Burial in the vicinity of holy shrines, particularly in Najaf and Karbala, was a well-established religious practice that held a special place among many Shiite Muslims for many centuries. With the development of modern means of transportation, the process of transporting the dead to these two cities now takes only a few hours. However, this reality raises an important historical question: How were the dead transported to Najaf and Karbala before the emergence of modern means of transportation, when journeys took days, and perhaps weeks, along caravan routes? An answer to this question can be found in the accounts of a number of travelers and Orientalists who visited Iraq during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Their memoirs constitute important sources for the study of social and economic life, as they contain direct observations of customs, traditions, and patterns of everyday life. Among the most notable of these accounts is that recorded by the Frenchwoman Jane Dieulafoy during her journey from Baghdad to Hillah in 1881. She provided a detailed and moving description of the phenomenon of transporting the dead for the purpose of burying them in the holy shrines. Dieulafoy mentions that, upon nightfall, she and her companions arrived at the (Caravanserai) Birunos /Bir Younis Khan, located halfway between Baghdad and Hillah. Because of the severe cold weather, the caravan decided to spend the night inside the khan. There, she was surprised by a scene she had not expected, describing it as follows: “The weather was cold, so we took refuge inside the khan. There were bundles about two meters long lying in irregular heaps along the walls, filling the adjoining arches next to where we had pitched our camp. We were told that they belonged to Shiite pilgrims who had arrived before us, and that they had been left in our care and under our trust. How immensely proud I would have felt of this proof of confidence, had it not been for the fact that a foul smell was emanating from these bundles! Curiosity seized me, and I touched the bundles with my hand; horror! I am not dreaming, they are corpses! Some were wrapped in carpets and tied with ropes like sausages, while others were lying in wooden boxes through whose ill-fitting planks the corpses of their owners could be seen.” She continues her description, saying: “From all parts of Persia and even from India, the Shiites transport their dead to be buried in the lands surrounding the shrine of Hussein ibn Ali; thus, my neighbors were these newcomers. Despite all my respect for these traveling mummies, my heart could not bear to spend the entire night beside them, so we moved our belongings and pitched our tents outside, without being able to escape the foul breaths that emanated from inside the khan with the evening breezes.” This testimony reveals that the transportation of the dead to Iraq was not limited to Iraqi cities and villages, but also included distant regions such as Persia and India, where corpses were transported within overland caravans and stopped at the khans spread along the route to rest before continuing their journey toward the holy cities. The account also highlights the role played by the khans as logistical stations serving travelers, pilgrims, and those transporting the dead at a time when transportation depended on pack animals. Another later testimony by the American historian and archaeologist James Henry Breasted, who visited Iraq in 1920, confirms this phenomenon. On April 4, he took a photograph of a man transporting a corpse to Najaf and attached the following caption to it: “I saw a man carrying a corpse wrapped in reeds, balancing it on the front of his saddle while securing it behind him. He was riding a small horse that swayed beneath its weight. Transporting corpses in this manner was common in the region, as corpses were brought from places both near and far to be buried in Najaf at the shrine of Imam Ali.” Breasted’s photograph is particularly important because it provides visual evidence of the continuation of this practice into the early twentieth century. It also illustrates one of the methods used to transport the dead, as the corpses were wrapped in reeds and secured to the backs of pack animals during long journeys. This is consistent with what European travelers had described in previous decades. The testimonies of Dieulafoy and Breasted highlight the religious status that the cities of Karbala and Najaf held in the hearts of Shiite Muslims, prompting large numbers of them to endure the hardship and expense of long journeys in the hope that their dead would be laid to rest beside the holy shrines. These two testimonies also constitute important sources for understanding one of the social practices in Iraq that continued until the beginning of the twentieth century, before automobiles and modern means of transportation brought about a radical transformation in the methods of transporting the dead to the holy cities. Asst. Prof. Dr. Angham Salim Mohammed – Asst. Lect. Ammar Mohsen #Al-Mustaqbal University – The first private university in Iraq”