Marble Statue Of Woman

The “Marble Statue of a Woman” is part of a large group of funerary statues. It came from Attica, Greece. The statue was placed in a deep and covered niche where it was found.
We knew about Demetrios of Phaleron, the governor of Athens. In the late 4th Century, he banned ostentatious displays by rich families. However, we knew that the sculptures that the wealthy families commissioned for graves did still exist, so we checked some areas for sculptures that we knew existed but couldn’t find.
After looking at some old maps and historical references we found a place that we suspected may have held some sculptures from Demetrios of Phaleron’s era. We created a map of the Attica historical region based on what we knew about Ancient Attica so that

we knew about our surroundings.
After getting the government’s permission, we used fine blades to cut around the cover to see if any of the sculptures were underneath. After seeing some marble, we had to excavate the objects.
To excavate the objects, the cover on top of the niche had to be taken down. Some of the tools we used were: shovels and trowels to loosen the dirt around the cover, brooms and brushes to clear away the dirt and buckets to carry the dirt away. We also used a flat mason’s trowel, which scraped away the soil surrounding the niche.