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252 asunder to discover the contents, and placed upon a base, similar in general form to the covering; the ends of this base are raised or recurved upwards. The material of which the sarcophagus is composed is a rough gritty calcareous stone. The following are its dimensions:—Cover. Length, 5 ft. 3 in.; breadth, 3 ft.; thickness, 11 in.; diameter of hole in centre, 2 ft.; depth of ditto, 6 in. Chest. Diameter, 2 ft. 10 in.; height, 2 ft.; internal ditto, 1 ft. 6 in. Consequently the bottom is six inches thick, but the middle is very much thinner, and in the centre of the bottom there is a hole. Base. Length, 5 ft. 3 in.; breadth, 3 ft.; thickness, 1 ft.; thickness of central part, 10 in.; breadth of side, raised part, 1 ft. 10 in.

This form of chest, arca or loculus, is rather uncommon, although well adapted for single interments; when the remains of two or more members of a family were placed in the same tomb, it was generally made of a rectangular shape, with a long elliptical trough, the ends of which well fitted the vases containing the ashes of the deceased: in these sarcophagi the vases were usually formed of glass. Such is the shape of the coffins discovered by the Rev. P. Rashleigh at Southfleet, in Kent, in 1821, and of that published by M. Caumont.

In the British Museum are cylindrical vases of lead, with circular covers, and enclosing bones, and small vases, found in excavations made in the island of Delos. These are evidently of the Roman period. Such forms were familiar to the Roman writers. Arrian mentions the, or bin, in which the body of Cyrus was deposited, which Curtius translates by dolium, or cask ; and Phlegon of Tralles, the freedman of Hadrian, gives an account of the discovery of the head of the hero Idas, in a , or cask of stone. A leaden vase, apparently Roman, with a short cylindrical neck and cover, and body of cylindrical shape, found in Fenchurch-street in 1833, is in the collection of the British Museum.

In the excavations undertaken by Mr. Rashleigh in the Sole field at Southfleet, he discovered two stone coffins, one formed of separate pieces clamped together, the other of a single