Dirges chanted upon the death of an important person or a beloved friend.

Surviving examples date back to the death of Charlemagne in 814. In France laments bore the names of déploration, plainte, and TOMBEAU. JOHANNES OCKEGHEM wrote a lament on the death of Gilles Binchois and was in turn musically lamented by JOSQUIN DES PREZ, who was upon his own death lamented by NICOLAS GOMBERT. FRANÇOIS COUPERIN LE GRAND wrote an apotheosis for JEAN-BAPTISTE LULLY, but he himself had to wait for nearly two centuries to be musically commemorated with comparable grandeur by MAURICE RAVEL in his Le Tombeau de Couperin.

Other types of laments are the DIRGE, ELEGY, and THRENODY.