property comparative-law death
In which countries does the body of the dead become property of someone?
<p>It's been claimed <a href="https://politics.stackexchange.com/a/33859/18373">on politics SE</a> that the body of the dead becomes the property of his family. No country was specified, but is there really a country where this happens? </p>

<p>In the US, Pennsylvania specifically, the court in <a href="https://www.ravellaw.com/opinions/02fa7f5db6683f6f58a6477a390ca680" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Pettigrew v. Pettigrew</a>, 207 Pa. 313 says that</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>the law rec­ognizes property in a corpse, but property subject to a
  trust and limited in its rights to such exercise as shall be in
  con­formity with the duty out of which the rights arise.</p>
</blockquote>

<p><a href="https://casetext.com/case/larson-v-chase" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Larson v. Chase</a>, 47 Minn. 307 likewise states</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>in this country it is, so far as we know, universally held that those
  who are entitled to the possession and custody of it for purposes of
  decent burial have certain legal rights to and in it, which the law
  recognizes and will protect. Indeed, the mere fact that a person has
  exclusive rights over a body for the purposes of burial leads
  necessarily to the conclusion that it is his property in the broadest
  and most general sense of that term, viz., something over which the
  law accords him exclusive control.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>This is in contrast to the English legal tradition where the church has jurisdiction over a corpse, giving rise to a doctrine that a corpse is not property, citing a dictum from Lord Coke that</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>It is to be observed that in every sepulchre that hath a monument two
  things are to be considered, viz., the monument, and the sepulture or
  burial of the dead. The burial of the cadaver that is <em>caro data
  vermibus</em> is <em>nullius in bonis</em>, and belongs to ecclesiastical
  cognizance; but as to the monument action is given (as hath been said)
  at the common law, for defacing thereof.</p>
</blockquote>

<p><a href="https://scholarship.law.marquette.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&amp;httpsredir=1&amp;article=4512&amp;context=mulr" rel="nofollow noreferrer">This article</a> provides further analysis and case citations, mostly in the US. The topic of body-ownership is the subject of a book-length analysis (ten Have &amp; Welie, <em>Ownership of the human body</em>). I think, according to <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3713940/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">this article</a>, that under Islamic law, a body (living or dead) is not property, so an advance directive is not an absolute right. </p>
