1938

Episkopi, May 29, 1938

Dear Mr. Hill,

Your letter from Corinth reached me a day or two ago, some time after a letter for George which assumed that mine had already arrived. Both letters found us well and happy, enjoying unusually good weather for this time of year. We had a short hot spell a fortnight ago, and had made up our minds to a speedy end of work outdoors when the weather suddenly changed. It has been tollerable, and at times distinctly cool, ever since.

I have owed you a letter for some time, to tell you that I finally got Georko Kourievs to sign on the dotted line, and have been working in his lot for some time past. I had quite a session with him when I went the day after your departure to get his sig-nature. He pretended that he would be delighted to have us dig, but that unfortunately the lot was not his but his wife's, and that she was very much opposed to it. Rather a change from his wife's attitude the day before! Well we talked and talked and talked, and I nearly gave up several times. George gave me a good opening so I suggested with a valiant attempt at a "Hill smile" that of course we could dig without his permission, but that weakened preferred to arrange things on a friendly basis. That weakened his resistance, and then when I gave him a written agreement that we would give him the value by weight of gold found, and that he could have stones which we did not need, he finally broke down and signed. He had tried previously to make me agree to fabulous values for many different items, and also tried to get me to sign an affidavit that in case we decided to buy his land we would pay some fabulous price. Of course I said that I had no authority to sign such a paper. But when it was all over he became very friendly, and has remained so ever since. He apologized profusely for being such a nuisance, but said that we must excuse &t since he had become embittered by the action of his relatives. And so on and so on. We are very chummy now.

I have fairly littered his lot with trial trenches, most of which will be filled before I leave. The results are still a bit uncertain. Fairly high up on the west side we found a very large area which is a first rate mystery. I think that it was probably a large bothros in it gave some excellent 15th century B.C. pottery. Over much of this area there is a very deep deposit, as much as three meters, of pure fourteenth century earth, which seems to have washed down from the top of the hill. Both this and trenches I have sunk on the top of the hill make me fairly certain that the hill has been much quarried since the Bronze age, so that its level is considerably lower than it was then, and that whatever buildings it held are lost. One exception to this is a magnificent well or cistern, surely the finest construction of the sort I have seen in Cyprus of any period. There is no doubt that it was built in the 14th or even 15th century B.C. An enormous pit has been cut in the rock, which is poor at this point, to a depth of 7.50 meters from the present level of the land. In this pit is the well, 1.85x1.90, built with walls a meter thick composed of large stones, rectangular, and with a fairly well cut inner face. The courses are surprisingly regular, and the corners are carefully bonded. 7.50 meters down the rock being very firm here. We have now reached a depth of a little over eight meters, and it gives no indication of stopping. There is no plaster or clay used in the construction. We found a large block, 1.50 long, which once belonged to the well-head. It is deeply scored in many places