Ayios Ermoyenis, Discovery of Trench 43, V. Grace 1941Virginia Randolph Grace

Continued from scan 7

… covering floor was laid not long after his interment, all the skulls being crushed level with the other bones. At this time also the offerings must have been cleared away. All that can now be precisely associated with these skeletons are four items: #75, an iron nail(?) beyond the head of the woman, at her level; #79, a narrow piece of iron which seemed to support the arch of her left foot (see Figure 15); #80, a silver coin which had been in the mouth of the man (found on the shoulder where the lower jaw bone had rested); and #78, an uncertain iron and wood object between the legs of the northeast child. Unfortunately the coin, which might have dated the last burial at this level, went to pieces in cleaning, and could not be identified; its appearance when found suggested that it was Ptolemaic. A bronze mirror, #74, was found tilted in the soft strewn covering earth, hence presumably belongs to the first level. Finally, the stone alabastra #44-46, found broken and laid aside together against the side of the north stomion, one inverted, must have been offered before the second burial period, since the fragment #72, which lay directly on the ribs of the northeast child, joins with #46.

There was evidently a fall of roof in this quarter while the bones of the northeast child were still exposed, since these were covered with the smooth stones (one quite large) into which the loose conglomerate disintegrates, whereas the southeast child, overhung by walls of the same material, was covered like the bones on the south and west with a mixture of earth and broken-up sandstone. An actual breach, probably into the fragmentary trefoil lamp, #73, explain in Tomb 9, at this point would most easily explain the crushed skull of the northeast child, certain stray bones which found resting over the crushed skull of the northeast child, some adult teeth, and the bottom of a small pot found just east lay west of the skull, some adult teeth, and the bottom of a small pot found just east of #78. See Figure 16, which shows also samples of the strewn earth which formed the floor of the second burial level, and the silted-in earth which covered the latter. The tidying of the chamber previous to its use at the second level left a rise in the floor in the northeast quarter which somewhat confuses the attribution of objects to the various burials. To the items predating Period II may probably be added the iron strigil #47, found with its tip buried in fill of broken rock.