size.
Fig. 65.—Gold fibula, one-half of the actual size. The hoop is very slender; the cups deep and conical. The contents were peculiar and very interesting. While, as might naturally be expected, we find, in most ancient graves, only the bones and teeth, all the soft parts having long ago decayed away, in some cases—and this was one of them—almost exactly the reverse has happened. Through the action of water, owing perhaps to the fact that it was strongly impregnated with iron, the soft parts of the body had been turned into a dark, greasy substance; and the bones, with the exception of a few fragments, were changed into a kind of blue powder.
Fig. 66.—Smooth, massive, cylindrical gold ring, with ornamented ends, one-half of the actual size.
Singularly enough, the brain seems to have been the part which had undergone least change, On opening the coffin, it was found lying at one end, where no doubt the head had originally been placed, covered by a thick hemispherical woollen cap, about six inches in height (fig. 72). The outer side of the cap was thickly covered by short loose threads, every one of them ending in a small knot, which gave the cap a very singular appearance. The body of the corpse had been wrapped in a coarse woollen cloak (fig. 73), which was almost semicircular, and hollowed out round the neck. It was about 3 ft. 8 in. long, and broad in proportion. On its inner side were left hanging a great number of short woollen threads, which gave it somewhat the appearance of plush.
On the right side of the body was a box, closed by a lid of the same diameter. It was 712 in. in diameter,
