Lapithos, Cyprus Expedition records

Bert Hodge Hill, a native of Bristol, Vermont, was born in 1874 and received his A.B. degree from the University of Vermont. Attaining his M.A. from Columbia University in 1900, he attended the American School of Classical Studies in Athens as a Drisler Fellow. Hill continued his work at the American School for two years. Following his return to the U.S., he worked briefly at the Museum of Fine Arts in New York as the Assistant Curator of Classical Antiquitoes and lectured in Greek sculpture at Wellesley College.

Hill returned to Athens in 1906 to become the director of the American School of Classical Research for the next twenty years.

In 1931, Hill was commissioned to direct the excavation on Cyprus. He surveyed the site in May and June of that year, beginning formal excavations in September 1931. Dorothy H. Cox assisted him. Excavations needed to cease in 1932 due to financial difficulties. Despite this, analysis of the vast amounts of pottery unearthed and publication of the initial findings was begun by Virginia Grace funded by a grant from the Penn Museum.

in the Spring of 1934, Hill traveled to Kourion with George H. McFadden as a contributing researcher. Excavations continued there until 1953, when McFadden passed away. The important sites included Sotira, Bamboula, Kaloriziki and Kourion.

During World War I and II, Hill served the Red Cross and was an official of the Greek Refugee Settlement Committee under the League of Nations.

Hill resided in Greece for most of his adult life with his wife, Ida. They were married for twenty-nine years at the time of his death in 1958. Hill is buried in the Protestant section of the First Cemetery of Athens.

Dorothy Hanna Cox was raised in Terre Haute, Indiana and first educated in Zurich, Switzerland followed by Miss Shipley's School in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. She attended Bryn Mawr College where she exceled in her majors, math and physics. She was an indifferent student but did well in French and German. Cox completed her college days Columbia University School of Architecture in 1917.

Cox soon found that opportunities were meager for a woman in the profession of architecture. At the outbreak of WWI, she joined the Army Hospital Service. Returning to New York in 1919, she again met with disappointment for job prospects. Feeling unfulfilled in the jobs available to her, she began to serve as an architect for various archaeological expeditions in Greece, Turkey and Cyprus. There she developed an interest and expertise in ancient and medieval coins.

At the start of WWII, Cox was posted to Turkey with the Red Cross but actually worked with the Office of Strategic Services gaining information from refugees about the occupying German and Italian forces in Greece.

Cox returned to the U.S in 1944, exhausted but celebrated for her sensitive and productive work during the war. She joined the history department at Yale. In 1949, she participated in the Yale expedition to Dura Europos on the Euphrates River. The 1950s produced several digs at Gordion for the University of Pennsylvania. Cox was present at the opening of Midas' Tomb and completed detailed drawings of the site.

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In 1931 the University of Pennsylvania Museum commissioned Bert Hodge Hill, associated with the American School of Classical Studies in Athens, to direct a program of excavations in Cyprus. Assisted by Dorothy H. Cox, Hill surveyed the area in May and June and began work at the chosen site of Lapithos in September, 1931. The excavations, concentrated on a series of Early Bronze Age and Geometric tombs, were suspended in 1932 due to financial difficulties. In 1935, under a University of Pennsylvania Museum grant, Virginia Grace began research on the vast amount of pottery excavated at Lapithos. The correspondence in this series is primarily with B. H. Hill, V. Grace, Jotham Johnson, D. H. Cox, and Horace H. F. Jayne, Museum Director. Field note books, field notes, catalogues, inventories, reports, and photographs are included, relating to both the excavation and the later study of the finds. Objects from Lapithos in the University of Pennsylvania Museum bear catalogue numbers 32-27-1 ff.; 69-35-1 ff.

The University of Pennsylvania Museum returned to Cyprus in 1934 to initiate a major project at Kourion. See the finding aid for Kourion, Cyprus records for the records of this expedition.

NOTE: The term Swedish Tombs refer to an earlier Swedish expedition and is not part of the Museum expedition.

Tomb numbering: Initially the tombs were numbered in a series beginning with the number 400 (e.g. 401, 402, etc.), in the belief that the Swedish expedition had excavated close to four hundred tombs. Subsequently the numbering system was changed to a two digit system (e.g., 01, 02, etc.), and at times with the prefix “p” (e.g., p01, p02, etc.). The last two digits in all the schemes refer to the same tomb (i.e., 401, 01, p01 are all the same tomb). Letters after the number refer to chambers (e.g. 6A indicates tomb 6, chamber A.). All tomb numbers in the finding aid and folder titles employ the two digit system.

Photo numbering: A compilation of excavation views was undertaken in 1931 and 1932 and numbered sequentially. In 1953 revised numbering was used for the same set of photos. On the reverse side of the photos (container 7) the original numbers have been placed in squares and the revised ones in circles.

Publication Information: University of Pennsylvania: Penn Museum Archives, 12/14/2016

Finding Aid Author:

Use Restrictions:

Personal Name(s)

• Cox, Dorothy Hannah, b. 1893-
• Grace, Virginia R., b.1901-d.1994
• Hill, B.H. (Bert Hodge), b. 1874-d.1958
• Jayne, Horace H.F., 1898-1975
• Johnson, Jotham, 1905-1967