The Guild of Embalmers and Gravediggers maintains civic cemeteries and burial grounds for the Directorship. Over the years the guild has also invested funds in the purchase of vacant plots adjacent to the new City cemetery, which members have made into private burial grounds.

This guild has monopoly on the legitimate disposal of corpses within the Free City. Only when a certificate confirming the death and burial of a citizen is issued by the guild and delivered to the office of the Inspector of Taxes, Glodreddi Bakkanin will the name of that citizen be struck from the census register (and a guild roll, if applicable) and the person cease to be eligible for taxation. It is therefore very important that the relatives of the deceased ensure that a body is passed onto the guild to avoid further tax demands (for which the immediate family will be responsible). The guild’s certificate is the only proof of death that the Greyhawk Revenue Service will accept, and it is not unknown for unscrupulous members of the guild to sell these certificates to healthy citizens.

The present Guildmaster, Selczek Gobayuik, is a half-orc with great relish for his chosen profession. Preferring to dress in thick black robes, Selczek is unspeakably ugly, even for a half-orc. The social acceptability accorded to other Guildmasters has eluded Selczek — a guest who reeks of embalming fluid ceases quite rapidly to be a novelty at society cocktail parties, and perhaps he shows a little too much professional zeal in measuring up potential clients when they are all too fit and healthy. Conversational gambits such as a fixed glare and an utterance of “Didn’t I stuff your uncle last month?” also fail to increase Selczek’s appeal. The half-orc and his wagon-load of coffins and ghoulish apprentices also have an whenever there is a serious accident in the city, and he is well known for his dislike of priests and their nasty habit of healing and curing people. Despite his considerable wealth, Selczek still lives over his store in the seamier part of the River Quarter.

The Dead Do Not Rest. Easy Graverobbing is a constant menace in Greyhawk — prevalent even in such a great place as the Free City, because there is no shortage of evil people within the walls and certainly no shortage of corpses. Even for everyday citizens who never get into life-threatening situations, the average life expectancy is not very high-and then there are the unlucky and the impetuous (adventurers, for the most part) who enter the city, or Castle Greyhawk, and never leave….

Carl Sargent and Rik Rose. Greyhawk Adventures, Folk, Feuds, and Factions. 1989

Gem of the Flanaess