I also found in this tomb the two very curious golden ornaments (see No. 293), which are too large and heavy to have been worn as pendants of earrings and have probably been used as breast ornaments. Each consists of two pieces of repoussé work, which are soldered together, and thus these objects present the same ornamentation on either side.
No. 294.
A Golden Cross.
Sepulchre III.
Actual size.
There was also found a small golden cross, represented under No. 294, having an ornamentation of spirals on either side. It deserves particular mention that the last-named ornaments (Nos. 291-294), as well as some of the smaller ornaments of this sepulchre,[293] though of gold, have a reddish bronze-like colour, so that, if I had found them alone, I should decidedly not have claimed for them a very remote antiquity; but the conditions under which they lay in the sepulchre make it impossible to suppose that the objects found there were of different ages.
GOLDEN HAIR-HOLDERS.
There were also found on each of the three bodies two golden ornaments (six in all) almost in the form of earrings, of which two are represented in the engravings Nos. 295 and 296. But as the two ends of each of these objects are in the form of spirals turned round four or five times, they can, of course, not have been used for the ears; besides they would be by far too heavy for that use, because they are of solid gold. The only use which, in my opinion, can have been made of them is to hold together the locks, and I think they perfectly explain the passage in Homer:[294]—
"Those locks, that with the Graces' hair might vie,
Those tresses bright, with gold and silver bound,
Were dabbled all with blood."
LORD DERBY.