Epigraphy

“ I would be glad to see the most valuable printed by themselves, those which ought not to be seen, burned immediately, and the others that have gone abroad, printed separately like opuscula, or rather be stifled and forgotten. I thought your epitaph was immediately to be engraved, and therefore I made less scruple to give a copy to lord Orrery, who earnestly desired it, but to nobody else; and he tells me, he gave only two which he will recal. I have a short epigram of his upon it, wherein I would correct a line, or two at most, and then I will send it you, with his permission. ”

“ The end of an epitaph is to convey some account of the dead; and to what purpose is anything told of him whose name is concealed? An epitaph, and a history of a nameless hero, are equally absurd, since the virtues and qualities so recounted in either are scattered at the mercy of fortune to be appropriated by guess. The name, it is true, may be read upon the stone; but what obligation has it to the poet, whose verses wander over the earth and leave their subject behind them, and who is forced, like an unskilful painter, to make his purpose known by adventitious help? ”

“ We may begin our consideration of the type with the epigram i, in so far as it really remains an epigram, that is an inscription on columns, effects, monuments, gifts and so forth, and at the same time points with an ideal finger to something else, and by doing so explains through words, inscribed on an object, somewhat otherwise plastic, local, something present outside the words expressed. In such an example the epigram states simply what a definite fact is. The individual does not as yet express his concrete self ”

“ EVERY Art is best taught by example. Nothing contributes more to the cultivation of propriety, than remarks on the works of those who have most excelled. I shall therefore endeavour, at this visit, to entertain the young students in poetry with an examination of Pope's Epitaphs.
To define an epitaph is useless; every one knows that it is an inscription on a Tomb. An epitaph, therefore, implies no particular character of writing, but may be composed in verse or prose. It is indeed commonly panegyrical; because we are seldom distinguished with a stone but by our friends ”

“ This group of epigrammatists brought back a phantom of freshness into the old forms; once more the epigram becomes full of pretty rhythms and fancies, but they are now more artificial; set beside work of the best period they come out clumsy and heavy. Language is no longer vivid and natural; the colour is a little dimmed, the tone a little forced. As the painter's art had disappeared into that of the worker in mosaic, so the language of poetry was no longer a living stream, but a treasury of glittering words. ”

“ Epistolæ Obscurorum Virorum (i. e. letters of obscure men) , a celebrated collection of Latin letters which appeared in the 16th century in Germany, attacking with merciless severity the doctrines and modes of living of the scholastics and monks, credited with hastening the Reformation.
Epitaph, an inscription placed on a tombstone in commemoration of the dead interred below. The natural feeling which prompts such inscriptions has manifested itself among all civilised peoples, and not a little of a nation's character may be read in them. ”

“ That of Philippus has one word which describes the epigram by a single quality; he calls his work an {oligostikhia} or collection of poems not exceeding a few lines in length. In an epitaph by Diodorus, a poet of the Augustan age, occurs the phrase {gramma legei}, [4] in imitation of the phrase of Herodotus just quoted. This is, no doubt, an intentional archaism; but the word {epigramma} itself does not occur in the collection until the Roman period. Two epigrams on the epigram, [5] one Roman, the other Roman or Byzantine, are preserved, both dealing with the question of the proper length. ”

“ Setting-out.—An inscription of any size, or one requiring complex or very nice arrangement, is set-out in faint, sketchy outline of lead pencil or chalk. Simple writing is not set-out, but such slight calculation or planning as is necessary is carried out mentally, or on a scrap of paper. By practice the scribe, like the compositor, can fit his lettering to the given space with ease and accuracy. ”

“ If I rightly understand the word epigram, it is or at least looks to have one object, like that overcoat of practical use, to express something, a Cathay of thought or not, before itself; its beauty, if it has any, is like that of a netsuke or okimono carved in ivory or wood, decorative at the best. ”

“ What writing is to those who read, that a picture is to those who have only eyes; because, however ignorant they are, they see their duty in a picture, and there, although they have not learned their letters, they read; wherefore, for the people especially, painting stands in the place of literature.” [1] In conformity with this opinion these manuscripts were composed at an early period; they were written rapidly by the scribes, and illustrated with designs made with the pen, and rudely colored by the rubricators. ”

“ A great part of the beauty of mediaeval manuscripts is quite unconnected with their illumination. The plain portion of the text, from the exquisite forms of its letters and the beautiful glossy black of the ink on the creamy ivory-like vellum page, lighted up here and there by the crisp touch of the rubricator's red, is a thing of extraordinary beauty and charm. This perfection of technique in the writing and beauty of the letters lasted considerably longer than did the illuminator's art. ”

“ Man learned to write long before he learned to make paper. Smooth stones, clay tiles, and wax tablets, among other surfaces, were early precursors of scratch-pads and typewriter bond. Later, but before the modern form of a paged book developed, written records were most often kept on long rolls of papyrus, parchment, or vellum—the latter two being much alike. ”

“ The transition from the monumental to the purely literary character of the epigram was favoured by the exhaustion of more lofty forms of poetry, the general increase, from the general diffusion of culture, of accomplished writers and tasteful readers, but, above all, by the changed political circumstances of the times, which induced many who would otherwise have engaged in public affairs to addict themselves to literary pursuits. These causes came into full operation during the Alexandrian era, in which we find every description of epigrammatic composition perfectly developed. ”

“ Instances which deal with literature directly are the noble lines of Alpheus on Homer, the interesting epigram on the authorship of the /Phaedo/, the lovely couplet on the bucolic poets. [2] Some are inscriptions for libraries or collections; [3] others are on particular works of art. Among these last, epigrams on statues or pictures dealing with the power of music are specially notable; the conjunction, in this way, of the three arts seems to have given peculiar pleasure to the refined and eclectic culture of the Graeco-Roman period. ”

“ The epigrams extant in literature which are not in the Anthology are, with a few exceptions, collected in the appendix to the edition of Jacobs, and are reprinted from it in modern texts. They are about four hundred in number, and raise the total number of epigrams in the Anthology to about four thousand five hundred; to these must be added at least a thousand inscriptional epigrams, which increase year by year as new explorations are carried on. It is, of course, but seldom that these last have distinct value as poetry. ”

“ I was reading in a newspaper the other day of a new film which shows on the screen the innumerable adventures of a book in the making, from the time the manuscript is accepted to the point where the completed volume is delivered into the hands of the reader. And it struck me that the intimate life of a manuscript before it is accepted might be even more curious to the general public. The career of many an obscure manuscript, I reflected, doubtless is much more romantic than its character. ”

“ Sham Epitaphs and Quotations (Vol. vi., p 340.) .—Your correspondent A. A. D. asks, in reference to a certain epitaph, "has it really a local habitation, and where?" This is a Query full of grave suggestions. Are there not hundreds of epitaphs in print which have no existence except as printer's paragraphs, and which serve the same purpose as the immortal calf with six legs, and the numberless gigantic gooseberries and plethoric turnips. ”

“ But if we think for a moment of how the manuscript books to which the early printers were accustomed had been produced we shall see that it was the most natural thing in the world. A scribe would take his quire of paper or vellum, and if he were a high-class scribe, mindful of the need of keeping his text clean, he would leave his first leaf blank and begin at the top of his second. ”

“ I write chiefly to avoid idleness, and print to avoid the imputation; and as others do it to live after they are dead, I do it only not to be thought dead whilst I can live. Epigram in general is a quick and short kind of writing, rather a slight than any great force of the spirit, and therefore the more fit for me, who love not to take pains in any thing, and rather affect a little negligence than too great curiosity. ”

“ From looking too exclusively at the Latin epigrammatists, who all belonged to a debased period in literature, some persons have been led to speak of the Latin as distinct from the Greek sense of the word "epigram". But in the Greek Anthology the epigrams of contemporary writers have the same quality. The fault was that of the age, not of the language. No good epigram sacrifices its finer poetical qualities to the desire of making a point; and none of the best depend on having a point at all. ”

“ The scribe should have an epicaustorium [304] covered with leather; he should have an arcanum (pen-knife ?) with which to shape his pen, so that it may be well formed and suitable for writing....
He should have the tooth of a dog (?) or of a wild boar for the polishing of his parchment.... And he should have spectacles lest troublesome delay be caused through blunders. He should have hot coals in a brazier so that [his ink] may dry quickly [even] in cloudy or rainy weather.... He should also have mineum (minium) for the painting of red, crimson or purple letters and initials. ”

“ TOOLS & MATERIALS The making of manuscript books, based on a study of the early MSS., offers the best training to the scribe and illuminator in writing, lettering, rubricating, gilding, illuminating initials and borders, and miniature painting, and is the best means of mastering the foundations of Book Typography and Decoration. ”

“ Those exposed to the air have all disappeared ages ago. In the second century parchment was brought into common use as a writing material, and papyrus paper gradually fell into disuse. And with the change of material the shape of manuscripts was changed; the ancient form of the papyrus-roll giving place, in manuscripts written on parchment, to the form of books with leaves. How we should value the original rolls which contained the handwriting of the evangelists and apostles! ”

“ Unquestionably, if there were more of the "science" of penmanship taught and practiced, and more time and attention devoted to its study and its cultivation, we would have more of the art of handwriting to delight our esthetic sensibilities.
The science of palæography, being related fundamentally to language, links us with prehistoric times. Writing is crystallized speech in visible record, as the phonographic "record" is speech in audible perpetuity. ”

“ Accounts which differentiate in their descriptive details of questioned ink-written fragments of antiquity and on the genuineness or authenticity of which rests the truth or falsity of ancient history or other literature, serve to taint such remains with a certain degree of suspicion and doubt. When, however, in the light of investigation, the materials of which they are composed are found to approach closely the age they purport to represent, then it is that such fragments can be said to have fairly established their own identity. ”

“ The relation between an epistle and a letter has been compared to that between a Platonic dialogue and a talk between two friends. A great man's letters, on account of their value in setting forth the views of a school or a person, may, if produced after his death, become epistles. Some of these, genuine or forgeries, under some eminent name, have come down to us from the days of the early Roman Empire. Cicero, Plato, Aristotle, Demosthenes, are the principal names to which these epistles, genuine and pseudonymous, are attached. ”

“ The state of literature among the ancients may be paralleled with that of the age of our first restorers of learning, when printing was not yet established; then Boccaccio and Petrarch, and such men, were collectors, and zealously occupied in the manual labour of transcription; immeasurable was the delight of that avariciousness of manuscript, by which, in a certain given time, the possessor, with an unwearied pen, could enrich himself by his copy: and this copy an estate would not always purchase! ”

“ IMPLEMENTS OF WRITING The implements used for writing necessarily varied in the different ages and diverse civilizations according to the character of the materials successively used and the nature and stage of the civilization. When inscriptions were made in stone of any sort—sand-stone, marble, granite, basalt, or other stone—or in wood, a chisel was the tool. ”