| Entry: | PTW removed the possible installation F.3325 today (the "bukranium"). It sits on a strange bump of plaster, mortar and mud brick (?), but does not seem to be an installation, as I believe - rather a coincidence. He also found the continuation of the floor U.15167 of Space 447 in between buttress F.3319 and wall F.5075. He and PFB then scraped the upper part of wall F.5075 in order to theck the hypothesis that this feature was a buttress in the beginning, which was then extended to form a wall. There seems to be an interface visible, supporting this idea, but this has to be checked by further scraping.
EMM continued excavating room fill (15180) in Space 449 and came up with several beautiful artefacts, bone tools and in the end of the day a large piece of antler and a horn just on the southern face of buttress F.3326. JFB and LKH continued taking out room fill in Space 448 (15184). This fill is still not very spectacular, probably disturbed by agricultural activity as it is so near to the surface.
SCS continued working on clarifying the walls north of Space 340 (F.2428, 2429). She removed the upper parts of that walls (15181). We decided not to sample the material of the walls, as they are very high up and disturbed - other walls might be better suitable for investigating Chalcolithic building techniques. After removing the very disturbed upper parts of that walls and cleaning the section, it became very clear that we had a third wall in this part (F.3327). F.2429 is parallel to trench section and partially outside trench borders, thus the trench section also shows a section of this wall. Towards east, it is abutting F.3327, a wall running NS and also cut (perpendicularly) by the section. The corner between the two walls ist just inside trench borders by some centimeters. F.3327 must be earlier than F.2429, because the western face of 3327 is plastered and then 2429 built against it. 2429 is leaning towards north. At some point walls F.3327, 2428, 2429 and buttress F.5052 must all come very close to each other, and SCS is now doing further scraping to find that point and identify relationships between those features.
After clarifying this today, I feel more confident about the hypothesis that F.3320, 3321 and the floor between them (15170) belong to a building phase that is later than a building surrounded by F.2429 and 3327 and a building surrounded by F.2428, 5052, 5053/5054, 2413/5055, 5056, 5057, 3326, 3324. We will have to take away F.3322 and the floor in order to go down here and check this hypothesis.
XHB worked in the northeastern corner around F.3322. By now it is clear that F.3322, some kind of container/installation, does not connect with F.3321 or 3324 and is much higher up than those features, thus probably does not go together with them. Several strange plaster and clay lumps are coming up in that corner, which we cannot make much sense of at the moment. Some seem flat (floors?).
BOD had a complicated day exposing structures in Space 450. It is now fairly clear that there is another mudbrick feature (F.3328) west of buttress F.3326 and, as we clarified today, abutting it (put against ist plaster coating) and thus later than 3326. Another mudbrick construction (F.3329) is set in between 3326 and 3321, west of 3324 and abutting the plaster line of 3324. The relations between 3324, 3326, 3321 are not yet entirely clear.
Further confusing are mudbricks that became visible in the room fill section west of 3329 and 3326 yesterday. Today we spent some time clarifying them. 15182 describes those bricks running along the northern face of 3326 and west of 3329. At first we though there was a gap (15183) is this mudbrick feature, but this does not seem to be the case. Those bricks are blueish grey (15182), sitting on top of soil that looks brick like, because it is very homogenous, but rather yellowish (15188). We might have cut the western part of 15182, but not of the yellowish brick underneath, as it is clearly distiguishable from the heterogenous fill west of it. These mudbrick features (15182, 15188) seem to abut F.3326 but run under F.3329. We have to go further down to get an idea of what purposes 15182 and 15188 might have had.
The disturbance in Space 310 (15179/ 15185) finally proved to by Byzantine today, as it contained sherds and tiles dating to that period. It is a massive pit that destroyed the southern corners of both buttresses (3301, 3302) and extends over nearly the whole space south of them. I am already fairly deep and it just will not finish. It is ashame that so much of the original fill is gone. It is very easy to see the interface between disturbance and fill/walls. 15179 started much higher up than the level where I spotted it, at least at the top level of the buttresses and walls. I has a bubble-like shape, cutting the buttresses with a concave cut. I took away the upstanding part of wall F.2427 today, which was only some cm thick any more, as it was cut from east (15161) and west (15179). It is very clear now that these two (Byzantine) pit do NOT meet or form one big disturbance, but it is a very odd coincidence that they are so close to each other and the gap between them is exactly where the plaster line of F.2427 is running. |
