Inside the elaborate farewell to Pope Francis

Pope Francis' body is sitting under the great dome of St Peter's Basilica. The great dome was designed and started by Michelangelo and completed after his death by Giacomo della Porta in 1590.

Viewed from floor level, the inside of the dome is visually stunning, an intricately patterned golden structure culminating in the lanternino: a windowed apex that diffuses natural light into the church

The sculpted bronze baldacchino (a canopy over the high altar) was completed by Gian Lorenzo Bernini in 1634 using 6,200 kilograms of bronze taken from the Pantheon. This magnificent structure marks the traditional burial place of St Peter, the first pope and leader of the Catholic Church.

At a lying in state, it's customary that the corpse be visible, displayed in an open coffin or on a bier.

Pope Francis simplified the funeral rituals for popes after the death of Pope Benedict in 2022.

While previous popes were displayed on a red elevated bier, Francis' body is displayed in a simple coffin lined with red fabric.

He wanted the funeral rites to be appropriate for "a shepherd and disciple of Christ and not of a powerful man of this world".

Francis will be buried in this plain wooden coffin lined with zinc, to preserve his remains.

Traditionally, popes have been buried in three nesting coffins of cypress, lead and oak. This elaborate mode of burial was indicative of personal power in the temporal world as well as the spiritual realm.

St Peter's and Pope Francis' coffin is guarded by the Swiss Guards, a military order unique to Vatican City and the smallest army in the world, recognisable by their Renaissance-era uniforms.

The Guard is open only to single Swiss Catholic men aged 19 to 30. Recruits must be at least 1.74 metres tall, and have graduated from high school or completed a professional diploma. They do basic military training in Switzerland before joining the Swiss Guard in Vatican City.

Pope Francis is clothed in red vestments over a white cassock and a mitre, and is holding a rosary.

The red outer vestments are an ancient Byzantine tradition, where red is customary at funerals. The clergy officiating at the funeral will also be clad in red vestments.

Francis wears a mitre, the tall pointed headdress of bishops, worn as a sign of their office. The papal mitre is white with gold trim.

The pope’s traditional regalia includes the Ring of the Fisherman, which was destroyed on Francis’ death. But Francis most often wore this plain silver ring with a cross that he wears in his coffin.

He also wears the pallium, a white woollen stole ornamented with black crosses symbolic of his high religious office.

Francis holds a rosary, a string of prayer beads used by Catholics to pray a sequence of devotions to the Virgin Mary.