The fourth part of an ongoing series
By Andrew Hoffman
Hello all, I welcome you to an ongoing series on a lighter subject of death, the epitaph. An epitaph is defined as a phrase or form of words written in memory of a person who has died, as an inscription on a tombstone. The words we choose for our gravestone say a lot about who we are and were.
I’ve highlighted some creative, eccentric and funny engravings.
Some epitaphs make reference to the actual cause of death some are quite funny and clever, like on a tombstone on Prince Edward Island Canada: “Here lie the remains of THOMAS LAMB, killed by a great big tree falling upon him, slap bang.”
In a cemetery in Pembrokenshire: “Here lie I, and no wonder I’m dead, For the wheel of a wagon went over my head.”
On a tombstone in Ithaca, New York: “Here lie the body of our Anna, Done to death by a banana, It wasn’t the fruit that laid her low, But the skin of the Thing that made her go.”
Here are some quick and to the point humorous epitaphs, like the one for Richard Burbage a Shakespearian actor who lived from 1567 to 1619, his stone simply reads “Exit Burbage”
On an auctioneer’s monument in Greenwood, New York “Going, Going, Gone.”
Dr J.J. Subers tombstone in Rosehill Churchyard in Mancon, Georgia reads “Been Here and Gone, Had a Good Time.”
On a tombstone of a pauper in England, the church parish took up a collection and wanted to spend as little as possible, so the stone reads “Thorpe’s Corpse.”
Believe it or not, not all epitaphs are written with humans in mind. Quite a few monuments have been placed for our four-legged friends, and some beautiful sentiments have been written on their eternal monuments. On a monument in Aspen Hill Cemetery of Pets in Aspen, Maryland: “MAJOR: Born a dog, Died a Gentleman.”
Lord Byron’s inscription on the monument of his dog reads: “Near this spot are deposited the remains of one who possessed beauty without vanity, strength without insolence, courage without ferocity, and all the virtues of man without his vices, the praise, which would be unmeaning flattery, if inscribed over human ashes, is but a just tribute to the memory of BOATSWAIN, a dog, who was born at Newfoundland, May 1803, and died at Newstead Abby November 18th, 1808.”
And finally, a beautiful tribute to Maggie an army mule in France that served during World War II whose epitaph reads: “In memory of MAGGIE who in her time kicked two colonels, four majors, ten captains, twenty-four lieutenants, forty-two sergeants, four hundred and thirty-two other ranks AND One Bomb.”
Stay tuned to my next article as we go deeper into art of the epitaph and highlight a few more.
Andrew B. Hoffman is a funeral director at Jeffries and Keates and Keates-Plum Funeral Homes. He is a twenty-two year veteran of the funeral industry.
