains or relics of saints; a tomb.

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c. 1330.  R. Brunne, Chron. (1810), 36.

                He tok vp the bones,
In a fertre tham laid a riche for the nones.

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c. 1375.  Sc. Leg. Saints, Clement, 919.

        Quhene þe pupule come to se
His fertyre, & til hyme pray.

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1483.  Caxton, Gold. Leg., 156/4. His bones there leyde in a worshypful fiertre or shryne.

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1535.  Stewart, Cron. Scot., III. 92.

        Of Sanct Thomas translatit wer the bonis
Intill ane ferter that tyme fra his graif.

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1593.  Rites & Mon. Ch. Durh. (Surtees), 58. A most sumptuous and goodlie shrine above the High Alter, called the Fereture.

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1709.  Hearne, Collect. (Oxf. Hist. Soc.), II. 261. The Jewells & other Reliques belonging to St. Cuthbert’s Feretory the richest in all this land.

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1762.  H. Walpole, Vertue’s Anecd. Paint. (1765), I. i. 19. Porphyry stones for Edward the Confessor’s feretory.

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1844.  Lingard, Anglo-Sax. Ch. (1845), II. ix. 80. The coffin was then brought from the feretory.

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1863.  Sir G. G. Scott, Glean. Westm. Abb. (ed. 2), 130. We are totally without means of forming any authentic idea of the exact form of the golden feretory that was placed above the marble and mosaic base.

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  2.  In etymological sense: A bier.

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c. 1400.  Maundev. (1839), xxi. 225. Thei setten hem upon a blak Fertre.

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1458.  Will of Duchess Exeter (Somerset Ho.). I … forbede … any … solempne Hers or Ferture.

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1513.  Douglas, Æneis, VI. xv. 68.

        How mony fertyris and dule habitis schyne
Sall thow behald.

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a. 1572.  Knox, Hist. Ref., Wks. (1846), I. 259. I [an idole] was fast fixed with irne nailles upon a barrow, called there fertour.

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1848.  B. Webb, Continent. Eccles., 16. It being within the octave of SS. Peter and Paul, a relic of the patron saint was exposed on a feretry in the nave.

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  3.  A small room or chapel attached to an abbey or a church, in which shrines were deposited.

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1449.  Will Sir W. Bruges, in Illust. Mann. & Exps. (1797), 133. In the middle of the feretorye a gret round blak corver.

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1480.  Caxton, Chron. Eng., cclxi. The feratour of the abbey of Westmestre.

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1593.  Rites & Mon. Ch. Durh. (Surtees), 5. The Shrine of the holy and blessed man Saint Cuthbert within the Feretory.

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1727.  Dart, Canterb. Cathedr., 33. The lesser Armary … contain’d nothing but the Body of St. Blaise, being rather a Feretry than Store-room.

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1860.  Hook, Lives Abps., I. vii. 382. He [Odo] was taken up in his leaden coffin, and placed in the feretry of S. Dunstan.

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  4.  attrib., as feretory-aisle.

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1489.  Churchw. Acc. St. Margaret’s, Westminster (Nichols, 1797), 3. Lady Jakes for her grave in the feretre isle 7s. 4d.

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1853.  Rock, Ch. of Fathers, III. x. 409. The feretory aisle.

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