(ἐπί τοῦ ὀστέου, and ἐπί τοῦ σαρκός, a sepulchre), an inscription on a tomb. It is also used for an eulogium, in prose or verse, composed in honour of a person deceased, without any intent to be engraven on a monument.

It has been doubted whether the ancient Jews inscribed epitaphs on tombs; yet it is certain that instances of epitaphs of very ancient date have been found among them. The Athenians commonly inscribed only the name of the dead, with the epithet ἀγαθός, good, or ἤγειρα, hero, and the word χάρις, intimating their good wishes; but the name of the deceased's father and that of his tribe were occasionally added. The Lacedaemonians allowed epitaphs to none but those who had died in battle. The Romans inscribed their epitaphs dis manibus; and frequently introduced the dead, by way of prosopopoeia, speaking to the living.

The English language is perhaps richer than any other in compositions of this kind. That discovered by Sir Walter Scott, on a defaced tomb-stone in the churchyard of Melrose, is among the finest in its own vein—

Earth walketh on the earth glistering in gold; Earth goeth on the earth whither it wold; Earth builds on earth palaces and towers, Earth says to earth, all shall be ours.

Ben Jonson's epitaph on the Countess of Pembroke is well known:

Underneath this marble bier Lies the subject of all verse, Sydney's sister, Pembroke's mother; Death, ere thou hast slain another Wise and good and fair as she, Time will throw his dart at thee.

Equally happy in its own way is that by an unknown author, inscribed on a tomb in a cemetery in the Isle of Wight:

Forgive, blest shade, the tributary tear, That mourns thy exit from a world like this; Forgive the wish that would have kept thee here, And stayed thy progress to the realms of bliss. No more confined to grovelling scenes of night, No more a tenant pent in mortal clay; Now should we rather view thy glorious flight, And mark thy progress to the realms of day.

In a far different vein is that composed by Benjamin Franklin on himself:— "The body of Benjamin Franklin—printer (like the cover of an old book, its contents torn out and stripped of its lettering and gilding), lies here, food for worms; yet the work itself shall not be lost, for it will (as he believed) appear once more in a new and more beautiful edition, corrected and amended by the Author."

For simplicity and appropriateness, that on Copernicus in a church at Cracow is remarkable:—

Sta, sol, ne movere.

In this case the words of Scripture, which were used as a pretext for the persecution of the great truth which he discovered, are here employed to form the astronomer's epitaph.

Similar in spirit to this is Pope's famous epitaph on Newton:—

Nature and Nature's laws lay hid in night, God said, Let Newton be, and all was light.

Many others of Pope's epitaphs are remarkable. We select that on Mrs Corbet:—

Here rests a woman, good without pretence, Blest with plain reason and with sober sense; No conquests she—but o'er herself—desired, No arts essayed—but—not to be admired. Passion and pride were to her soul unknown, Convinced that virtue only is our own. So unaffected, so composed a mind; So firm, yet soft; so strong, yet so refined; Heaven, as its purest gold, by tortures tried; The saint sustained it, but the woman died.

Of satirical epitaphs the French language affords some very piquant examples. One of the best known is that of Piron on himself, written in a spirit of revenge against the French Academy:—

C'est Piron, qui ne fut jamais rien, Pas même Académicien.

The next is scarcely less happy. It may still be seen in Père-la-Chaise at Paris:—

C'est ma femme. Ah! qu'elle est bien Pour son repos et pour le mien.

In this vein one of the most famous epitaphs is that of Dr Arbuthnot on the infamous Col. Chartres:—"Here continueth to rot the body of Francis Chartres, who, with an inflexible constancy and inimitable uniformity of life, persisted, in spite of age and infirmities, in the practice of every human vice excepting prodigality and hypocrisy; his insatiable avarice exempted him from the first, his matchless impudence from the second. Nor was he more singular in the undeviating pravity of his manners than successful in accumulating wealth. For without trade or profession, without trust of public money, and without bribe-worthy service, he acquired, or more properly created, a ministerial estate. He was the only person of his time who could cheat without the mask of honesty, retain his primeval meanness when possessed of ten thousand a-year; and having daily deserved the gibbet for what he did, was at last condemned to it for what he could not do. Oh! indignant reader, think not his life useless to mankind. Providence convicted at his execrable designs, to give to after-ages a conspicuous proof and example of how small estimation is exorbitant wealth in the sight of God, by his bestowing it on the most unworthy of all mortals."