DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9177#0083
IV
THE HOUSE AND THE TOMB
63
himself brought in a law to check it. . . . He diminished the
cost of funerals not only by imposing fines, but even by restrict-
ing them in time; they were by law confined to the time before
daylight. He also set bounds to fresh tombs; ordaining that
on the tumulus of earth nothing should be set up but a little
column not higher than three cubits, or a flat slab, or a water-
pot. A special magistrate was appointed to superintend this
matter." When Cicero speaks of plaster-work (opus tectorium)
he perhaps means fresco-painting, for which a coating of plaster
was necessary as a foundation, or his authority may have been
really speaking of reliefs. When he speaks of a water-pot
(labellum), he must mean not the hydria, which does not occur
on graves, but the lutrophoros, or vessel for fetching sacred
water from the Ilissus for the nuptial bath, a marble represen-
tation of which commonly stood on the graves of those who died
unwedded.1
This statement is in general accord with the facts as revealed
by the spade. Monuments in the archaic period are quite
simple; but the severe law of Solon must soon have been some-
what relaxed, as we find on them, not indeed laudatory inscrip-
tions, but simple reliefs or paintings representing the deceased.
We possess only a few tombs of the time before the Persian wars.
In the days of greater hardness and austerity which followed on
those wars, the monuments of the dead are very simple; the
inscription recording usually only the name of the deceased and
°f his father and clan. Then in the later fifth and the fourth
centuries the art of the sculptor has fuller and fuller course;
until in the age of Demetrius Phalereus, at the end of the fourth
century, it meets with a decided check.
The usual and simplest form of the tombstone is the stele or
mere upright slab, surmounted by a conventional acanthus
design, whereon is engraved the name of the dead, and fre-
quently, in the most unpretending style of art, a relief represent-
1 Sculptured Tombs of Hellas, p. 114.
THE HOUSE AND THE TOMB
63
himself brought in a law to check it. . . . He diminished the
cost of funerals not only by imposing fines, but even by restrict-
ing them in time; they were by law confined to the time before
daylight. He also set bounds to fresh tombs; ordaining that
on the tumulus of earth nothing should be set up but a little
column not higher than three cubits, or a flat slab, or a water-
pot. A special magistrate was appointed to superintend this
matter." When Cicero speaks of plaster-work (opus tectorium)
he perhaps means fresco-painting, for which a coating of plaster
was necessary as a foundation, or his authority may have been
really speaking of reliefs. When he speaks of a water-pot
(labellum), he must mean not the hydria, which does not occur
on graves, but the lutrophoros, or vessel for fetching sacred
water from the Ilissus for the nuptial bath, a marble represen-
tation of which commonly stood on the graves of those who died
unwedded.1
This statement is in general accord with the facts as revealed
by the spade. Monuments in the archaic period are quite
simple; but the severe law of Solon must soon have been some-
what relaxed, as we find on them, not indeed laudatory inscrip-
tions, but simple reliefs or paintings representing the deceased.
We possess only a few tombs of the time before the Persian wars.
In the days of greater hardness and austerity which followed on
those wars, the monuments of the dead are very simple; the
inscription recording usually only the name of the deceased and
°f his father and clan. Then in the later fifth and the fourth
centuries the art of the sculptor has fuller and fuller course;
until in the age of Demetrius Phalereus, at the end of the fourth
century, it meets with a decided check.
The usual and simplest form of the tombstone is the stele or
mere upright slab, surmounted by a conventional acanthus
design, whereon is engraved the name of the dead, and fre-
quently, in the most unpretending style of art, a relief represent-
1 Sculptured Tombs of Hellas, p. 114.