Epitaph in Bookish Style
by Ben Franklin
The Body of Benjamin
Franklin (Printer)
(Like the cover of an old book
Its contents
torn out
And stript of its lettering and gilding)
Lies here,
food for worms.
But the work shall not be lost
For it will (as
he believed) appear once more
In a new and more elegant
edition
Revised and corrected
by
The Author.
We all face a legacy of sorts. No matter how significant or insignificant you believe yours will be, the impression of your days is inescapable. What made you decide to be who you are at this moment in your life? And, what memory do you hope to leave?
Did you have definite defining moments that set your path or changed the course of your
life? Each of us is unique with distinctive qualities that distinguish our existence. Yet, have you ever considered what led to your personal growth?
Of course, some people – many of whom are notable and famous – publish autobiographies that explore the complex makeup of their lives. These personal narratives trace their complex existence chapter by chapter. But, I wonder what has helped define us simple folk like you and me – those of us who feel a book-length biography is much too long and just not in order.
If you do contemplate this question and seek an answer, you likely hope your understanding may benefit others you love in some way. After all, even if your life can be summed up in a simple epitaph, you can find some comfort in passing along a simple message you gained in your brief journey on earth.
I have thought about an appropriate epitaph – commemorate inscription, brief poem or other writing (often on a tombstone) – for my life. Plenty of models exist – many from hundreds or even thousands of years ago.
If you could choose your own epitaph, what would you leave for the living?
History
Epitaphs have a long history. Let's explore the history of those inscriptions today in the blog entry.
Probably the earliest epitaphial inscriptions that have come down to us are those of the ancient Egyptians, written, as their mode of sepulture necessitated, upon the sarcophagi and coffins. Deciphered as much in the same form, they commence with a prayer to a deity, generally Osiris or Anubis, on behalf of the deceased, whose name, descent and office are usually specified.
The Greeks, from which the word originally comes, put inscriptions on their tombs. Epitaph traces its history to the Greek epi, “about,” and taphos, “grave,” name of the funeral prayers with which the dead Athenians were honored on the battlefield. These prayers used to be recited during the funeral and annually on memorial days.
(“Epitaph – Concept, origin, history and famous examples.” Concept Daily. conceptdaily.com.)
Siminoides, a King of Sparta, honored the famed three hundred who fell at Thermapolyae with these words “Go tell the Spartans, stranger passing by that here, obedient to their law, we lie.” on his own tomb.
Cyrus the Great, the founder of the Persian empire, according to legend had these words inscribed on his own tomb outside Pasagardae: “Passer-by, I am Cyrus, who founded the Persian Empire and was king of Asia. Grudge me not, therefore, this monument.” These words were then read by Alexander the Great when he himself conquered the Persian Empire hundreds of years later.
Roman epitaphs, in contrast to those of the Greeks, contained as a rule, nothing beyond a record of facts. However, many Roman epitaphs included a denunciation on any who should violate the sepulchre; a similar later denunciation is found on William Shakespeare’s tomb:
“Good friend, for Jesus’s sake forbear
To dig the dust enclosed here;
Blest be the man that spares these stones,
And curst be he that moves my bones.”
So called "Laudatio Turiae" inscription (fragment). Courtesy of VROMA.
The Roman, Laudatio Turiae, wrote the longest known epitaph in the 1st century BC at 180 lines long commemorating and celebrating his loyal wife. The inscription gives a unique insight into the late 1st century Roman world during the rise of Augustus Caesar, as its extended history of the life of the author's wife addresses many aspects of Roman society and civil life.
The unnamed subject ot Turiae's epitaph has sometimes been identified with the Turia married to Q. Lucretius Vespillo, one of three women listed by the historian Valerius Maximus as examples of womanly virtue:
"When Quintus Lucretius [Vespillo, the consul of 19 BCE] was proscribed by the triumvirs, his wife Turia hid him in her bedroom above the rafters. A single maidservant knew the secret. At great risk to herself, she kept him safe from imminent death. So rare was her loyalty that, while the other men who had been proscribed found themselves in foreign, hostile places, barely managing to escape the worst tortures of body and soul, Lucretius was safe in that bedroom in the arms of his wife."
(“Valerius Maximus, Memorable Deeds and Sayings.” 6.7.1-3.)
As Christianity took hold in the West during the Dark Ages and Medieval period epitaphs borrowed from the Bible, as well as the use of common or stock aphorisms such as “Here lies” or “Sacred to the memory of …”. These sayings can be commonly seen today in many old English churches and are the forebears to the well known “Rest in Peace” or “RIP.”
According to dictionary.com, “The Latin phrase (as requiescat in pace) began appearing on Christian gravestones in the 8th century, and became widespread on Christian grave markers by the 18th century.” Biblical roots of “rest in peace” appear in Isaiah 57:2: “He enters into peace; They rest in their beds, Each one who walked in his upright way.” This verse promises relief in death, an “escape from turmoil” as the NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Guide notes. “This may either refer to the peaceful rest of the grave,” notes Barne’s Bible Commentary, “or to that which awaits the just in a better world.”
(Meg Buche. “Does 'Rest in Peace' (RIP) Have a Christian Origin?” crosswalk.com. October 17, 2019.)
When “rest in peace” became conventional, the absence of a reference to the soul led people to suppose that it was the physical body that was enjoined to lie peacefully in the grave. This is associated with the Christian doctrine of the particular judgment; that is, that the soul is parted from the body upon death, but that the soul and body will be reunited on Judgment Day.
(Karl Siegfried Guthke. Epitaph culture in the West. 2003.)
Another phrase of very common occurrence on Ancient Roman tombstones, Sit tibi terra levis ("Light lie the earth upon thee"), has continued in frequent use down to modern times.
(http://gluedideas.com/Encyclopedia-Britannica-Volume-8-Part-2-Edward-Extract/Epitaph.html. 2011.)
Most of the epitaphs that have survived from before the Protestant Reformation were inscribed upon brasses. Epitaphs on Monumental Brasses and church memorials engraved on brass were utilized during the Middle Ages as an alternative to the general tombstones, their heyday being from the 13th to the 18th century. (Although it was not brass they used or bronze but an amalgam of copper, zinc, lead and tin.)
And much of these works were imported from the Low Countries and Germany. Brasses covered several categories, Knights and Ladies, Husbands, civilians, merchants and scholars, and some miscellaneous categories.
(Cara Links. “History Of Headstones.”)
Professor Emeritus George Vane explains …
“As the words suggest, a brass is a memorial to bear witness to the dead. It might be a simple effigy or merely a plate inscribed with information about the deceased. Or, it might be quite elaborate, with several figures, a canopy, heraldic shields, and religious emblems in addition to an inscription. A monumental brass is composed of one or more pieces of brass plate, each engraved with a figure, inscription, shield, or other decoration such as a saint – set into the surface of a stone slab, either as a single plate or with different parts of the composition cut out and set in separately. The stone is laid in the church either as a grave cover – perhaps on an altar tomb, on the floor, or on the wall – or as a memorial without burial. The person or persons commemorated are depicted in armor, vestments, or civilian clothes of the period …
“Evidence suggests that once there were a quarter of a million brasses in Europe. Now scarcely four hundred remain on the Continent, and only about eight thousand in England, of which half are figure brasses in various states of preservation.”
In Shakespeare's play Henry V, just before the King sends his weary, sick soldiers to the battlefield of Agincourt where he hopes for victory but fears he will lose many good men, he rouses them to action with the famous St. Crispin's Day speech. But soon after he comments to the French envoy …
“A many of our bodies
shall no doubt
Find native graves; upon the which I trust
Shall
witness live in brass of this day's work:
And those that leave
their valiant bones in France,
Dying like men, though buried in
your dunghills,
They shall be fam'd ...”
(George Vane. “Brass Rubbings Collection.” Hamline University. Minnesota. 2021.)
Historical Note:
Military effigies are but one type.
On brasses, we can study the vestments of various ranks of clergy
from priest to archbishop, and on civilian brasses, we can trace the
development of fashion in costume of men and women for a period of
five hundred years—whether it be the varieties of ladies'
headdresses, the change in men's dress from tunic to knee-breeches,
or the rise and fall of the ruff.
Other brasses display a
fascination for skeletons or figures in shrouds, for chalices and
bleeding hearts, or for elaborate floriated crosses. After 1420,
children often appear on small plates beneath their parents and
dressed much like them, the sons under the father, the daughters
below the mother. The many coats of arms on shields or costume make
possible the study of heraldry and genealogy, and inscriptions
illustrate the development of language and spelling from the
fourteenth century on, for brasses are almost the only dated medieval
works of art.
(George Vane. “Brass Rubbings Collection.” Hamline University. Minnesota. 2021.)
By Elizabethan times, however, epitaphs upon stone monuments, in English, became much more common and began to assume a more literary character.
Thomas Nashe tells how, by the end of the 16th century, the writing of verse epitaphs had become a trade. Many of the best-known epitaphs are primarily literary memorials, not necessarily intended to be placed on a tomb. Said to be among the finest are those by William Browne, Ben Jonson, Robert Herrick, John Milton, and Robert Louis Stevenson. Alexander Pope wrote several epitaphs; they inspired one of the few monographs on the subject – Samuel Johnson’s examination of them in The Universal Visiter (sic) for May 1756.
(Amy Tikkanen. “Epitaph: Poetic Form.” Encyclopaedia Britannica.)
During the 19th century that epitaphs became more common and more individualized to the person who had died, including oftentimes being written by the deceased themselves, often with humor as a motif.
(“Epitaphs: History and Examples.” Obitia. February 0l1, 2020.)
Britannica records …
“Semiliteracy often produces epitaphs that are comic through grammatical accident – for example, 'Erected to the memory of / John MacFarlane / Drowned in the Water of Leith / By a few affectionate friends.' Far more common, though, are deliberately witty epitaphs, a type abounding in Britain and the United States in the form of acrostics, palindromes, riddles, and puns on names and professions …
“Antiquary Thomas Fuller has the inscription 'Fuller’s Earth.' Many offer some wry comment, such as John Gay’s epitaph:
'Life is a jest, and all things show it;
I thought so once, and now I know it.'
“The epitaph was also seen as an opportunity for epigrammatic satire, as in the Earl of Rochester’s lines on Charles II: 'He never said a foolish thing / Nor ever did a wise one.'
“The art of the epitaph was largely lost in the 20th century. Some notable examples of humorous epitaphs were suggested, however, by the 20th-century writer Dorothy Parker; they include 'I told you I was sick' and 'If you can read this, you’re standing too close.'
(Amy Tikkanen. “Epitaph: Poetic Form.” Encyclopaedia Britannica.)
Other Epitaphs
Here are some other examples of famous epitaphs:
“Oh God of dust and
rainbows, help us see
that without dust the rainbow would not
be.”
– Langston Hughes
“To save your world you asked this man to die: Would this man, could he see you now, ask why?” – Tomb of the Unknown Soldier
“I had a lover’s quarrel with the world.” – Robert Frost
“That’s all, folks!” – Mel Blanc (voice of Porky the Pig)
“I am ready to meet my Maker. Whether my Maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter.” – Winston Churchill
“I knew if I waited around long enough something like this would happen.” – George Bernard Shaw (playwright)
“There goes the neighborhood.” – Rodney Dangerfield
“Free at last, free at last, thank God almighty I’m free at last.” – Martin Luther King Jr.
Never Again | Never
Forget
6 July 1943 | 22 June 1988
A Gay Vietnam Veteran
“When
I was in the military they gave me a medal for killing two men and a
discharge for loving one.” – Leonard Matlovich (1943–1988),
the first gay service member to purposely out himself to the military
to fight their ban on homosexuals.
“The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen, nor touched, but are felt in the heart.” – Helen Keller
“#$%& @!&% #?!$% @?*&!@^#!* @*$! &!%?” – George Carlin
Do It Yourself
Come on, readers. Write your own epitaph. You won't be promising to chisel it in stone, but it might be interesting to contemplate what you would choose to leave to future generations. If you do write one, share it with me.
Some advice on choosing an epitaph
"Less is more" - epitaphs are usually short and concise. Even if you use the whole reverse of a headstone, you will be limited to a few lines. Epitaphs provide a chance to sum up a person's life in just a few words, to give it shape and express real emotion.
Epitaphs often convey a strong feeling. However, the best epitaphs are timeless and not overly sentimental, and for this reason, I always advise waiting at least a year before choosing an epitaph so that emotions have time to settle and you don't later regret your choice.
Often, someone is speaking in the first person (a relative, a friend; the deceased). You might want to think about whose voice you want the epitaph to be. The Church of England discourages overly sentimental epitaphs.
Consider whether you want the epitaphs to speak directly to someone. This may be a passerby or the loved one themselves.
Take inspiration from literature, lyrics and poems. You might even use a few words from a poem which was read at the funeral.
(“Headstone Epitaphs- 250 beautiful examples.” The Headstone Guide. stoneletters.com. October 13, 2014.)
Eugene Shoemaker
Postscript: A Special Epitaph – “Out of This World”
In 1997, some of the ashes of Eugene "Gene" Shoemaker – one of the 20th century's great minds – were laid to rest near the moon's southern pole. That made him the first – and to date, the only – person to ever receive a lunar burial.
Shoemaker's work on impact craters affected everything from NASA's Apollo missions to the dinosaur extinction debate. For his contributions to human knowledge, he was the National Medal of Science by then-president George H.W. Bush in 1992.
Carolyn C. Porco, a planetary scientist at The University of Arizona in Tucson, proposed and produced the tribute. She said, "The idea to give Gene Shoemaker the moon as his final resting place came to me on July 19th , the day after Gene died and the moment I read in the morning newspaper that his body would be cremated."
Porco's inspired thought became reality. She quickly contacted the Shoemaker family and NASA officials about the proposal. Given the go-ahead, she designed and crafted the inscription in time to get it and the capsule containing Shoemaker's ashes on the lunar spacecraft before pre-flight testing.
Porco was a student of Shoemaker's when he was a professor and she was a graduate student at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech). Field trips that Shoemaker led into Meteor Crater and the Grand Canyon in northern Arizona "are to this day among my most cherished memories," Porco said.
During the 1980s, Porco and Shoemaker were members of the imaging team for Voyager, the mission to the outer planets. They also collaborated as co-investigators on a science instrument proposal for the upcoming NASA mission to Pluto.
"It was legend in the planetary science community that Gene had always wanted to go to the moon as an Apollo astronaut and study its geology firsthand," Porco said. "He said only last year, 'Not going to the moon and banging on it with my own hammer has been the biggest disappointment in life.' I felt that this was Gene's last chance to get to the moon, and that it would be a fitting and beautiful tribute to a man who was a towering figure and a pioneer in the exploration of the solar system," Porco said.
Gene Shoemaker is considered the founding father of astrogeology, and NASA rewarded his years of work by sending his ashes to the moon. NASA
The polycarbonate capsule, one-and-three-quarters inches long and seventh-tenths inch in diameter, was carried in a vacuum-sealed, flight-tested aluminum sleeve mounted deep inside the spacecraft.
Around the capsule is wrapped a piece of brass foil inscribed with an image of a Comet Hale-Bopp, an image of Meteor Crater in northern Arizona, and a passage from William Shakespeare's enduring love story, "Romeo and Juliet":
“And, when he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night,
And pay no worship to the garish sun.”
(Mark Mancini. “Eugene Shoemaker: The Only Human Buried on the Moon.” How Stuff Works. February 05, 2021.)
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