PAEISH OF GANTON. 



165 



their chests, the other between their hips. Beneath the shoulders 

 of the man there lay a boar's tusk and a small round quartz pebble. 

 The two vessels are almost identical in shape, size, and orna- 

 mentation ; as also are their covers. The vase [fig. 77] is 2J in. 

 high, 3 in. wide at the mouth, and If in. at the bottom. It is 

 entirely covered on the outside, as well as on the inside of the 

 rim, with lines, arranged herring - bone wise, and made by a 

 sharp-pointed tool drawn towards the maker in the moist clay. 

 The cover, which has a handle to raise it by, is 3 Jin. in diameter, 

 and has a pattern, made by dotted impressions, two lines of which 

 run round it, one on the edge, the other near to and parallel with 

 it ; from the latter encircling line, others, placed in pairs, converge 

 towards the handle. It will be observed from the engraving that there 

 is a want of uniformity in the ornamentation of the vase and of the 

 cover, and this is still more apparent in the originals. The colour 

 and nature of the clay also differs very materially; the vases being 

 of a very pale brown, the covers of a very dark brown. It would 

 therefore appear probable that they did not proceed from the hands 

 of the same workman. 



In this case we can have little hesitation in regarding the 

 burial as that of a man and his wife, who, one in life, in death 

 had not been divided. They had both died in their prime, and 

 may very possibly have been childless. And if so, their very 

 attitude in the grave betokening the strong bond of affection which 

 had linked them together in life, and all analogy leading us to the 

 conclusion that, in their rude, untutored system of belief, that 

 connection was not to be dissolved even through 'the grave and 

 gate of death,' are we to think harshly of the possible self-sacrifice 

 which, now that she was deprived of what had made the old life 

 most desirable to her, would, as she thought, enable her to follow 

 into a new one him whose love had been her happiness, and to 

 whom she hoped to be in the future, as she had been in the past, 

 the loving help-mate, the sharer of his toils and pleasures ? 



Eleven feet east-north-east of the centre was the body of a very 

 young child, the head to W. Twelve feet north-east-by-east of the 



A vase with a cover is stated to have been found at Stanton Moor, Derbyshire. 

 Archseol., vol. viii. p. 62. A very beautiful ' food vessel ' with a cover, discovered at 

 Cairn Thierna, County Cork, is figured in the Journ. of the Arch. Inst., vol. vi. p. 191. 

 In a cist at Danesford was found a deposit of burnt bones, and a very fine and 

 elaborately ornamented urn with a cover, having ' a handle or loop at the top to lift it 

 by.' Kilkenny Journ of Arch., N. S., vol. iii. p. 169. In Denmark urns with lids are 

 not very uncommon, and they have occurred in Germany and Italy. 



