What's your favorite epitaph?

[JoeSki]

I love Benjamin Franklin's.

The body of
B. 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 Believ'd) Appear once More
In a New and More Elegant Edition
Revised and Corrected
By the Author.

I'm not a fan or poetry. To me it's music without sound, but I really think this bit here is a thing of beauty. I can only hope the words on my tombstone sum me up in such a refined and sublime way.

[QuickSilver]

"I told you I wasn't feeling well!"

[OtakuLoki]

I don't recall the woman's name, but in the early '80's there was a minor shitstorm in the Municipal Cemetary of Framingham, MA. She chose an epitaph that summed things up quite succinctly: Oh, Shit!

[Grits and Hard Toast]

There is not always tomorrow.

[Reply]

Snopes has the best epitaph ever.

[Nametag]

Robert Louis Stevenson:

Under the wide and starry sky,
dig the grave and let me lie;
Glad did I live and gladly die
and I laid me down with a will.
This be the verse you gave for me;
here he lies where he longs to be,
Home is the sailor, home from the sea,
and the hunter home from the hill.

[gum]

"Excuse my dust"

Dorothy Parker.

[Andros_X]

Good friend, for Jesus´ sake forbeare
To digg the dust enclosed here!
Blest be ye man that spares thes stones
And curst be he that moues my bones.

-Wm. Shakespeare

[Large Marge]

Truth serves only a world that lives by it.

[Already in Use]

"Anyway, it's always other people who die." -- Epitaph of Marcel Duchamp.

Or how about "Confusion"?

[marky33]

"Here lies David St. Hubbins, and why not?": requested epitaph for Spinal Tap lead singer.

[Zoe]

This one is from a Massachusetts churchyard, I believe:

Here lies the body of Mary Ann Lowder;
She burst whilst drinking a Seidlitz powder;
Called from this world to her heavenly rest,
She should have waited till it effervesced.

[seosamh]

Originally Posted by QuickSilver

"I told you I wasn't feeling well!"

Of course, Spike Milligan wanted "See, I told you I was ill" on his gravestone, although in the end it was only allowed if it was written in Irish. Duirt mé leat go raibh mé breoite (although I understand that the translation is a bit iffy).

He's buried in Winchelsea, in East Sussex.

[Scissorjack]

Lady Florence Sale, indomitable Victorian mem-sahib:

Under this stone reposes all that could die of Lady Sale.

[Scoundrel Swanswater]

The owner of the local paintshop where I grew up had

He brought colour to our lives

That brought out a chuckle when I first saw it.

[the first supraliminal]

I was fond of the tombstone that just said "P. Burns"
Always good for a laugh.

[Airman Doors, USAF]

Here lies Lester Moore
Four slugs from a .44
No Les no more

http://www.ghost-trackers.org/images/boothill3.jpg

[DrMemory]

Here lies the body of Mary Lee
Lived to the age of 103.
For 16 years she kept her virginity.
Not a bad record, for this Vicinity.

[Podkayne]

Johannes Kepler:

Mensus eram coelos, nunc Terrae metior umbras.
Mens coelestis erat, corporis umbra jacet.

I used to measure the Heavens, now I measure the shadows of Earth. The mind belonged to Heaven, the body's shadow lies here.

[CalMeacham]

I used to have a Ripley's Believe it or Not book of gravestones, which claimed all of them were real (including some above, like the now-generally-discredited Lester Moore tombstone). Agfter all these years, I still remember a lot of them. I take no stand on their veracity:


Here beneath this stone we lie
Back to back, My Wife and I
And when the angel's trump shall trill
If she gets up, then I'll lie still








Here beneath this stone our Baby lies
She neither cries nor hollers
She lived just one and twenty days
And cost us forty dollars




In Loving Memory
of Ellen Shannon
Aged 26
Fatally burned in the
Explosion of a Lamp
Filled with
Danforth's Non-Explosive Fluid







John Yeast
Pardon Me For Not Rising



Lee
Lee
(This one in Lee County, Mississippi, no less)


P.S. The Old Nuisance



In memory of ________

Fell to Earth Jan. 14 1846
Had the dust brushed off him Mar. 25, 1888

[CalMeacham]

Actually, my favorite epigraph isn't in words, but in a picture. It's that of Simon Stevin BRUGGHELINCK ("Stevinus"), who managed to get an illustration of one of his proofs on his tombstone:

http://home.planet.nl/~hopfam/Devreese.html



(Actually, I've never seen a photo of the tombstone, so I hope this isn't another Urban Legend)

[Beware of Doug]

I am ready to meet my Maker.

Whether my Maker is prepared for the great ordealof meeting me is another matter.

Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

[Kilvert's Pagan]

Originally Posted by Already in Use

Or how about "Confusion"?

Nuts - beat me to it.

Already in Use, we're showing our age.

[Ranchoth]

Two favorites, at the moment—

Tandem Felix ("Happy at Last")

From Gustavus III, King of Sweden, and

Emperor of the United States
and
Protector of Mexico

[JoeSki]

There are some prime reply's here.

[quote=Airman Doors, USAF]Here lies Lester Moore
Four slugs from a .44
No Les no more

I like this one. Dark and gritty. If I didn't know better I'd swear it was straight out of a campy noir novel/flicker show.

Originally Posted by DrMemory

Here lies the body of Mary Lee
Lived to the age of 103.
For 16 years she kept her virginity.
Not a bad record, for this Vicinity.

Hah. Me and my mom both got a laugh out of this .

This thread has got me thinking: maybe I should check out some Edgar Allen Poe poems.

[JCorre]

Not dead yet but this is what he claims he would like:

"Don't bother me. I'm skating."

-Bam Margera

I thought it was kinda cool.

[poeticyde]

Here are a few of my favorites...


John Adams lies here, of the parish of Southwell,
A carrier who carried his can to his mouth well;
He carried so much, and he carried so fast,
He could carry no more - so was carried at last;
For the liquor he drank, being too much for one,
He could not carry off - so he's now carri-on.
~written by Lord Byron

Posterity will ne'er survey,
A nobler grave than this:
Here lie the bones of Castlereagh:
Stop, traveller, and piss.

~written by Lord Byron

And humbly I submit what I have written to place on my own stone...

This stone of gravel, rock, and clay,
Above a bed of grass doth lay,
To mark the final resting place,
Of long ago forgotten face.
It bears no name, nor ever will,
It sits here, silent, cold and still,
Remembered here, this pile of bone,
By place and memory alone.
For if this man is long forgot,
He'd much prefer this as his lot,
And never bother living kin,
With troubled memories of him.
And if recalled, who needs a name?
When one has love, or fear, or fame?
So sign me not upon this stone,
Be I remembered, or alone.