Dressing a deceased woman in her Doodshemd is a funerary custom from the Netherlands.
Do you know: The Doodshemd, also known as ‘lijkhemd’, is a special nightdress worn by a woman on her wedding night.
Placing white sheets on the windows of a house where someone has recently died was a common custom in the Netherlands, to ward off evil spirits. If a woman passed away, she was dressed in her Doodshemd in which she’d have initialled her name using a single needle and thread. It would be kept away after the wedding night and removed only when the lady passed away. The needle was buried with the deceased or burnt in a fire.
