| Entry: | Peter Boyer 15th April 1999
Well here it is my first diary entry for 1999. We've been working on site for a week now though the first few days were spent just cleaning the excavation areas in the Mellaart area, now renamed the South area due to some type of political shenanigans. I actually started excavating the small fire installation feature I cleaned out in 1998 (F293). As I mentioned on the feature sheet then, it appears to have been some type of appendage to the larger oven, F 269. Removal of the superstructure revealed it to be quite insubstantial with its actual function no clearer than when I left off last year, though it does appear to have shared some type of external platform with F269.
On Sunday (11/4) we had a team photo, with everyone looking a little cold and miserable, it'll be interesting to see how it compares with group shots taken in a few months time. I guess we'll look a little warmer. Also on Sunday we had a team meeting about general site stuff. It was ok but once again the annual division between site staff and "specialists" raised its ugly head. It centred on the need for extra staff to oversee heavy residue sorting, a factor which had been curiously overlooked in previous discussions. It was suggested by certain people that site staff should be taken away from excavation in order to perform this function as obviously the "specialists" are too important to do this. Anyway the situation appears to have been resolved thanks to the totally reasonable (in my mind) suggestion by Louise M. that everyone should take it in turns to perform this onerous task.
Anyway, back to site matters. I dealt with the rest of the oven F269. The floor which I reached last year was rock hard and had to be removed with a hand pick. It was not, however the base of the feature as below it was a layer of levelling material, hardly affected by the burning in the oven. It filled a cut which the oven superstructure had been built around, so maybe the oven utilized some earlier feature. Anyway the ovens Craig excavated in the souh-west corner of the same space (117) appear to have been of a similar structure.
On Monday Ian had a meeting with the powers in Ankara re the excavation strategy, and Lo and Behold we are not allowed to remove any Neolithic walls - very practical for a deep excavation through a prehistoric city, clearly there are people in important positions over here blessed with the same ignorance of pragmatism as the mandarins at EH. And just to add insult to injury, the regular beer emporium was closed and the van broke down on the way back to Catal (sorry, can't find the sydilla on this keyboard).
On Tuesday morning I was going to clean up the eastern end of Space 117 to see what to take out next after the removal of the ovens. However when we got to site - bummer! a large chunk of the wall at the eastern end of the room (F66) had fallen victim to the vagaries of the central Anatolian climate (and possibly a few other factors such as age, gravity and exposure), and come crashing to the ground. After discussions with the reps it was agreed that the mess could be cleaned up without permission in triplicate from God. The remainder of the wall could then be cleaned and recorded, and the upper part of the wall which looked about to fall, could be carefully removed. This began with the removal of the surviving plaster. However, by Tuesday morning it was realised that some layers of this had been painted and a small area of a red geometric pattern exposed. It was agreed to cover this and wait for the conservator to expose and conserve any further artwork on the wall. Funny though that the plaster on the walls of this space had been extensively sampled by the conservators last year wth no feedback about the presence of paintings!
Yesterday I started drawing the elevation of the wall, having tarted up the bricks and mortar as much as possible without the risk of further collapse.
This morning I felt old. Whether it be the effects of too much booze, fags and late night scrabble, the climate, or a sad ageing factor, I felt like I was wearing the knees of an octagenarian. This resulted in a somewhat slow completion of the elevation as this poor old bugger suffered with every bending measurement. Starting to sample the bricks and mortar was a much more comfortable task. Unfortunately it was also a very short-lived one as shortly before lunch a large chunk of the north-eastern wall of Space 117 came crashing down just behind me as I was partaking of a short gibberish break. Candam was in attendance in the next space (shrine 10) and did not appear too distressed and we agreed that I should clean up the mess a la F66 and continue as planned. At this rate we wont have to remove any walls as they will all come tumbling down, clearly in sympathy with our excavation needs.
So, I have now started to slowly and carefully sample and remove the bricks and mortar in the upper part of F66. The upper two or three courses appear to have been of a later rebuild of the wall after the initial wall had started to sag into the central crawl-hole of the feature. The upper bricks are reddish brown in colour with the texture of fruitcake, whereas the lower ones are dark grey and altogether more firm.
I must now go and wrap up the plaster samples I took from the collapse of the north wall. Oh yeah, the plaster on that wall was painted too!Entered By: Peter Boyer |
