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The funeral obsequies were not limited to the day of the funeral. The family group, relatives and neighbours took part in certain religious celebrations during the mourning period. Those obsequies included the Novena novena that followed the funeral, during which honour masses were held in some locations. At the end of the mourning period, which lasted at least a year, the anniversary mass was held that was a repetition of the funeral mass.

== The Novena novena ==

The Novenanovena, ''bederatziurrena'', which began in the church on the day following the funeral, was until recently an integral part of the obsequies and was reported as being held throughout the Basque Country. In the past, those masses which the members of the family and the closest neighbours attended were as solemn as the funeral. The members of the household went to the church for nine days, dressed in mourning and in a ritual procession.

A rite inherent to this Novena novena was the response that the priest said or chanted before the tomb or family burial sites every day at the end of mass.

The old custom of the Novena novena lasted in general until the 1970s, even though it had gradually lost in solemnity and was limited to three days in some cases. It is currently reduced to a mass that is held on the Sunday following the funeral and which is popularly called the “departure mass”.