Papers of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens (6.1890-1897 (1897))

GRAVE-MONUMENTS FROM ATHENS.

I.

In digging for the foundations of the large house which Mr.
C. Merlin, the well-known artist and photographer of Athens, is
building at the corner of Academy and Kephissia Streets, the
workmen came upon considerable remains of an ancient ceme-
tery. At my suggestion Mr. Merlin made over to the American
School the right of publishing these discoveries, and afterwards
generously presented to the School three reliefs and one other
inscribed stone, together with some smaller fragments. The
finds were made in the autumn of 1894. Only a part of them
came under my observation at the time; hence the description of
the graves and their location rests in part upon the accounts of
Mr. Merlin and his workmen.

The description will be made clearer by Fig. 1, which exhibits
an outline of the plan of the house, and its situation with rela-
tion to the adjacent streets. All the graves lay two or three
meters below the present level of Academy Street, and this is
somewhat lower than Kephissia Street. Within the triangle ABC
were several graves with sides and tops of rough-dressed marble
slabs. Near A were two of this type, side by side, one of which
I saw opened. This contained sknlls and other bones, more or
less broken, which indicated at least five bodies, one of them that
of an infant. With these bones was a jar, of poor and undecor-
ated pottery, about 15 cm. high and of like diameter, containing
only earth and some fragments of plain glass bottles of common
Roman shape. The eastern end of this tomb was walled up with

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