CANDIDATUS FIAT HONORATUS TUUS, ET TU FELIX SCRIPTOR, SI HIC NON SCRIPSERIS. INSCRIPTOR ROGO TE UT TRANSEAS HOC MONUMENTUM. QOIUS CANDIDATI NOMEN INSCRIPTUM FUERIT, REPULSAM FERAT, NEQUE HONOREM ULLUM GERAT.[15]

In an early state of society there would be little danger that the site on which interments had taken place should be converted to ordinary purposes. The violation of a sepulcre was severely punished by the Roman law, and is deprecated on grounds of humanity in some inscriptions, threatened with divine vengeance in others. Fabius Augurinus offers this wish for him who should spare the tomb of his wife and child;[16] SIC NUNQUAM DOLEAS ATQUE TRISTE SUSPIRES QUANTUM DOLORIS TITULUS ISTE TESTATUR. Another pleads,[17]

Sacratam cunctis sedem ne læde viator.
Hanc tibi nascenti fata dedere domum.

Another[18] utters the awful imprecation, QUISQUIS HOC SUSTULERIT AUT LÆSERIT, ULTIMUS SUORUM MORIATUR. The act of dedication is often recorded on the tomb with the addition “Sub ascia,” and the figure of an adze or hatchet[19]. But Roman burial places had no legal sanctity, like that which our churchyards enjoy; they were taken from out the fields and gardens which bordered the highway, and the temptation was great on the part of the heir to re-annex the ground to his property. The inscriptions on Roman sepulcres indicate the care which those who caused them to be erected took, to prevent their being either alienated to other purposes, or taken possession of by others than those for whom they were designed. The area which the tomb and its appurtenances should occupy, is carefully defined; HIC LOCUS PATET IN FRONTEM PEDES XX.; IN AGRUM PEDES XXV.; occasionally we meet with much larger dimensions. If the ground had been granted by another for this purpose, the words of the grant were sometimes inscribed on the monument. The right of using the sepulcre for placing sarcophagi, or urns, is defined commonly by the words, SIBI SUISQUE FECIT; frequently permission is given for the interment of freedmen and freedwomen with their master. Sometimes leave is given to introduce into the columbarium a limited number of ollæ, or funeral urns,[20] or, on the other hand, an individual is prohibited by name from sharing or even approaching the sepulcre; EXCEPTO HERMETE LIBERTO QUEM VOLO PROPTER DELICTA SUA ADITUM, AMBITUM NEC ULLUM ACCESSUM HABEAT IN HOC MONUMENTO. In another inscription, SECUNDINA LIBERTA, IMPIA IN PATRONUM SUUM, is forbidden to be interred in his tomb.[21] The churlish declaration, IN HOC MONUMENTO SOCIUM HABEO NULLUM is a rare exception, and in general the sepulcral inscriptions give a pleasing idea of the relation between masters and their households. The collection of Gruter contains many pages of inscriptions expressive of the reciprocal feelings of masters and patrons, slaves and freedmen; and an equally copious and pleasing record of the feelings of slaves and freedmen towards their fellows.

The heir was the object of especial jealousy; HOC MONUMENTUM HÆREDEM NON SEQUITUR (H.M.H.N.S.) is a regular formula; the contrary stipulation, that the monument should go to the heir is most uncommon.[22] The prohibition to alienate is expressed with all the fulness of legal phraseology; HOC MONUMENTUM, CUM ÆDIFICIO SUPERPOSITO NEQUE MUTABITUR, NEQUE VÆNIET, NEQUE DONABITUR, NEQUE PIGNORI OBLIGABITUR, NEQUE ULLO MODO ABALIENABITUR, NE DE NOMINE EXEAT FAMILIÆ SUÆ,[23] and is sometimes enforced by a fine to the municipality, to the Roman people or the vestal virgins and the Pontifices, to secure the exaction of which one-fourth is to go to the informer. Legal chicanery was greatly dreaded as the means of defeating the purpose of the builder of the monument: hence we often find the protestation, HUIC MONUMENTO DOLUS MALUS ABESTO; sometimes with the addition ET JURISCONSULTUS, a combination which, in countries where the civil law is practised, is a standing jest against the jurisconsults.[24] To preclude one source of cavil we find a man protesting on his tomb, in an inscription by which he directs a statue to be erected to him, that when he made his will, he had “a sound and disposing mind;” SANUS, SANA QUOQUE MENTE INTEGROQUE CONSILIO, MEMOR CONDITIONIS HUMANÆ, TESTAMENTUM FECI.[25] It is recorded on the pyramid of C. Cestius that the monument had been erected in 330 days, “arbitratu Pontii Cl. Melæ heredis et Pothi liberti,” the heir not having been trusted alone with the execution. So in Horace (Sat. 2, 5, 105),

——Sepulcrum
Permissum arbitrio sine sordibus extrue.

In one inscription, it is made the condition of inheritance, that the monument should be begun in three days after the testator’s death, and its model is prescribed. A son apologizes to his father for having erected a humble monument to him on the ground of the smallness of the inheritance; “Si major auctoritas patrimoni mei fuisset, ampliori titulo te prosecutus fuissem, piissime pater.”[26] With this distrust of posterity, it was natural that men should erect their monuments in their own lifetime, leaving to their heirs only the duty of inserting the years of their age; for the year of the decease, which the Romans marked by the Consuls, is rarely given. Sibi vivus fecit (sometimes se vivo, se vivis even me vivus, se vivus) is often found, as on the sarcophagus