TODAY MARKS the anniversary of one Arabella Young, a long-dead Massachusetts woman about whom we know nothing except that, in some way or other, she talked too much, writes Frank McNally
Was she the town gossip? Did she finger somebody for a crime? Or was she just a general windbag, who never let anybody else get a word in? Whatever her precise failing, when she expired in 1771, someone felt strongly enough to put the following inscription on her grave: "Here lies as silent clay/ Miss Arabella Young/ Who on the 21st of May/ Began to hold her tongue."
The use of the term "Miss" would at least seem to rule out a henpecked husband as the author. But spouses with an axe to grind have, on occasion, ground it on the headstones of the not-so-dearly departed. Elisha Philbrook, for example - another American - who lived long enough to have the last word about his wife Sarah on their joint memorial: "Beneath these stones do lie/ Back to back, my wife and I/ When the last trumpet the air shall fill/ If she gets up, I'll just lie still."
Wives do seem to have been the butt of epitaph jokes more often than husbands, although this may just reflect past disparities in the genders' headstone-purchasing power.
In any case, here's another example, from the grave of a woman called Anna Wallace in Worcestershire, England: "The children of Israel wanted bread/ And the Lord sent them manna/ Old clerk Wallace wanted a wife/ And the Devil sent him Anna."
Epitaphs have supplied a humorous sub-genre for centuries - so much so that it can be hard now to tell the historical ones from the inventions. But rude and amusing inscriptions enjoyed a real fashion between the 16th and 18th century, when the need to speak well of the dead was not so keenly felt as it is today.
The trend had passed by the Victorian era, clearly, and an 1893 book on the subject was moved to apologise for some of the examples cited: "Our ancestors seem to have frequently looked upon the churchyard as a fair field for mirth at the expense of the departed. Gibes, allusions to deformities, misfortunes, or peculiarities often meet the eye, puns and double entendres are set forth, and we are sometimes puzzled to account for the levity and want of good taste displayed by survivors, who could think it worth their while to record in stone their neighbours' foibles and peccadilloes."
Among several explanations for the practice, the author's best guess was entertainment: "The village churchyard would oftentimes be a place of rendez-vous in the long summer evenings, the tombstone inscriptions would be read, criticised, applauded or condemned, and if they caused a laugh or contained a good joke, so much the better."
Having lived and died at the height of the fashion, Jonathan Swift was a man of his time, therefore. Even tombstones were vehicles for his satire. And as Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, he was happy to use the power of a polemical epitaph to shame those who crossed him. It's not the funniest thing Swift ever wrote, but a famous example is his inscription for the Duke of Schomburg, whose remains rested in an unmarked crypt at St Patrick's for 40 years after his death at the Battle of the Boyne, until the dean started badgering the relatives for the £50 needed to erect a stone.
When the family - whose guilt was exacerbated in Swift's eyes by Whig connections - failed to deliver, he composed a lengthy inscription in Latin, berating the descendants' meanness and concluding of their grandfather: "The renown of his valour had greater power among strangers than had the ties of blood among his kith and kin."
Friends persuaded him to tone down his original version slightly, but it still caused a furore when it first appeared, being quoted widely in the London press. The inscription remains in the cathedral to this day, amusing and scandalising visitors.
In his lighter moments, Swift would have been proud of the effort of an unnamed satirist who wrote an epitaph in Nova Scotia: "Here lies/ Ezekiel Aikle/ Aged 102/ The good die young." He might even have enjoyed this one, from a cemetery in London: "Here lies Ann Mann/ Who lived an old maid/ But died an old Mann/ Dec. 8, 1767."
But finally, here's an example from Edinburgh that offers the last word both on its immediate subject, and also - I hope - on a small controversy I ignited in the Letters columns recently. You may recall that I had quoted the old weather warning "Ne'er cast a clout/ Till May is out", interpreting this to mean the month of May (which is not "out" for another 10 days), rather than the may-bush, which has been out for weeks. Some critics suggested I had the wrong May.
Of course I could summon Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fableand the Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs- both of which are with me in anti-bush camp (as it were). But I won't. Instead, I merely invite those who would cast their clouts prematurely to reflect on the following epitaph, from somewhere in Scotland.
"Beneath this stone a lump of clay/ Lies Uncle Peter Dan'els/ Who early in the month of May/ Took off his winter flannels".