their exact position.

[Illustration: FIG. 164.--Tomb at Mugheir; from Taylor.]

[Illustration: FIG. 165.--Tomb at Mugheir; from Taylor.]

Sometimes the covering is more simple in construction and has a domed top
(Fig. 165). Elsewhere in the same necropolis numerous examples of a still
more elementary form of burial were discovered. The skeletons of children
were found between two hollow plates, and full grown bodies in a kind of
double vase into which they could only have been thrust with some
difficulty and that after being doubled up. Still more often coffins were
of the form shown in our Fig. 166. The diameter of these cylindrical jars
was about two feet. The joint between them was sealed with bitumen. At one
end there was a hole to allow the gases generated by decomposition to
escape. None of these coffins contained more than one skeleton, but narrow
as they were room had been found for the vases and dishes. These were
mostly of earthenware, but a few of bronze were also encountered. Each
coffin held an arrow-head of the latter material, while the feet and hands
of the skeleton were adorned with iron rings. In several cases the remains
of gold ornaments, of sculptured ivories and engraved shells, were
discovered.

[Illustration: FIG. 166.--Tomb, or coffin, at Mugheir; from Taylor.]

Finally the fashion seems to have changed, and a more elegant form of
coffin to have come into use. It was still of terra-cotta, but its surface
was covered with a rich glaze originally blue but now mostly of a dark
green. Here and there, on the parts shielded best from the atmosphere, the
blue has preserved its colour. The general shape of these coffins is that
of a shoe or slipper; the oval opening through which the body was
introduced has a grooved edge for the adjustment of the lid. The small hole
for the escape of gas is at the narrow end. This type seems to date from
the last centuries of antiquity rather than from the time of the Chaldaean
Empire; its examples are found close to the surface of the cemeteries,
whence we may fairly conclude that they were the last accessions. It is
still more significant that the images stamped upon the panels with which
the lids are decorated have little to remind us of the bas-reliefs of
Assyria and Chaldaea, and it is not until we turn to the medals of the
Parthians and Sassanids that we find anything to which they can be readily
compared.[444]

In the cemeteries of Lower Chaldaea the vario