Epitaph is a memorial inscription on a tombstone or other monument to the dead. The term comes from two Greek words, epi (upon) and taphos (tomb). The word also means a literary memorial, often in verse, composed in honor of the dead, but not intended to be inscribed on a monument. The earliest known epitaphs are those found on Egyptian coffins. Such English writers as John Milton, Alexander Pope, and Samuel Johnson have composed celebrated epitaphs. The Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson wrote this epitaph:
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 grave for me: “Here he lies where he longed to be; Home is the sailor, home from the sea, And the hunter home from the hill.”
The modern custom is to inscribe epitaphs that usually consist only of the name, dates of birth and death, and perhaps a few words of commemoration.
