Epigram

• An epigram is a short, witty, sometimes paradoxical remark or statement, often satirical in tone. As Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) puts it in his couplet An Epigram,

What is an epigram? A dwarfish whole,

Its body brevity, and wit its soul.

An epigram may be either in prose or in verse. Of the following examples the first four, of which the author is Oscar Wilde (1854-1900), are taken from prose works, while the final two come from the long poem An Essay on Criticism by Alexander Pope (1688-1744).

To love oneself is the beginning of a life-long romance.

Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.

A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is absolutely fatal.

Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative.

To err is human, to forgive divine.

We think our fathers fools, so will we grow;

Our wiser sons no doubt will think us so.

• The word epigram may also be used to describe a poem written in the style of an epigram. Coleridge's couplet An Epigram, quoted above, is an example. An epigram in this sense is a short poem - rarely more than a dozen lines, sometimes no more than a couplet - displaying wit and ingenuity, often satirical, and with a sting in the tail.

The most famous author of epigrams in this sense is the Roman poet Martial (40-104 CE), who published twelve books of epigrams. Here are two examples:

Quid mihi reddat ager quaeris, Line, Nomentanus?

hoc mihi reddit ager: te, Line, non video. (Book II, 38)

You ask me what I see in my farm near Nomentanum, Linus?

What I see in it, Linus, is: I can't see you.

Cur non mitto meos tibi, Pontiliane, libellos?

ne mihi tu mittas, Pontiliane, tuos. (Book VII, 3)

Why don't I send you my little book?

Pontilianus, lest you send me yours.

A more recent example of a poem which is an epigram is Lamia in Love by Robert Graves (1895-1985):

Need of this man was her ignoble secret:

Desperate for love, yet loathing to deserve it,

She wept pure tears of sorrow when his eyes

Betrayed mistrust in her impeccable lies.

• Do not confuse the nouns epigram and epigraph. An epigraph is either a short quotation at the beginning of a book (or chapter of a book) or an inscription on a monument or building. The related noun epigraphy is used to mean the study of inscriptions, particularly ancient inscriptions.

Epigram and epigraph both come from Ancient Greek words. An epigramma (ἐπίγραμμα) in Greek was either an inscription or an epigram in the sense of a short poem; while an epigraphe (ἐπιγραφή) was an inscription on a monument. Both these Greek words derive ultimately from the preposition epi (ἐπί, on) and the verb graphein (γράφειν, to write).: