conspicuous of our finds, and the fact they all came
from the proximity of the temple would undoubtedly
seem to prove that they were used in temple service,
broken by subsequent occupants of the ruins, and
the fragments thrown outside.
The next find from Zimbabwe which we will
discuss is the circular soapstone object with a hole in
the centre, which at first is suggestive’of a quern ; but
SOAPSTONE CY L IND ER FROM ZIM BABW E
being of such, friable material such could not have
been the case. It is decorated round the side and on
the top with rings of knobs, four on the side and four
on the top ; from the central hole a groove has been
cut to the side, and the whole is very well finished
off. This thing is 2 feet 2 inches in circumference.
We also found portions of a smaller bowl with the
same knob pattern thereon. The use of this extraordinary
soapstone find is very obscure. Mr. Hogarth
calls my attention to the fact that in the excavations
at Paphos, in Cyprus, they found a similar object,
similarly decorated, which they put down as Phoenician.
It is now in the Fitzwilliam Museum at Cambridge,
and is a cylindrical object of coarse white
marble six inches in diameter and about four and three-
quarter inches high. It is studded with round projecting
studs left in relief on the marble, resembling
O B JEC T FROM T EM P L E ' OF PA PH O S , CY PRU S
in general disposition those on our soapstone find,
and there is no question about the similarity of the
two objects. They remind one of Herodian’s description
of the sacred cone in the great Phoenician temple
of the sun at Emesa, in Syria (Herodian, bk. v. § 5),
which was adorned with certain ‘knobs or protuberances,’
a pattern supposed by him to represent
the sun, and common in phallic decorations.