A nameless poor Roman
c. 1st–3rd century · Roman Empire · ⟨ ⟩ marks letters the stonecutter left out. The date is not known exactly; it is put here in the early centuries of the Roman Empire, when most such epitaphs were cut.
If I had had a fortune to match my heart and spirit, I would have built you a magnificent monument here. As it is, since all of us, once dead, know the same, this is enough.
Si pro virtute et animo fortunam habuissem,
magnificum monumentum hic aedifica⟨vi⟩ssem tibi.
Nunc, quoniam omnes mortui idem sapimus, satis est.Bücheler, Carmina Latina Epigraphica 204 (CLE 204)
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A Roman who hailed the passer-by
c. 1st–3rd century · Italy, Roman Empire · Roman tombs lined the roads outside the town walls, and gravestones often spoke to the passer-by. The date is not known exactly; it is put here in the early centuries of the Roman Empire, when most such epitaphs were cut.
Traveller, traveller! What you are, I was; what I am now, you too will be.
Viator, viator! Quod tu es, ego fui; quod nunc sum, et tu eris.Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum XI 6243 (CIL XI 6243)
The writer of Claudia's epitaph
2nd century BC · Rome · A gravestone from Rome that tells a woman's life in eight lines, in its old spelling.
Stranger, what I have to say is short; stop and read it through. Here is the unlovely tomb of a lovely woman. Her parents gave her the name Claudia. She loved her husband with her whole heart. She bore two sons. One of them she leaves on the earth, the other she laid beneath it. Her talk was charming, her step was graceful. She kept the house. She spun wool. I have spoken. Go on your way.
Hospes, quod deico paullum est, asta ac pellege.
Heic est sepulcrum hau pulcrum pulcrai feminae.
Nomen parentes nominarunt Claudiam.
Suom mareitum corde deilexit souo.
Gnatos duos creauit. Horum alterum
in terra linquit, alium sub terra locat.
Sermone lepido, tum autem incessu commodo.
Domum servavit. Lanam fecit. Dixi. Abei.Bücheler, Carmina Latina Epigraphica 52 (CLE 52)
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