| Entry: | Today I continued work on F. 3342 U. 15383, which I was able to plan and lift today - I was surprised I got it done that quickly. While I was finishing the levels for the drawing, I had DJG come over to assist with this, and unfortunately as soon as he reached the mudbrick lining of the grave and leaned over to hold the point staff the mudbrick collapased into the grave! Luckily, it did not harm any of the bones, and fell into an area without many bones. I laughed/cried for a minute, and we finally got the levels for the drawing. There are remains from an infant and a juvenile (~6 yrs) in the grave, though the majority are from the juvenile. It appears the juvenile was put in first, and the neonate was on top. The only in situ remains from the infant were some of the vertebrae. It was highly disturbed and seemed to have been moved around by animal activity, as DLG located neonate remains just outside the mudbrick lining south of the grave, as well as a few juvenile vertebrae. There were also some isolated adult bones, a carpal and an atlas - I am not sure where these would come from, although DLG also located parts of an adult cranium in his wall section. The parts of the juvenile that were in situ were the cranium, some vertebrae, ribs, and the left shoulder (humerus and scapula). I will have to continue some removal of fill on 6/8/2011 to confirm I have reached the bottom of the grave, so there may be some more bone scattered in the fill from these individuals. It was extremely windy today, and it made it difficult to work at points. I floated the whole unit 15385, in an effort to retrieve more of the infant and juvenile remains, as well as to see if there were any small grave goods that I had missed. The only thing I did notice that may have been "grave goods" were river stones that seemed to have lined a portion of the inside of the fill - about 5 stones were retrieved, and it may have just been a coincidence that they were in there. I am looking forward to finishing this unit, as it was an extremely uncomfortable position to excavate for a few days. I believe I will be excavating and working on F. 3343 next, the burial at the southern edge of the trench on 6/8/2011, which I would enjoy since it appears to be an intact adult burial. |
