Week 5: AP Euro and Gravestones

Managed to remember the "k" this time. All is well.
Boccaccio and Botticelli AND Beccaria...too much too much. Seriously, trying to remember what each of these guys did can cause a minor headache.

The afternoon class is getting more into the Renaissance and how it connects back to Rome which is important for my topic of memory. Speaking of memory, I went to a cemetery this week to see how we memorialize people today as opposed to when the Romans were putting up funerary inscriptions.

The grave inscriptions I saw and Roman funerary monuments are strikingly similar. Grave markers from both the modern and ancient world included the name of the deceased(duh) and often some sort of familial relation. The Roman gravestones often didn't record the exact day of death, and if the deceased age was included it was often approximate.

Take 2 since it didn't save last time...
At the outset of my project, I thought I was going to look at literacy and language in public writing to see what it says about society as a whole, but attending classes and reading books has changed the focus of my project. Now I'm looking at memory in the form of twitter and gravestones, and I've found that graffiti doesn't fit in so much anymore. It's been a refinement process because I didn't realize just how huge my topic was.

Here's an example of a funerary inscription.
AE 1962.70 – Merida, Spain – probably 2nd

D M S
LUTATIA LUPATA ANN XVI
LUTATIA SEVERA ALUMNAE
H S E S T T L

Edited:
D(is) M(anibus) S(acrum)
LUTATIA LUPATA ANN(os) XVI
LUTATIA SEVERA ALUMNAE
H(aec) S(ita) E(st) S(it) T(ibi) T(erra) L(evis)

Translated:
To the Underworld Gods,
Lutatia Lupata 16 years
Foster child of Lutatia Severa
She lies here. May the earth rest lightly on you.

Here's a modern one.

Hope everyone's well!