Crystal balls have been found occasionally in tombs or in funerary urns, and their presence in sepulchres may perhaps be considered to have been due to a belief that they possessed certain magic properties. In the tomb of Childeric (ca. 436-481 A.D.), the father of Clovis, a rock-crystal sphere was found which was for a time preserved in the Bibliothèque Royale, Paris, and later in the Louvre Museum; it measures 1½ inches in diameter.[325] The chance discovery of a number of crystal balls is related by Montfaucon. Towards the end of the sixteenth century, the canons of San Giovanni in Laterano, Rome, wished to have some repairs made to a house they owned, just outside of the city walls, and sent thither some workmen with the order to break up or remove two large, superimposed stones, which were much in the way. The workmen proceeded to break the upper stone, but were much astonished to find embedded within it an alabaster funerary urn with its cover. This had been hidden between the two stones, a space for its reception having been hollowed out in the upper and lower stones, so that it fitted within them. Opening the urn there were found inside, mingled with the ashes, twenty crystal balls, a gold ring with a stone setting, a needle, an ivory comb, and some bits of gold wire. The presence of the needle was taken to indicate conclusively that the ashes were those of a woman.[326] The discovery of the tomb of Childeric was made, May 27, 1653, by a deaf-mute mason, named Adrien Quinquin, while he was excavating for the restoration of one of the dependencies of the church of Saint Brice de Tournai. One of the most interesting objects found in the tomb was the golden signet of Childeric bearing his head and the legend _Childerici regis_. The earliest description is given in a work by Chiflet entitled “Anastasis Childerici,” “Resurrection of Childeric,” published by Plantin of Antwerp in 1655. The various ornaments were sent by the Spanish Governor-General of the Netherlands to the Austrian treasury in Vienna, and were not long afterward, in 1664, graciously donated by Emperor Leopold I to King Louis XIV, at the instance of Johann Philip of Schonborn, Archbishop of Mainz, who was under great obligation to the French sovereign. [Illustration: ROCK-CRYSTAL SPHERE. Japan, five inches diameter. Morgan collection, American Museum of Natural History, New York.] In Paris the various ornaments were preserved in the Bibliothèque Royale until the night of November 5-6, 1831, when many of them, with other valuables, were stolen by an ex-convict. Closely pursued by the police, the thief threw his booty into the Seine; much of the plunder was subsequently recovered, but the signet of Childeric was lost for ever. The crystal ball had not seemed of sufficient value to tempt the thief and was left undisturbed; it was later, in 1852, deposited in the Louvre Museum.[327]