Slab vi. contains five male figures. Three (Nos. 12-14) carry vases on their shoulders; a fourth (No. 15) stoops to raise from the ground a similar vase, which is singularly misinterpreted in Carrey's drawing as a lamb. The vase resembles in form the three-handled water-pitcher, hydria or calpis, which was in use in the period of Pheidias, but two handles only are shown in the sculpture; the third handle, which was attached to the neck midway between the other two, is not seen, except, perhaps, on the vase of No. 15. Michaelis supposes that the vases here represented on the frieze contained the wine used in the Panathenaic sacrifice, and that these figures may be the Spondophori, who are mentioned by Pollux (i. 35). On the right of this slab are the arms, flute, and drapery of the first of the four flute-players drawn by Carrey. This slab was found in 1833, inside the peristyle of the Parthenon. [Rightnote: VII.] The persons bringing objects connected with the sacrifice are immediately followed by a band of musicians, consisting of four flute-players and four lyre-players, or citharists, all playing on their instruments. The musicians, as is usual, wear long chitons and ample mantles. Of slab vii. only two small fragments remain. See Plates vii., viii., and Nos. 345, _5_ and _6_. [Rightnote: VIII.] [Sidenote: 17, 18.] [Sidenote: 19.] The next slab contains parts of the second pair of citharists and the foremost of a group of male figures, principally on the two slabs immediately following. [Rightnote: IX., X.] [Sidenote: 19-30.] The figures on these two slabs are bearded men (Nos. 19-30), all clad in the himation, and moving forward at a leisurely pace; Nos. 25 and 26 wear a band on their heads; No. 25 draws it over his hair; Nos. 28 and 30 wear long hair, plaited in the manner of the _krobylos_. The attire, elderly type, and general deportment of these figures corresponds with that of the Thallophori, by which name ancient authors designate elderly citizens who carried olive branches in the Panathenaic procession. The right hands of three of these figures are closed, as if they were holding a wand or branch. Slab ix. was discovered in 1840, and is a fragment of the slab drawn by Carrey, which, when he saw it, contained nine figures similar to those on x. A recently-discovered fragment, from the left of slab ix., has not been inserted for want of space (cf. Plate viii., and No. 345, _8_).