| Entry: | Last day of excavation in Trench 5 for this year.
EMM continued taking out clay ball cluster U.15343 and removed probably is main part, but still some of it is remaining is Space 449, there was no time to take them out and record. We will protect them as good as possible so they survive the winter.
XHB drew his floor U.15141. JFB finished drawing the southern section of the trench and then drew the southern section with assistance from my and XHB. SCS finished her drawing of F.5052, 3320, 3335.
I drew the southern section of space 310 towards Space 454. When looking at it closer, I noticed something very interesting - buttress F.3301, whose base we thought we saw last year already, is actually continuing downwards. It lower part extends far more east and has a very wobbly upper limit - my guess would be that this is a wall which had then be cut to form a buttress. In what case 3301 would not only form part of the later building phase surrounding space 310 (together with 5058, 2408 and 2427), but also of the earlier phase (together with 3312, 3313 and 3314). It is also worth noting that buttresses F.3301 and 3302 do not have equal sizes, 3302 is much smaller than 3302, probably added after 3302 had been cut into buttress-form.
BOD and LKH, assisted by SCS, clarified outlines of F.3324, 3326, 3321, 3320, 3335 and 3334. The western and northern face of buttress F.3326 as well as the eastern face of F.3324 and the southern face of F.3321 in Space 452 gave us a hard time. All features are marked by plaster coating in their upper parts, which is not extant any more in the lower parts, and at times it is really hard to tell apart mudbrick an the last bit of roomfill sticking to it. We gave up on finding the exact interfaces between walls and fill in the end, because of lack of time and also because, as noticed several times during this season, the roomfill peels of the walls by itself when dried out - cracks appear and it is very obvious where fill is remaining on the walls. It will thus be easier to check these features again next year. It is clear that we do not yet see the lower base of F.3324 and 3326 sitting on fill here, as their downwards continuation is visible on the other side (F.3324: in Space 448, 3326; in Space 449). That 3321 is sitting on fill is possible; the soil underneath looks more like mudbrick and is more compact than the roomfill - but it does contain too many inclusions to be definitely identified as brick. Same is true for 3320, where plaster stops exactly on the level of floor U.15170 - if 3320 does still continue downwards, only the parts above the floor were plastered. I would guess 3320 and 3321 still continued downwards, but, as already said, will be checked next year.
When levelling the top of F.3320, it became clear that what was held to be one structure beforehand are in fact two - F.3335 abuts 3320 directly south of it and it a bit wider (EW) than 3320. A crack separates both. Abutting 3335 from south is are mudbricks, which I now believe to belong to F.3334, the "bench" abutting the southern and eastern face of buttress F.5052. Including the part south of 3335, 3334 has a kind of rectangular S-shape. Part (2-5cm) of ist eastern part (south of 3335) were removed during excavating accidentally, because it was so disturbed, but the original outlines can still be reconstructed. The base of F.3334 is visible and sitting on fill. It is not regular, but migh higher up in the east than it is in the west. It is thus clear that 3334 was an addition to B.98 later than the buttresses and walls surrounding it, and F.3328 (west of F.3326, removed today because only some cm of ist height remaining and sitting on fill) as well.
3335 and 3320 seem to abut F.5052 rather than have cut it, as they do not seem to have altered ist original outlines. Ist plaster coating is not extant in this part any more, though. Whether or not 3335 and 3320 did cut 2428, 2429 and/or 5052 will have to be clarified next year by following them downwards. 3335, 3320 and 3321 might also be later additions, 3321 and 3324 are abutting and form a perfect corner, though, as visible today- they are separated by a crack or mini-gap (German: Fuge/ Baufuge).That means that at some point both constructions were used contemporaneously.
What purposed F.3335, 335, 3320 and 3321 had also to remains unclear for now.
We thus did not really "solve" the northeast corner of F.98 this season, but outlines and stratigraphy of features as seen today are already much clearer than a few days ago.
We took of the upper part of F.2408 today, for reasons of stability, and took flotation samples of brick and mortar. The bricks were nicely visible in plan after levelling the wall and documented in photos, but as usual also badly disturbed by rodents. A substantial amount of larger pot sherds, animal bones, shell and burnt plaster was included in the brick - this together with the small inclusions from flotation will hopefully tell us more about the origin and production of the building materials used in Trench 5.
Two more features were also defined today - the ghost wall F.3330 is better visible after brushing today. It is just visible in plan south of floor U.15341 and baldy disturbed (rodents), but seems to be slightly curving northwards and not to be in line with 3321. 3336 became visible after brushing the tops of walls again - it is north of and parallel to F.3332. 3332 was thought to be a thick wall so far, today a crack (Fuge) became visible in its middle, it must therefore be two abutting walls. We could observe in the last days, how these mini-gaps (Fugen) become better visible every day, when the tops of walls are levelled and brushed several time and dried out. Spaces 447 and 448 are thus separated by a double wall, but the open-area-hypothesis for 448 might still be worth keeping in mind.
In the end of the day we took final photos of building 98, its spaces and features. Tomorrow will be dedicated to cleaning the whole trench and surroundings, taking overview photos and protecting fragile things for the winter. |
