In the same paper Professor Loeschcke publishes[159] a fragment of an archaic equestrian statue (Fig. 52), which comes from the graveyard of Vari in Attica, and was probably a memorial of a cavalier buried there. The equestrian figure on Greek tombs had, as we have found in an earlier chapter, usually a special meaning; but here it seems to be a mere portrait of one who had served in the cavalry, or perhaps had won a victory at the great games of Greece with a racehorse. Noteworthy are the long rigidly cut figure of the horse, and the seat of the rider, whose legs stretch along the flanks of the horse. This may result from the greater sculptural difficulty of carving the legs in a detached attitude. We possess also certain seated female figures of the same [Illustration: PLATE VI _Page 136_ ] [Illustration: FIG. 52. HORSEMAN FROM TOMB.] early age which appear to have adorned tombs. A fragment of one of these was found built into the wall which Themistocles constructed round Athens soon after the battle of Salamis, a wall erected, as Thucydides[160] tells us, in such haste that men spared neither public nor private edifice in its construction. But the best evidence as to the character of the early sepulchral portraits of Athenian ladies reaches us by a less direct route. Many people are familiar with the charming seated figure in the Vatican which goes by the name of Penelope, a veiled woman seated in pensive attitude, with her head resting on one hand, while the other hand lies on the rock on which she sits (Pl. VI). This rock, however, is a restoration[161], and replicas prove that in place of it we must suppose a chair, under which stood a large work-basket, to have supported the lady. She is, in all likelihood, no mythic heroine, but an ordinary Greek mistress of the house, resting for a while from the active toils of the loom in an attitude which gives the impression that the thought of approaching death has come over her with saddening power. Both the attitude and the basket of work recur frequently in the reliefs of early stelae[162], and there is good reason to suppose that the so-called Penelope is an excerpt from some Greek cemetery, though the statue itself dates only from the Roman age. The original from which it is copied would date from the early part of the fifth century. Before going on to speak of the stelae with reliefs, which are our main business, it may be well to follow down to a later time the lines which start with figures like the ‘Apollo’ of Tenea and the ‘Penelope’ of the Vatican.