Simonides on Tombs, and the ‘Tomb of Simonides’

This chapter begins with the observation that inscribed texts were memorized and orally transmitted. This insight provides the key for a reading of Callimachus’ ‘Tomb of Simonides’—itself a reading of Simonides’ own response to the poetics of inscribed epigram (and of his role as the inventor of memory techniques). The chapter argues that Callimachus presents Simonides’ tomb not as an epitaph, but as a ‘meta-epitaph’—an elegy which is not itself inscribed, but describes the loss of an inscribed tombstone: liberated from the tomb that once covered his body, the voice of Simonides now speaks through Callimachus’ verse.