"Urn Burial" redirects here. For the 1987 novel by Robert Westall, see Urn Burial (novel).
Title-page of 1658 edition of Urn-Burial together with The Garden of Cyrus
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.
The title is Greek for "urn burial": A hydria (ὑδρία) is a large Greek pot, and taphos (τάφος) means "tomb".
Its nominal subject was the discovery of some 40 to 50 Anglo-Saxon pots in Norfolk.[1] The discovery of these remains prompts Browne to deliver, first, a description of the antiquities found, and then a survey of most of the burial and funerarycustoms, ancient and current, of which his era was aware.
The most famous part of the work is the apotheosis of the fifth chapter, where Browne declaims:
But man is a Noble Animal, splendid in ashes, and pompous in the grave, solemnizing Nativities and Deaths with equal lustre, nor omitting Ceremonies of bravery, in the infamy of his nature. Life is a pure flame, and we live by an invisible Sun within us.
The English composer William Alwyn wrote his Symphony No. 5, subtitled Hydriotaphia, in homage to Browne's imagery and rhythmic prose.
The American composer Douglas J. Cuomo's The Fate of His Ashes: Requiem for Victims of Power for chorus and organ takes its text from Urn Burial.
Eric Ambler excerpts a passage from chapter 5 ("But the iniquity of oblivion blindely scattereth her poppy...") as the epigram for the novel The Mask of Dimitrios.
Kevin Powers uses an excerpt from the fifth chapter ("To be ignorant of evils to come, and forgetfull of evils past...") as one of the epigraphs for his novel "The Yellow Birds".
It also appears in the novel Sanshirō, written by Natsume Sōseki; Hirota-sensei lent the book to Sanshirō.
The British mystery writer Reginald Hill uses quotes from Urn Burial as chapter headings for his novel "Urn Burial" (1975), also known as "Beyond the Bone" written under the name Patrick Ruell.
American nonfiction writer Colin Dickey compares some of Browne's writing on death in Urn Burial to the fate of Browne's skull in his book Cranioklepty: Grave Robbing and the Search for Genius.
References
^"Spoilheap: Antiquities and the Art of Contemplation". British Archaeology. 176: 66. January–February 2021. ISSN1357-4442.
^George Saintsbury (1911). "Antiquaries". In A. W. Ward; A. R. Waller (eds.). The Cambridge History of English Literature. Vol. 7. Cambridge University Press. p. 242.
