Fundata est ecclesia Merciencis
Quae nunc Lichfieldia dicitur
Facta Cathedralis
Anno Domini
DCLVII
Dugdale, in his "Visitation of Staffordshire," gives us this inscription. It has long since disappeared. Pennant mentions a curious or, as he calls it, "droll" epitaph on the floor near the west door, but there is no sign of it now:—"William Roberts of Overbury, some time malster in this town (tells you) for the love I bore to choir service, I chose to be buried in this place. He died Decr. 16th, 1768."
From a MS. quoted by Shaw we learn that before the Great War "on a fair marble gravestone, placed on the right-hand at the entrance into the choir, is this inscription on a brass plate:—
"Here lyeth George Bullen lat dean of this church who made his own epitaph—viz.,
Lo here in earth my body lyes,
Whose sinfull lyfe deserves the rod:
Yet I believe the same shall rise,
And praise the mercies of my God.
As for my soule let none take thought,
It is with him that hath it bought;