parapets walls or banks used to screen troops from frontal enemy fire, sometimes placed along the top of a rampart.
interment the act of interring; burial.
bier a platform or portable framework on which a coffin or corpse is placed.
heady impetuous; rash; willful.
cortege a ceremonial funeral procession.
palpable clear to the mind; obvious; evident; plain.
legates governors of Roman provinces, or their deputies.
inviolable not to be violated; not to be profaned or injured; sacred.
derided laughed at in contempt or scorn; made fun of; ridiculed.
appease to pacify or quiet, esp. by giving in to the demands of.
pre-empted seized before anyone else can, excluding others; appropriated beforehand.
curvets in equestrian exhibitions, a movement in which a horse rears, then leaps forward, raising the hind legs just before the forelegs come down.
guile slyness and cunning in dealing with others; craftiness.
impiously not piously; specif., in a manner lacking reverence, respect, or dutifulness.
