Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial, or a Discourse of the Sepulchral Urns lately found in Norfolk, is a work by Sir Thomas Browne, published in 1658 as the first part of a two-part work that concludes with The Garden of Cyrus. Sir Thomas Browne (October 19, 1605 – October 19, 1682) was an English author of varied works that disclose his wide learning in diverse fields including medicine, religion, science and the esoteric. ... Events January 13 - Edward Sexby, who had plotted against Oliver Cromwell, dies in Tower of London February 6 - Swedish troops of Charles X Gustav of Sweden cross The Great Belt (Storebælt) in Denmark over frozen sea May 1 - Publication of Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial and The Garden of Cyrus by... The Garden of Cyrus or The Quincuniall, or Lozenge, or Network Plantations of the Ancients, naturally, artificially, mystically considered is a work written by Sir Thomas Browne. ...

Its nominal subject was the discovery of a Bronze Age urn burial in Norfolk. The discovery of these remains prompts Browne to deliver, first, a careful description of the antiquties found, and then a careful survey of most of the burial and funerary customs, ancient and current, of which his era was aware. The Bronze Age is a period in a civilizations development when the most advanced metalworking has developed the techniques of smelting copper from natural outcroppings and alloys it to cast bronze. ... Norfolk (pronounced IPA: ) is a low-lying county in East Anglia in the east of southern England. ... For the musician, see Burial (musician). ... Underwater funeral in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea A funeral is a ceremony marking a persons death. ... A convention is a set of agreed, stipulated or generally accepted rules, norms, standards or criteria, often taking the form of a custom. ...

The most famous part of the work, though, is the fifth chapter, where Browne quite explicitly turns to discuss man's struggles with mortality, and the uncertainty of his fate and fame in this world and the next, to produce an extended funerary meditation tinged with melancholia. The changes wrought by time and eternity, the fleetingness of mortal fame, and our feeble attempts to cope with the certainty of death are Browne's subjects. Yet, at the same time, Browne can be tersely witty, mocking human vainglory: "Time hath spared the epitaph of Adrian's horse, confounded that of himself." Melancholia (Greek μελανχολια) is a mood of non-specific depression. ... An epitaph ( literally: on the gravestone in ancient Greek) is text honoring the deceased, most commonly inscribed on a tombstone or plaque. ... Publius Aelius Traianus Hadrianus (January 24, 76 – July 10, 138), known as Hadrian in English, was a Stoic-Epicurean[] Roman emperor from 117 – 138, and a member of the gens Aelia. ...

A piece of exquisite baroque prose that George Saintsbury called "the longest piece, perhaps, of absolutely sublime rhetoric to be found in the prose literature of the world," Hydriotaphia displays an astonishing command of English prose rhythm and diction. The following is a sample, representative both in its beauty and its inscrutability. Browne rhetorically asks: George Edward Bateman Saintsbury (October 23, 1845 - 1933), was an English writer and critic. ... Rhetoric (from Greek , rhêtôr, orator, teacher) is generally understood to be the art or technique of persuasion through the use of oral or written language; however, this definition of rhetoric has been contested since rhetoric emerged as a field of study in Universities. ...

What Song the Syrens sang, or what name Achilles assumed when he hid himself among women, though puzzling Questions are not beyond all conjecture. What time the persons of these Ossuaries entered the famous Nations of the dead, and slept with Princes and Counsellours, might admit a wide solution. But who were the proprietaries of these bones, or what bodies these ashes made up, were a question above Antiquarism.

Brown's skepticism shows up even at the level of his sentence structure. Note, in particular, how Browne begins these sentences with questions—"who were the proprietaries of these bones," for example—which one would generally expect to see answered in the rest of the sentence.. Instead, Browne not only leaves us in uncertainty for the length of these clauses, but makes that uncertainty permanent by refusing to give an answer at the end. This is a technique he uses throughout the fifth chapter and, indeed, the entire work. Perhaps this was part of what led Virginia Woolf to comment: Odysseus and the Sirens. ... The Wrath of Achilles, by François-Léon Benouville (1821–1859) (Musée Fabre) In Greek mythology, Achilles, also Akhilleus or Achilleus (Ancient Greek ) was a hero of the Trojan War, the central character and greatest warrior of Homers Iliad, which takes for its theme, not the War... An ossuary is a chest, building, well or site made to serve as the final resting place of human skeletal remains. ... Virginia Woolf (née Stephen) (January 25, 1882 – March 28, 1941) was an English novelist and essayist who is regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century. ...

...while the Bible has a gospel to impart, who can be quite sure what Sir Thomas Browne himself believed? The last chapters of Urn Burial beat up on wings of extraordinary sweep and power, yet towards what goal?... Decidedly [Browne's] is the voice of a strange preacher, of a man filled with doubts and subtleties and suddenly swept away by surprising imaginations.

Influence

Browne deeply influenced Thomas de Quincey, who said of this work, Thomas de Quincey from the frontispiece of Revolt of the Tartars, Thomas de Quincey (August 15, 1785 – December 8, 1859) was an English author and intellectual. ...

What a melodious ascent as of a prelude to some impassioned requiem breathing from the pomps of earth, and from the sanctities of the grave! What a fluctus decumanus of rhetoric! Time expounded, not by generations or centuries, but by the vast periods of conquests and dynasties: by cycles of Pharaohs and Ptolemies, Antiochi and Arsacides!

The Urn Burial has also been admired by Charles Lamb, Samuel Johnson, John Cowper Powys, James Joyce, Jorge Luis Borges, and Ralph Waldo Emerson, who said of it that it "smells in every word of the sepulchre." Which was, of course, the exact effect Browne wished. Pharaoh is a title used to refer to any ruler, usually male, of the Egyptian kingdom in the pre-Christian, pre-Islamic period. ... cleopatra ruled seneca for 10 years before she ruled Egypt. ... This entry incorporates text from Eastons Bible Dictionary, 1897, with some modernisation. ... The Arsacid Dynasty ruled Persia. ... Charles Lamb (1775-1834) Charles Lamb (10 February 1775 –- 27 December 1834) was an English essayist, best known for his Essays of Elia and for the childrens book Tales from Shakespeare, which he produced along with his sister, Mary Lamb (1764–1847). ... For other persons named Samuel Johnson, see Samuel Johnson (disambiguation). ... John Cowper Powys (October 8, 1872 - June 17, 1963) was a British (English-Welsh) writer, lecturer, and philosopher. ... James Joyce James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (Irish Seamus Seoighe; 2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish writer and poet, widely considered to be one of the most influential writers of the 20th century. ... Jorge Luis Borges (August 24, 1899 – June 14, 1986), was an Argentine writer who is considered one of the foremost Hispanic literary figures of the 20th century. ... Ralph Waldo Emerson Ralph Waldo Emerson (May 25, 1803 – April 27, 1882) was an American essayist, poet, and leader of the Transcendentalist movement in the early nineteenth century. ... A sepulchre (also spelled sepulcher) is a burial chamber. ...

English composer William Alwyn wrote his Symphony No. 5, subtitled Hydriotaphia, in memory of Thomas Browne. William Alwyn (November 7, 1905 – September 11, 1985) was an English composer, conductor, and music teacher. ... Sir Thomas Browne (October 19, 1605 – October 19, 1682) was an English author of varied works that disclose his wide learning in diverse fields including medicine, religion, science and the esoteric. ...

External link

• text of Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial and The Garden of Cyrus