Unnumbered pageScan 2 of 2
Printed: LE CASTEL-BLANC / 14, RUE TURGOT / ST-GERMAIN-EN-LAYE
8th April 1949
Dear Megaw,
being hurried. On the other hand, in order to ensure a chance for the new publication to become a good seller, I must insist on a date towards august-september for handing the volume to the printer, especially since you wanted a provisional report of your dig and the statue in a paper with such wide circulation as the Illustrated London News, which will, I know from experience, be fully used by archaeologists. [illegible] that I went on alone at Enkomi-Alasia.
If Dikaios intends to resume his dig before my return to Cyprus in September, I would like him (as I already asked him in a letter) to keep the corner of the room where he found the statue as it was after the removal of the statue. The date of this important find will be hotly disputed and I want to be able to support Dikaios' stratigraphy after examination of the spot before excavations will be resumed there.
Dikaios' travel and other expenses would be taken over by the French Expedition as far as this year's excavation programme is concerned. As to this year's excavation programme of your digI suppose you intend to proceed to the lower levels without enlarging the area of the dig itself, to which of course I agree. It will soon become a problem how to get rid of the great quantities of dumped earth without too much waste of time and money. I already asked you where you were dumping the earth. Could the good earth not be taken by the villagers for improving their neighbouring fields some of which are rather rocky?
Have you bought, as I believe you intended, a lorry and fender for your department which could be used also at Enkomi for removing the earth? Or do you want to go back to the system of the Decauvilles? Another solution would be to excavate each section of the town to the virgin soil and then, after a season or two, when the plans are ready and air photographs made, we fill them in again and sell the land back to the peasants in improved condition.
Please think these points over. Our policy should be to keep the maximum of money for the scientific dig and the publication. A town site as much dug up and disturbed as Enkomi, will hardly be worth being kept open as a whole; I propose to preserve only the most important and best preserved buildings.
Yours sincerely
Handwritten: signature
with regard to the publication, I cannot without showing to the printer the manuscript and the plates of your contribution, get an exact estimate of the cost. But I think that since your contribution does not make a large part of the first volume (Enkomi I), the most practical arrangement would be that the French Expedition pays the production of the whole book and then sends you a copy of the bills (printer's, elicheur, etc.). This will enable you to work out your share of the cost which you can then refund to the French Expedition's account at Barclay's in Famagusta. In any case it will be well below the commitment fixed by your authorities.
As I have already written to Dikaios, I can agree to a later date for sending me the manuscript of his contributions to Enkomi I (a definite account of the statue and a provisional account on his dig 1948-49). Thus he will be able to work without the fearing of
65 figures hard to readstruck struck outadded written in above” jug ditto, and what it repeatsword reading not certain