Editing Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial

{{short description|Book by Thomas Browne}}
{{redirect|Urn Burial|the 1987 novel by Robert Westall|Urn Burial (novel)}}
{{italic title}}
[[File:Title-page of 1658 edition of 'Urn-Burial' and 'The Garden of Cyrus'.jpg|thumb|right|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]].<ref>{{cite journal|journal= British Archaeology|title=Spoilheap: Antiquities and the Art of Contemplation|volume=176 |date=January–February 2021 |page=66 |issn=1357-4442 }}</ref> 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 [[funerary]] [[convention (norm)|customs]], 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:
{{blockquote|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.}}

[[George Saintsbury]], in the ''[[The Cambridge History of English and American Literature|Cambridge History of English Literature]]'' (1911), calls the totality of Chapter V "the longest piece, perhaps, of absolutely sublime rhetoric to be found in the prose literature of the world."<ref name="Saintsbury1911"/>

==Influence==
''Urn Burial'' has been admired by [[Charles Lamb]], [[Samuel Johnson]], [[John Cowper Powys]], [[James Joyce]], and [[Herman Melville]],<ref name="Foley1984"/> while [[Ralph Waldo Emerson]] said that it "smells in every word of the [[sepulchre]]".<ref name="Emerson"/>

Browne's text is discussed in [[W. G. Sebald]]'s novel ''[[The Rings of Saturn]]''.<ref name="SebaldNote" />

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 (novel)|The Mask of Dimitrios]]''.

[[Derek Walcott]] uses an excerpt as the epigraph to his poem "Ruins of a Great House",<ref name="Walcott" /> while [[Edgar Allan Poe]] quotes the ''Urn Burial'' in the epigraph of "[[The Murders in the Rue Morgue]]".<ref name="Poe" />

[[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]]".

[[Alain de Botton]] references the work in his book ''[[Status Anxiety]]''.<ref name="Botton2004" />

[[Jorge Luis Borges|Borges]] refers to it in the final line of his short story "[[Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius]]".

It also appears in the novel ''[[Sanshirō (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 (novel)|Urn Burial]]" (1975), also known as "[[Beyond the Bone]]" written under the name Patrick Ruell.

The American playwright, screenwriter and essayist Tony Kushner uses the work as the point of departure for his five-act "epic farce," ''Hydriotaphia or the Death of Doctor Browne'', first produced in New York City in June 1987, by Heat & Light Co., Inc., and then in April 1997 by the Graduate Acting Program of the NYU Tisch School of the Arts, with a coproduction the following year by the Alley Theatre in Houston, Texas, and Berkeley Repertory Theatre in Berkeley, California.<ref>Kushner, Tony (2000). ''Death & Taxes: Hydriotaphia & Other Plays''. New York: Theatre Communications Group. Pp. 27-30.</ref>

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==
<references>
<ref name="Botton2004">{{cite book |title=Status Anxiety |author=[[Alain de Botton]] |publisher = Vintage International |year=2004 |isbn=9780375725357 |pages=228–229 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/statusanxiety00debo/page/228}}</ref>

<ref name="Foley1984">
{{cite journal
 | last= Foley | first= Brian
 | year= 1984
 | title= Herman Melville and the Example of Sir Thomas Browne
 | journal= [[Modern Philology]]
 | volume= 81| issue= 3 | pages= 265–277
 | doi= 10.1086/391307
 | jstor = 437269
}}
</ref>

<ref name="Emerson">''Journals of Ralph Waldo Emerson: with annotations, Volume 1''{{full citation needed|date=March 2023}}</ref>

<ref name="Poe">{{cite wikisource |title=Tales |chapter=The Murders in the Rue Morgue |wslink=Tales_(Poe) |last=Poe |first=Edgar A. |authorlink=Edgar_Allan_Poe |date=1846 |publisher=Wiley & Putnam |location=London |page=116 |pages= |scan=}}</ref>

<ref name="Saintsbury1911">{{cite book |title=The Cambridge History of English Literature |volume=7 |chapter=Antiquaries |author=[[George Saintsbury]] |editor1=A. W. Ward |editor2=A. R. Waller |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1911 |page=242 |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/afw0070.0007.001.umich.edu/page/242/mode/2up}}</ref>

<ref name="SebaldNote">In chapters 1 and 10 of ''[[The Rings of Saturn]]'' [[W. G. Sebald]] Harvill Press 1998</ref>

<ref name="Walcott">{{Cite web |url=http://www.poetryarchive.org/poem/ruins-great-house |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150110162451/http://www.poetryarchive.org/poem/ruins-great-house |url-status=dead |archive-date=January 10, 2015 |title=Ruins of a Great House |website=poetryarchive.org |language=en |access-date=2017-06-27 }}</ref>
</references>

==External links==
* {{Wikisource-inline|links=''[[s:Sir Thomas Browne's works, volume 3 (1835)/Hydriotaphia|Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial]]''|single=true}}, an 1835 edition edited by Simon Wilkin
* [http://penelope.uchicago.edu/hgc.html Text of ''Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial'' and ''The Garden of Cyrus'']
* [https://librivox.org/search?title=Religio+Medici+Hydriotaphia&author=Browne&reader=&keywords=&genre_id=0&status=all&project_type=either&recorded_language=&sort_order=catalog_date&search_page=1&search_form=advanced Recordings of ''Hydriotaphia'' and ''Religio Medici''] at [[Librivox]] (public domain audiobooks)
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[[Category:1658 books]]
[[Category:Archaeology books]]
[[Category:Death customs]]
[[Category:Works by Thomas Browne]]


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