The Epitaph
Here lies Judge Boat within a coffin:Pray, gentlefolks, forbear your scoffing.A Boat a judge! yes; where's the blunder?A wooden judge is no such wonder.And in his robes you must agree,No boat was better deckt than he.'Tis needless to describe him fuller;In short, he was an able sculler.
Words in this poem
- gentlefolks n.
- Persons of gentle or good family and breeding. Etym: [Generally in the United States in the plural form.]
- needless a.
- Having no need.
- sculler n.
- A boat rowed by one man with two sculls, or short oars.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Epitaph is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume 2, Project Gutenberg ebook #13621; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Jonathan Swift, The Epitaph, in Poems, Volume II (1710–1745), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #13621, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/swift-poems/the-epitaph.html, id L09323.
Form and metre
The Epitaph is 8 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 50% of the lines: heroic couplets. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 91%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.8 syllables. 6 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
See other poems in heroic couplets, other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 --AABB-- coffin · scoffing · blunderA · wonderA · agreeB · heB · fuller · sculler
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Here lies Judge Boat within a coffin: | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| Pray, gentlefolks, forbear your scoffing. | 9 | ····˘/·/˘ |
| A Boat a judge! yes; where's the blunder? | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| A wooden judge is no such wonder. | 9 | ·/˘····/˘ |
| And in his robes you must agree, | 8 | ······˘/ |
| No boat was better deckt than he. | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| 'Tis needless to describe him fuller; | 9 | ·/˘·˘/·/˘ |
| In short, he was an able sculler. | 9 | ·····/˘/˘ |
Notes from the edition 1
The notes to the Poems of Jonathan Swift, Volume II (Project Gutenberg #13621).
- Line 8 Query, whether the author meant scholar, and wilfully mistook?--Dublin Edition.
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.