Note 70 — Chapter V · THE CULT OF SOULS

The speaker in Dem. 55, 13 ff., mentions the παλαιὰ μνήματα of the πρόγονοι of the earlier possessors of his χωρίον (country-estate). This custom of burying the family dead in the private ground of the family καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις χωρίοις συμβέβηκε. Timarchos is asked by his mother τὸ Ἀλωπέκῃσι χωρίον (which lay 11 or 12 stades away from the city walls) ἐνταφῆναι ὑπολιπεῖν αὐτῇ (in spite of which he sold it): Aeschin., Tim. 99. Examples in East Attica of walled-in family cemeteries with room for many graves: Belger, Localsage von den Gräbern Agamem., etc. (Progr. Berl. 1893), pp. 40–2. It was thus the very general custom to keep the family graves on their own ground and soil; and this corresponds closely enough with the oldest custom of all, that of burying the master of the house in his own home.—In Plu., Arist. 1, Demetr. Phal. mentions an Ἀριστείδου χωρίον ἐν ᾧ τέθαπται in Phaleron.