An epigram is a short poem, often with a clever twist at the end or a concise and witty statement. Derived from the Greek epi-gramma, or "written upon", the literary device has been employed for over two millennia.
The Greek tradition of epigrams began as poems inscribed on votive offerings at sanctuaries — including statues of athletes — and on funerary monuments, for example "Go tell it to the Spartans, passer-by…". These original epigrams did the same job as a short prose text might have done, but in verse. Epigram became a literary genre in the Hellenistic period, probably developing out of scholarly collections of inscriptional epigrams. This article focuses on the historical aspects of the Hellenistic age for the cultural aspects see Hellenistic civilisation.
Though modern epigrams are usually thought of as very short, Greek literary epigram was not always as short as later examples, and the divide between 'epigram' and 'elegy' is sometimes indistinct (they share a characteristic metre, elegiac couplets); all the same, the origin of the genre in inscription exerted a residual pressure to keep things concise. The term " elegy " was originally used for a type of poetic meter ( Elegiac metre but is also used for a Poem of mourning from the Greek Elegiac couplets are a poetic form used by Greek lyric poets for a variety of themes usually of smaller scale than those of epic poetry Many of the characteristic types of literary epigram look back to inscriptional contexts, particularly funerary epigram, which in the Hellenistic era becomes a literary exercise. Other types look instead to the new performative context which epigram acquired at this time, even as it made the move from stone to papyrus: the Greek symposium. Symposium originally referred to a drinking party (the Greek verb sympotein means "to drink together" but has since come to refer to any Academic conference Many 'sympotic' epigrams combine sympotic and funerary elements — they tell their readers (or listeners) to drink and live for today because life is short.
We also think of epigram as having a 'point' — that is, the poem ends in a punchline or satirical twist. By no means do all Greek epigrams behave this way; many are simply descriptive. We associate epigram with 'point' because the European epigram tradition takes the Latin poet Martial as its principal model; he copied and adapted Greek models (particularly the contemporary poets Lucillius and Nicarchus) selectively and in the process redefined the genre, aligning it with the indigenous Roman tradition of 'satura', hexameter satire, as practised by (among others) his contemporary Juvenal. Marcus Valerius Martialis (known in English as Martial) (March 1 40 AD - ca Lucillius (fl 60s CE was the author of one hundred twenty three Epigrams in Greek preserved in the Greek Anthology. Nicarchus was a Greek Poet and writer of the first century AD best known for his Epigrams of which forty-two survive and his satirical poetry Satire is often strictly defined as a literary genre or form; although in practice it is also found in the graphic and Performing arts In satire human Decimus Iunius Iuvenalis, known in English as Juvenal, was a Roman Poet active in the late 1st and early 2nd century AD author of the Greek epigram was actually much more diverse, as the Milan Papyrus now indicates. The Milan Papyrus is a Papyrus Scroll written in Alexandria in the late third or early second century BC during the rule of the Ptolemaic dynasty
Our main source for Greek literary epigram is the Greek Anthology, a compilation from the 10th century AD based on older collections. The Greek Anthology (also called Anthologia Graeca or sometimes the Palatine Anthology) is a collection of Poems It contains epigrams ranging from the Hellenistic period through the Imperial period and Late Antiquity into the compiler's own Byzantine era - a thousand years of short elegiac texts on every topic under the sun. This article focuses on the historical aspects of the Hellenistic age for the cultural aspects see Hellenistic civilisation. Late Antiquity (c 300-600 is a Periodization used by historians to describe the transitional centuries from Classical Antiquity to the Middle Ages, in The Anthology includes one book of Christian epigrams.
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Ancient Roman
Roman epigrams owe much to their Greek predecessors and contemporaries. Roman epigrams, however, were more often satirical than Greek ones, and at times used obscene language for effect. Latin epigrams could be composed as inscriptions or graffiti, such as this one from Pompeii, which exists in several versions and seems from its inexact meter to have been composed by a less educated person. Graffiti (singular graffito; the plural is used as a Mass noun) is the name for images or lettering scratched scrawled painted or marked in any manner on property Pompeii is a ruined and partially buried Roman town-city near modern Naples and Caserta in the Italian region of Campania, in Its content, of course, makes it clear how popular such poems were:
- Admiror, O paries, te non cecidisse ruinis
- qui tot scriptorum taedia sustineas.
- I'm astonished, wall, that you haven't collapsed into ruins,
- since you're holding up the weary verse of so many poets.
However, in the literary world, epigrams were most often gifts to patrons or entertaining verse to be published, not inscriptions. Many Roman writers seem to have composed epigrams, including Domitius Marsus, whose collection 'Cicuta' (now lost) was named after the poisonous plant Cicuta for its biting wit, and Lucan, more famous for his epic Pharsalia. Domitius Marsus was a Latin Poet, friend of Virgil and Tibullus, and contemporary of Horace. Cicuta ( Water Hemlock or Cowbane) is a small genus of four species of highly Poisonous Flowering plants in the family Apiaceae Marcus Annaeus Lucanus ( November 3, 39 AD – April 30, 65 AD better known in English as Lucan, was a Roman Pharsalia was also an ancient district in Greece in which Pharsalus was located Authors whose epigrams survive include Catullus, who wrote both invectives and love epigrams – his poem 85 is one of the latter. For persons with a Cognomen "Catulus" see Lutatius Gaius Valerius Catullus (ca
- Odi et amo. Quare id faciam fortasse requiris.
- Nescio, sed fieri sentio, et excrucior.
- I hate and I love. Perhaps you're asking why I do this?
- I don't know, but I feel it happening, and it's torture.
The master of the Latin epigram, however, is Martial. Marcus Valerius Martialis (known in English as Martial) (March 1 40 AD - ca His technique relies heavily on the satirical poem with a joke in the last line, thus drawing him closer to the modern idea of epigram as a genre. Here he defines his genre against a (probably fictional) critic (in the latter half of 2. 77):
- Disce quod ignoras: Marsi doctique Pedonis
- saepe duplex unum pagina tractat opus.
- Non sunt longa quibus nihil est quod demere possis,
- sed tu, Cosconi, disticha longa facis.
- Learn what you don't know: one work of (Domitius) Marsus or learned Pedo
- often stretches out over a doublesided page.
- A work isn't long if you can't take anything out of it,
- but you, Cosconius, write even a couplet too long.
Poets known for their epigrams whose work has been lost include Cornificia. Cornificia (c 85 BC &ndash c 40 BC was a Roman Poet and writer of Epigrams of the first century BC.
English
In early English literature the short couplet poem was dominated by the poetic epigram and proverb, especially in the translations of the Bible and the Greek and Roman poets. Since 1600, two successive lines of verse that rhyme with each other, known as a couplet featured as a part of the longer sonnet form, most notably in William Shakespeare's sonnets. A couplet is a pair of lines of verse. It usually consists of two lines that rhyme and have the same meter William Shakespeare ( baptised Sonnet 76 is an excellent example. Sonnet 76 is one of 154 sonnets written by the English playwright and poet William Shakespeare. The two line poetic form as a closed couplet was also used by William Blake in his poem Auguries of Innocence and later by Byron (Don Juan (Byron) XIII); John Gay (Fables); Alexander Pope (An Essay on Man). In Poetics, closed couplets are two line units of verse that do not extend their sense beyond the line's end William Blake (28 November 1757 – 12 August 1827 was an English poet, painter, and Printmaker. Auguries of Innocence is a Poem from one of William Blake 's notebooks now known as The Pickering Manuscript Http//www Don Juan (dɒn dʒuən is a long digressive satiric poem by Lord Byron, based on the legend of Don Juan, which Byron reverses portraying Juan not as John Gay ( 30 June, 1685 - 4 December, 1732) was an English Poet and Dramatist. Alexander Pope (21 May 1688 – 30 May 1744 is generally regarded as the greatest English Poet of the eighteenth century best known for his Satirical
In Victorian times the epigram couplet was often used by the prolific American poet Emily Dickinson, her poem no. 1534 is a typical example of her eleven poetic epigrams . The novelist George Eliot also included couplets throughout her writings, her best example is shown within her sequenced sonnet poem entitled BROTHER AND SISTER each of the eleven sequenced sonnet ends with a couplet. Mary Ann (Marian Evans ( 22 November 1819 – 22 December 1880) better known by her Pen name George Eliot, was an In her sonnets, the preceding lead-in-line, to the couplet ending of each,could be thought of as a title for the couplet, and as is exampled in Sonnet VIII of the sequence.
In the early 20th century the rhymed epigram Couplet form developed into a fixed verse image form, with an integral title as the third line, when Adelaide Crapsey codified the Couplet form into a two line rhymed verse of ten syllables per line with her image couplet poem first published, 1915 in Rochester NY by The Manas Press. Adelaide Crapsey ( September 9, 1878 – October 8, 1914) was an American poet ON SEEING WEATHER-BEATEN TREES. By the 1930s this five line cinquain verse form became widely known in the poetry of the Scottish poet William Soutar. Cinquain refers in general to any Stanza or short poem of five lines William Soutar was a Scottish Poet, born 1898 He served in the navy in World War I, and afterwards studied at the University of Edinburgh, where Originally labelled epigrams but later identified as image cinquains in the style of Adelaide Crapsey. Adelaide Crapsey ( September 9, 1878 – October 8, 1914) was an American poet In the last decade of the 20th century the American poet Denis Garrison developed a two line 17 syllable variation of the image couplet with his [1], where euphony is the key component and a title thereto optional.
Poetic epigrams
- What is an Epigram? A dwarfish whole;
- Its body brevity, and wit its soul.
- — Samuel Taylor Coleridge
- Little strokes
- Fell great oaks. Samuel Taylor Coleridge ( 21 October 1772 &ndash 25 July 1834) was an English Poet, Critic and philosopher
- — Benjamin Franklin
- Here lies my wife: here let her lie!
- Now she's at rest — and so am I. Benjamin Franklin ( April 17 1790 was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States of America.
- — John Dryden
- I am His Highness' dog at Kew;
- Pray tell me, sir, whose dog are you?
- — Alexander Pope
- I'm tired of Love: I'm still more tired of Rhyme. John Dryden (– was an influential English poet Literary critic, Translator and playwright who dominated the literary life of Restoration England Alexander Pope (21 May 1688 – 30 May 1744 is generally regarded as the greatest English Poet of the eighteenth century best known for his Satirical
- But Money gives me pleasure all the time.
- — Hilaire Belloc
- I hope for nothing. Joseph Hilaire Pierre René Belloc (27 July 1870 &ndash 16 July 1953 was a French -born Writer who became a Naturalised British subject I fear nothing. I am free.
- — Nikos Kazantzakis
In the early part of the 20th century a short image form of the Poetic epigrams was created by Adelaide Crapsey whereby she codified this Couplet form into a two line rhymed verse of ten syllables per line with an integral title as exampled by her image poem published in 1915 . Nikos Kazantzakis ( Νίκος Καζαντζάκης) ( February 18, 1883, Heraklion, Crete, Ottoman Empire - Adelaide Crapsey ( September 9, 1878 – October 8, 1914) was an American poet A couplet is a pair of lines of verse. It usually consists of two lines that rhyme and have the same meter . 'ON SEEING WEATHER-BEATEN TREES'. In more recent times the American poet Denis Garrison developed a two line 17 syllable variation of the couplet which he labelled the crystalline. The key component of the latter is euphony.
Non-poetic epigrams
Occasionally, simple and witty statements, though not poetical per se, may also be considered epigrams, such as one attributed to Oscar Wilde: "I can resist everything except temptation. Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 1854 – 30 November 1900 was an Irish Playwright, Novelist, poet and Author of " This shows the epigram's tendency towards paradox. A paradox is a true statement or group of statements that leads to a Contradiction or a situation which defies intuition; or inversely Dorothy Parker's witty one-liners can be considered epigrams. Dorothy Parker (August 22 1893&ndashJune 7 1967 was an American writer and poet best known for her caustic Wit, wisecracks and sharp eye for 20th century urban foibles Also, Macdonald Carey's legendary line "Like sands through the hourglass, so are the days of our lives" can be considered an epigram, as the meaning of life is concisely explained in a simile. Edward Macdonald Carey ( March 15, 1913 – March 21, 1994) was an American Actor, best known for his role as the Patriarch
The term is sometimes used for particularly pointed or much-quoted quotations taken from longer works. For the Wikipedia quotation templates see:CategoryQuotation templates.
See also
- Aphorism
- Category:Epigrammatists
- Epigraph (archeology)
- Epigraph (literature)
- Epitaph
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