Such "minding days" were of great antiquity, and represent survivals of the Norse minne, or ceremonial drinking to the dead.
[4] The month's mind is still an almost universal practice in Ireland (for Roman Catholics) for the family of the deceased and close friends to attend mass and take a meal together.
Thus, one Thomas Windsor (who died in 1479) orders that "on my moneth's minde there be a hundred children within the age of sixteen years, to say for my soul", and candles were to be burned before the rood (cross) in the parish church and twenty priests were to be paid by his executors to sing Placebo, Dirige, and other songs.
In the correspondence of Thomas, Lord Cromwell, a commemoration in 1536 is mentioned at which a hundred priests took part in the requiem mass.
Commemorative sermons were usually preached, the earliest printed example being one delivered by John Fisher, bishop of Rochester, on Margaret, countess of Richmond and Derby, in 1509.