Hector, when burned and when his ashes have been placed in the casket, is laid in a [Greek: kapetos], a ditch or trench (_Iliad_, XV. 356; XVIII. 564); but here (XXIV. 797) [Greek: kapetos] is a chamber covered with great stones, within the howe, the casket being swathed with purple robes, and this was the end. The ghost of Hector would not revisit the sun, as ghosts do freely in the Cyclic poems, a proof that the Cyclics are later than the Homeric poems. [Footnote: Helbig, op. _laud_., pp. 240, 241.] If the burning of the weapons of Eetion and Elpenor are traces of another than the _old_ AEolic epic faith, [Footnote: Ibid., p. 253.] they are also traces of another than the late _Ionic_ epic faith, for no weapons are burned with Hector. In the _Odyssey_ the weapons of Achilles are not burned; in the _Iliad_ the armour of Patroclus is not burned. No victims of any kind are burned with Hector: possibly the poet was not anxious to repeat what he had just described (his last book is already a very long book); possibly the Trojans did not slay victims at the burning. The howes or barrows built over the Homeric dead were hillocks high enough to be good points of outlook for scouts, as in the case of the barrow of AEsyetes (_Iliad_, II. 793) and "the steep mound," the howe of lithe Myrine (II. 814). We do not know that women were usually buried in howe, but Myrine was a warrior maiden of the Amazons. We know, then, minutely what the Homeric mode of burial was, with such variations as have been noted. We have burning and howe even in the case of an obscure oarsman like Elpenor. It is not probable, however, that every peaceful mechanic had a howe all to himself; he may have had a small family cairn; he may not have had an expensive cremation.