Unnumbered pageScan 2 of 52
XXXX 19174
February 16, 1972Dear Peter:
I do apologize for the long delay in answering your enquiry about the date of the Ktisis mosaic and about a photograph of the floor mosaic from the Basilica.
I have read the Pales notebooks line by line all the way through from 2 Nov 48 onward to the end and have found no recognizable entry about lifting the mosaic or digging under it. I do not know what to think unless he changed the designation of the room (not impossible) and this escaped me. On the date the found it was referred to as Room K. However, I think the enclosed Xeroxes of pages in his vol. X will serve your purpose. You will see that coins of Honorius and Arcadius are regarded as pertinent. These must account for George's date of 408 A.D. for the building in general.
It is regrettable that there was no concordance of publication numbers and coin inventory numbers in Dorothy Cox's manuscript. I begged her to include one but she was unable to see her way to do so. Curium coins all had inventory numbers and it could indeed have been done.
About the mosaic in the Basilica illustrated in the Bulletin, vol. 7, 2. I fear the negative was one of those destroyed in the London blitz in WW II. A good many of George's were there, you know. I have, accordingly, ordered a copy print from the Bulletin and hope it will do.
I am of course very pleased that you feel you can proceed with the Basilica publication. Vassos does keep breathing down my neck, you know, annually or thereabouts.
I hope that the Dumbarton Oaks paper in May means that we may see you and Elektra! You are among our very favorite people, you know. It would be a great pleasure to see you both.
Best -
Handwritten: fem 23 / mm? — pencil note at lower left, illegible
65 figures hard to readstruck struck outadded written in above” jug ditto, and what it repeatsword reading not certain