This volume, the latest in the Corinth series, publishes the results of the rescue excavations of seven chamber tombs, seventy tile graves, limestone sarcophagi and cremation burials along the terrace north of ancient Corinth carried out by Henry Robinson on behalf of the Greek Archaeological Service in 1961 and 1962. S.’s systematic study provides fresh insights into the changing burial practices at Corinth from the fifth century bc to the sixth century ad, while offering a well-illustrated piece of research with informative maps, plans, drawings and plates. Two appendices are included: one on the 1932 Roman chamber tomb at Hexamilia and its finds, and another on the lead tablets, a rare occurrence at Corinth, from the ‘Chamber Tomb with Sarcophagi’ and its well.
Chapter 1 gives the topographical setting and the methodology, and summarises the results of the study. Chapter 2 provides a detailed topographical and chronological survey of the tombs, drawing a sharp distinction between the Classical and the Hellenistic tombs and funerary practices and those from the Roman period. In this context, S. also establishes two criteria that may be used to distinguish Roman practices at the site: the carving of pillows and the use of the claw-chisel in the local poros sarcophagi.
Chapter 3 introduces the ‘Robinson Painted Tomb’. Despite the ambiguous and fragmentary evidence, S. builds up an interesting hypothesis on the changing burial rites in it – from the first inhumations some time before the mid-second century (not the Augustan period as previously believed) to the fifth-century cremation burials. Contra M. Walbank's interpretation of the tomb's wall decoration as a Nilotic scene (‘Unquiet Graves: Burial Practices of the Roman Corinthians’, in D.N. Schowalter and S.J. Friesen [edd.], Urban Religion in Roman Corinth [2005], pp. 263–5), S. sees instead a depiction of rustic fertility, drawing parallels from domestic and funerary contexts in central Italy.
Chapters 4 and 5 discuss the three chamber tombs (Square Tomb with Tile Floor [STTF]; Chamber Tomb with Sarcophagi [CTS]; Late Square Tomb [LST]) to the south-west of the Greek Tile Works, and the earlier, Roman Burial Cavity X (X), Chamber Tomb QQ (QQ) and Cremation Tomb (CT) from near the south scrap of the aqueduct ditch, respectively. S. underlines the unique architectural arrangement of CTS (mid-second to sixth century) – the only Corinthian tomb with a precinct preserved in front of it, the exclusive use of LST (late fourth/early fifth century to late fifth or sixth century) for child burials, the inhumation of a child of possible special status in CTS and the banqueting-like arrangement of the second/third-century inhumations in CT.
The study of the burial assemblages is aptly complemented by the osteological and zooarchaeological analyses in Chapters 6 and 7 respectively (most of the 237 skeletons belong to the fourth and fifth centuries). Through a ‘shotgun’ approach, E. Barnes reconstructs the life circumstances of the cemetery population and their basic activities. Methodologically, though, Barnes's proposition that ‘robust bones indicate male’ (p. 156) cannot be taken at face value (e.g. R.L. Gowland, ‘Age, Ageing and Osteological Bias: the Evidence from Late Roman Britain’, JRA suppl. series 65 [2007], 164) and may raise some issues of interpretation. Signs of functional stress as well as exposure to diseases and infections are contextualised within the wider Mediterranean, and, interestingly, one of the earliest Mediterranean cases of leprosy was detected in CT. D.S. Reese's faunal analysis shows that the animal bones – some mixed with human remains – from fourteen ‘bone lots’ were either food debris (Sus, Ovis/Capra, Bos) purposely thrown into an open tomb or residues of other activities dumped in with earth fill (Gallus, E. caballus, E. asinus); the rarity of E. caballus in bone working in Corinth, as in other contemporary sites, is also noted.
In Chapter 8 funerary architecture is discussed and contextualised: none of the chamber tombs assessed may be classified as ‘monumental’; a remarkable uniformity is shared among the sizes, plans and layouts of chamber tombs across Corinth, possibly the work of a single contractor; interior space and furnishings are more important than tomb size/plan; local architectural variations and peculiarities are noted, for example the positioning of cists within the tomb, the presence of one or two steps in front of a central sarcophagus and of cut or built pillows in sarcophagi and cists; chamber tombs were built for ordinary Corinthians with some disposable wealth; all cremations are Roman and are often secondary to inhumations rather than being earlier; and no special provision was made for child burials. S. rightly urges that the equation of ‘family tomb’ with ‘multi-generational use’ should be treated with caution. She also goes some way towards challenging assumptions on the introduction of the chamber tomb in Corinth by highlighting local Roman preferences and fashions, a pattern also attested in Sicily, Crete and Cyprus; this suggestion merits further investigation. The comparison with the tomb with loculi and a triclinium on Mt Scopus in Jerusalem and the second-century tombs with triclinia at Ostia is interesting, and the assessment of the Jerusalem tomb is useful in this context.
Chapter 9 supports previous knowledge on depositional patterns of grave goods at Corinth. In Classical and Hellenistic burials the inclusion of lamps as a uniquely local practice is notable, as is the unvarying tradition of including a drinking cup and pitcher with the corpse, and the increasing use of miniatures rather than full-scale oinochoai and lamps. On the other hand, Roman and late Roman contexts are characterised by the deposition of unguentaria for anointing and the use of thin-walled mugs and two-handled cups for libations, the placement of a cooking pot and lamp on the cover of the sarcophagus before the grave shaft was filled in, the conscious lack of any kind of grave goods in some of the tombs and the recycling of ordinary clay pots as cinerary urns. As opposed to central Italian funerary customs, gold earrings of the single-loop variety are not associated with infants at Corinth. The significance of the fourth–fifth century dakainai with dove impressions might even be Christian, the dove serving as ‘a symbol of (deathbed?) baptism’ (p. 214).
Chapter 10 is in some ways the heart of the work as it addresses issues of variability of the cultural landscape of the Greek, Roman and Christian communities at Corinth with regards to funerals and commemoration rites. S.’s main thesis focuses on the relationship of the early Roman Corinthians to the city's Roman and pre-Roman past. She sees strong central Italian influences on the city's chamber tombs (poured concrete vaults, biclinia and the practice of cremation burials; see also K.W. Slane, ‘Remaining Roman in Death at an Eastern Colony, JRA 25 [2012]), a theory passionately debated by Walbank (‘Remaining Roman in Death at Corinth: a Debate with Kathleen Slane’, JRA 27 [2014]). Whether Roman Corinthians remained Roman in death is undoubtedly a multifaceted and complicated topic, and issues such as cultural memory and identity formation are at play here. Further, S. suggests that the gradual development of specifically early Christian burial practices may be traced locally in the orientation of the latest interments to the west (not to the east as was the Roman custom) and the introduction of multiple burials. Child burials become visible in this work, and this is a noteworthy contribution to the study of this relatively under-studied age group in Roman Greece. The history of the early urban development of the colony is advanced by the identification of the tombs at the (later) eastern edge of the town as being the earliest amongst the excavated Roman tombs at Corinth.
Some issues arise as a result of the volume's organisation, one being repetition. The findings of the osteological and faunal analyses are cited (sometimes in the exact same words) in both the scientific reports and in Chapters 2–6. It is not clear why Chapter 9 and the section on ‘Material Culture’ in Chapter 10 were not merged. Also, a summary of the results in the introductory Chapter 1 seems unnecessary. Leaving these issues aside, though, there is no doubt that this volume highlights important aspects of funerals and commemorative rites at Corinth over a millennium, integrates the findings in a wider Mediterranean perspective and stimulates scholarly debate on Roman and early Christian Corinth. This is where its value lies.
