| Entry: | I’m thinking of completely abandoning the “Level” scheme and stick with “house sequences” or “house histories” or something house-based instead of trying to conform my data to the Levels, which don’t really work. House sequences and the relationships between buildings are more informative because what I am really interested in are how one building relates to another. For example, Farid (2007: 280) says that Building 6 was built while Building 2 was still occupied but this is the difference between Level IX and Level VIII. So this is why I am starting to think that doing an analysis based on house histories instead of Levels is actually more productive and an efficient approach.
Being out here for the past few weeks has changed many of my ideas and notions about my patterns and trends. There are in fact more dissimilarities than there are similarities. I can still say with relative confidence that all the Level IX buildings are the same but this pattern begins to change at Level VIII. The south wall [F. 505] of Building 21 is unique to its neighbors. The south wall of Building 7 [F. 445] is also unique although there is a possibility that F. 455 is not a true south wall because of the access holes, indicating another space to the south. The brick fabric employed in F. 455 is unique across the mound which distinctive red, clay rich bricks. Might also want to mention that the other three walls of Building 7 are compositionally different than F. 455, lending greater weight to the idea that F. 455 is not a true south wall. Additionally, at Level VII there is a small room behind Shrine 8 that has two small spaces – Mellaart identified these as House 3 (which is slightly confusing because he labeled a house 3 at Level VI as well in the same area so something is a bit off here).
The one that really does not make sense to me is Building 43 because it is identified as Level VIII but it is at a greater elevation than its western neighbor, B. 6. Maybe Building 6 was constructed first? Anyway, the fabric used here is again unique across the mound. What I will need to look at is the fabric of the overlying structure and see how this pairs up with other Level VII buildings. Also, will want to have a look at the relationship between Building 43 and B 6. So, a summary of the Level VIII south walls is: Three walls are compositional anomalies, with one wall not being a true exterior wall. I have not included the outlying Level VIII buildings, such as Building 40. Need to have a look at these and take some detailed notes. Farid (2007: 280) says that Building 6 was built while Building 2 was still occupied. The south wall [F. 485] of Building 6 is constructed from the same backswamp clay as a Level IX building and is the ONLY Level VIII building made from this fabric.
The appearance of the brown fabric appears at Level VIII and not Level VII as I had stated previously. Also, I had said that the biggest change in brick fabric was at Level VII and it looks like it is at Level VIII, which does not match the ceramic data as neatly as I would have liked. I still need to look at the north end of the south area (at Level VIII) to complete this scenario but I think the neighboring structures of Sp. 161, 162 and Bldg 4 are more similar to each other than not. But when I was reading the context sheets, there were quite a few mentions of “lifts” so I’ll need to find a way of dealing with these, especially since I cannot locate all these samples in the archive and often there is not enough of the sample to survive each of my destructive analyses. Anyway, I had originally thought that the lower levels, particularly IX and VIII were more “communal” or community-based activities but if my ideas hold any weight, then these Level VIII walls undermine the argument. Hmmm. I’ll need to rethink that.
On that note, I’ve been thinking about brick size. The received wisdom is that bricks get smaller through time but, like everything else, that is not a standard. Very large bricks are coming out of the 4040 on a more regular basis where the exact opposite would be expected. I thought that the 4040 would have ‘smaller’ bricks but many of them are still large enough to require more than one individual. However, the bricks in the TP are indeed smaller (I seem to remember- I’d have this data more concretely if they ever bother to input their unit sheets so I can get all the context data!).
There is also the issue of re-used blocks that I will need to address at some point. Roddy has some pretty clear evidence of it- I seem to remember a single plastered brick in the east wall of Building 56 but the composition of the brick was the same as the others in the wall, not surprising for that sequence anyway. This issue is going to become important in order to discuss some unusual traits that have been showing up this year. For example, in Foundation Trench 7, Simon found some “backswamp” bricks, which I have not seen in the 4040. Also, I found a bit of white marl mortar- one near the midden pit and the other in Anise’s trench 5. It is unusual to see these fabrics suddenly “re-appear” after not being used since Level VIII. Yet another reason to dismiss the Level sequences and stick with “house histories”. I wonder if an old pit was re-opened? Or were earlier phases being robbed out and materials being re-used? I doubt marly mortar was being robbed but Roddy is fairly convinced of constant reuse of bricks. I’ll need to sort that out with the descriptive texts from context sheets.
The other thought that I had today was about “lifts” and how to deal with the various different bricks within a single wall. One thought was that maybe one lift of one house will match another? I wonder if two houses were built concurrently, like B. 16 and 23, if the “lifts” in each building match. Visibly, it looks as if the ‘lift’ of Building 23 matches the ‘lift’ of B. 16 but I might have this wrong. Thinking about it, I might be right about this but the stratigraphy of the east wall of B. 16 is still unclear to me and Shahina wants me to find the original profile drawings. Easier said than done.
I have been writing that I have not seen these lifts but because I mislabeled F.522, I was looking right at a lift without even knowing it. There are a few things that strike me about this wall in particular. The bricks are the same fabric throughout the wall so I am guessing, as before, that the bricks were made at one time, probably in advance and stored until they are used. But there is a very distinctive change in the mortar. This creates two possible scenarios. The first is that there is a temporal gap in the construction of the house. The second is that the house was built all at one time (one season) and mortars were made in batches. Mortars are easier to make, require less fabric and don’t require such an investment of labor so it is more likely that all the bricks were made in advance and mortars were made on the day/week of construction. How would I go about “proving” the accuracy of either of these scenario’s?
Then Simon had a few random bricks in his Trench 7 so I began to wonder about if bricks were left over from the construction of one house. For example, if a batch was made and there were leftover bricks, would these be incorporated into another house? Or are we looking at a repair job where a new brick fabric was made? Or are we looking at a communal effort, where many different people are contributing to the construction of a house? Are different bricks representing different people? I have discussed the possibility of “craft specialization”, group versus communal effort, or if a guild-like unit was responsible for all the building. I am starting to wonder if the variability is a reflection of one of these scenarios.
Mira has mentioned a “high variability” in fabric types but I am wondering just how variable this really is? I am starting to think that there are a few anomalies, such as the midden rich bricks of B. 43 (Serdar) and the super sandy brick of B. 53 (Simon), but that the rest of them fall into a generic category. For example, just about everything that I have seen in the 4040 this season has been very similar to each other- characterized by fine sand, orangy-brown silt. This fabric is similar to just about every other “late” material I’ve seen: Ist, TP and Roddy’s sequence. There are, of course, several exceptions to this but I still think that one fabric was favored in the final phases of East mound occupation.Entered By: SHL |
