86 The Roman Cemetery of Uriconium. 



him wherever they could obtain it to their own satisfaction, 

 provided it was not within the walls of a town. The possessor 

 of a villa in the country appears to have had his burial-place 

 within the precincts of his own house, as was the case in the 

 Roman villa recently uncovered at North Wraxhall, Wilts, by 

 Mr. Poulett Scrope, and described in the Wiltshire Archaeolo- 

 gical and Natural History Magazine for October, 1860; and in 

 that at Walesby, in Lincolnshire, described in the Reliquary 

 for October, 1861. The inhabitant of a town, as we have just 

 stated, bought himself a piece of ground outside the town ; and 

 from the circumstance of its being the repository of the dead, 

 it became consecrated, and to trespass upon it was regarded as 

 sacrilege. Nevertheless, the ground adjoining might be em- 

 ployed for any other purpose; and suburban houses and villas 

 might be intermixed with the tombs, as was the case in Pom- 

 peii. In fact, the Roman seems, even when dead, to have still 

 courted the proximity of the living, for he always by preference 

 sought to establish his last home as near as possible to the 

 most frequented road; and the inscriptions on his roadside 

 tomb often contained appeals to the passers-by — in terms 

 such as siste viator (stay, traveller), or tv qvisqvis es qvi 

 transis (ivhoever thou art, passenger) — to think on the departed. 

 The epitaph on a Roman named Lollius, published by Gruter, 

 concludes with the following words, intimating that he was 

 placed by the roadside, in order that the passers-by might say, 

 "Farewell, Lollius!" 



HIC . PROPTEE . VIAM . POSITVS 

 VT . DICANT . PRAETEREVNTES 

 LOLLI . VALE. 



These examples will explain the position of the cemetery of 

 Uriconium, and of those of the other Roman towns in Britain. 



To explain the various objects which have been found in 

 our excavations, it will be necessary to give a brief sketch of 

 the formalities which attended death and burial among the 

 Romans. The last duty to the dying man was to close his 

 eyes, which was usually performed by his children, or by his 

 nearest relatives, who, after he had breathed his last, caused 

 his body first to be washed with warm water, and afterwards to 

 be anointed. Those who performed this last-mentioned office 

 were called joollinctores. The corpse Was afterwards dressed, 

 and placed on a litter in the hall with its feet to the entrance 

 door, where it was to remain seven days. This ceremony was 

 termed collocatio, and the object of it is said to have been to 

 show that the deceased had died a natural death, and that he 

 had not been murdered. In accordance with the popular 

 superstition, a small piece of money was placed in the mouth, 



