“The next ceremony was that of burning the body. In the earlier ages of their history the Romans are said to have buried the bodies of their dead entire, without burning; and there seems to be no doubt that, at all events, the two practices, burning the body and cremation, existed at the same time; but the latter appears to have become gradually more fashionable, until few but paupers were buried otherwise. In the age of the Antonines the practice of cremation was finally abolished in Italy; but the imperial ordinances appear to have had but little effect in the distant provinces, where the two manners of burial continued to exist simultaneously. Both are accordingly found in the Roman cemeteries in Britain, in interments which were undoubtedly not those of Christians. Perhaps the practices varied in different parts of the island, according to the usages of the country from which the colonists derived their origin. It is a circumstance worthy of remark that, as far as discoveries yet go, no trace has been met with of burials in the Roman cemeteries of Uriconium, otherwise than by burning the dead. “The funeral pile, _pyra_, was built of the most inflammable woods, to which pitch was added, and other things, which often rendered this part of the ceremony very expensive. An inscription, preserved by Grüter, speaks of some persons whose property was only sufficient to pay for the funeral pile and the pitch to burn their bodies--_nec ex eorum bonis plus inventum est quam quod sufficeret ad emendam pyram et picem quibus corpora cremarentur_. It had been ordered by a law of the Twelve Tables, that the funeral pile must be formed of timber which was rough and untouched by the axe, but this rule was perhaps not very closely adhered to in later times. When the body was laid on the pile, the latter was sprinkled with wine and other liquors, and incense and various unguents and odoriferous spices were thrown upon it. It was now, according to some accounts, that the _naulum_, or the coin for the payment of the passage over the Styx, was placed in the mouth of the corpse, and at the same time the eyes were opened. Fire was applied to the pile by the nearest relatives of the deceased, who, in doing this, turned their faces from it while it was burning; the relatives and friends often threw into the fire various objects, such as personal ornaments, and even favourite animals and birds. When the whole was reduced to ashes, these were sprinkled with wine (and sometimes with milk), accompanied with an invitation to the _manes_, or spirit of the deceased. The reader will call to mind the lines of Virgil (Æn. vi. 226):-- ‘Postquam collapsi cineres, et flamma quievit, Relliquias vino et bibulam lavere favillam, Ossaque lecta cado texit Corynæus aëno.’