For miles from this point the Sacred Way was lined with tombs, especially in the immediate neighbourhood of the gate. A number of the ancient tombstones are still standing in their original place, but many have sunk out of sight, and not a few were used as materials for fortification after the Persian war, and again after the battle of Chæronea. Indeed, some of them are still to be seen built into portions of the wall. It was outside the Dipylon that the bones of those who had died in battle were interred. One of the most sacred obligations of a Greek army after an engagement was to recover the bodies of its dead, and whenever a truce for this purpose was asked by the defeated side it could not be refused without a breach both of honour and of religion. At the interment it was customary for a funeral oration to be delivered in praise of those who had given their lives for their country. On one of these occasions, as Thucydides tells us, when Pericles was the speaker, he gave such a noble address that the women mourners in their gratitude and enthusiasm crowned him with wreaths, as if he had been a conqueror.[6] Funeral honours paid to the brave dead were not a mere expression of sentiment, for provision was at the same time made out of the public funds for the support of their children till they came of age. The existing tombstones, as a rule, depict scenes illustrative of the life of the departed, or else they [Illustration: THE DIPYLON (GATE) AT ATHENS The central block of the outer side of the gate is in the foreground; in front of it the marble base of a statue with a low bench, also in marble. In the distance is seen the Acropolis, with the Propylæa at the right hand.] represent in a simple and impressive way the last farewell, by the mutual clasp of the hands, or by figuring the deceased as in the act of going on a journey. It was different, however, with the earthenware vases, called _lecythi_, which were placed within the tomb, for they had usually depicted on them a funeral scene of some kind, either borrowed from real life or having reference to the unseen world, Charon and his boat being frequently introduced in this connection. In some few cases the dead man is represented as partaking of a banquet, suggesting the idea that he still survived to claim the ministrations of his friends as a hero or demi-god. There was one form of large, two-handled vase in particular, generally of marble, which when deposited on a tomb indicated that the person interred there had died unmarried. As its name, _loutrophoros_, signifies, it was the jar used for carrying water from the spring Callirhoe for the bridal bath, and its presence on the tomb symbolised the belief that a marriage with _Hades_ (Pluto) awaited those who had died in their virginity.