A royal epitaph - Eshmunazar II

I have departed hence,

And am no more forever.

Like the day I vanished,

Hath my spirit faded from the world,

And my voice

Ceased from sounding in the ears of men.

Sarcophagus of Eshmunazar II
Louvre Museum
Source: Codex 99

Hush ! Here sleeps a king,

Encoffined in the tomb

He builded with his wealth;

Bequeathing unto whomsoe'er

Shall move his bones,

Or dig for treasure in his mould'ring dust,

A curse that shall continue,

And consume his race:

To him and his be there no rest for evermore,

Nor fruit of any toil;

Let him, when dead, lie rotting on the field,

His bones the prey of jackals.

I have departed hence, 

To dwell no more with men; 

And, like the day I vanished, 

Hath my spirit faded into nothingness: 

Farewell.

---

Eshmunazar II (c. 539 – c.525 BC) Ancient Phoenicia = modern day Lebanon

Translated by Frederic Rowland Marvin

Source: Flowers of song from many lands; being short poems and detached verses gathered from various languages and rendered into English, by Frederic Rowland Marvin, Pafraets Book Company, 1902

This is inscibed on the sarcophagus of Eshmunazar II who presumaby wrote it as his epitaph