The word tafiofobia derives from the Greek formation between "tafo" which means "grave", plus the entry "phobos" which means "fear". Tafiophobia is also known as taphophobia, tapephobia or taphephobia. It can be defined as that irrational and sick fear of being buried alive or of cemeteries; In other words, it is an abnormal feeling of fear of being buried while alive, after having been declared dead by mistake. On many occasions this fear can cause an individual to feel horror or dread for funerals, burials, headstones, graves and everything that is related to a burial without having died.
Throughout history, there have been numerous cases of people who were accidentally buried alive, this was a time when taphiophobia had a certain boom and in various countries stories or urban legends were told about cases of people who later Years after being buried there were indications that they had come back to life after burial and were trying to get out of the coffin by scratching it. So it is declared that before the so-called modern medicine this phobia was not entirely irrational.
From these numerous cases of burial by mistake, special coffins began to be built with different precautionary measures so that this did not happen, an example of them was that they began to place bells that could be played from inside the coffin through a rope or chain in case the person was not actually dead and could be rescued.
For their part, other coffins had the availability of glass panels that could be broken, some with the possibility of hoisting a flag or even came with a key to use to open the coffin from the inside if necessary.
