| Entry: | Work on the burials is still proceeding and we have not reached the deadline of completing them today as I had hoped. Burial F.44 and its adjacent number, F.45 are now out and all that remain, excluding the 'foundation' burial, are those under the two platforms. Chad and Louise are working on F.47 which includes a disarticulated adult? and an infant and and earlier interment in F.41, also an infant. Problems are arising with the feature/burial attributions in that it can sometimes be difficult to be clear whether something should be assigned a new feature number. Technically, every interment episode should have its own feature number (units comprising a cut, skeleton and backfill), but the multiple burials were usually grouped under a single feature number because recuts were so difficult to discern; the problem is especially acute with F.38 and F.29 and this year I am trying to be more rigorous with regard to burial episodes. Despite that, it is clear that in most cases, recuts are going to be too difficult to tease out. One suggestion is that in the future a section is kept across the burial so this can be seen as well as the excact level/floor at which the grave cut is made; the problem though is not only that it is practically very problematic to half-section a grave but also the axis on which cuts are made and visible will change and a single section is not going to pick up these subtlle differences. The best compromise is perhaps a working section kept until the top of the grave fill is seen, the section drawn and then removed - all one would need is a very small block of section on the edge of the feature. Anyhow, F.29 has now been split as Naomi and myself are excavating and looking for cuts; here on the south side of the platform we removed today the upper half of an articulated adult, F.49 but have also exposed another skull beneath; the bones here seem in much better condition than those under the northern platform F.13 which may be due to its greater depth below the surface of the mound. In F.29, an articulated torso is exposed and waiting to be recorded and underneath this, another skull is appearing. They seem to go on forever. I may be tempting fate to set a new deadline for the end of next week but it really must finish. On a brighter note, work has been picking up on cleaning all the walls and drawing them - Ali and Charlotte are now in Space 71 doing this and should finish in a few days while I and Loiuse worked on the low access step between Spaces 70 and 71 yesterday. This has revealed some interesting reworking in that it appears as if the original entrance/crawlway was to the north where there is a clear break in the wall and that at some point this was bricked up (using a real mixture of bricks - very reminiscent of the partion wall F.15 in Space 70) and the access shifted right up against the southern wall. This remodelling may be associated with the installation of a new domed oven (F.11) in the southwest corner of Space 70 as the opening of the oven aligns with the shifted access while the primary hearth, F.33 lay opposite the original access. Also probably associated with this remodelling was the insertion of the cattle horn core projecting out into Space 71.Entered By: Gavin Lucas |
