| Entry: | The week’s work commenced in an area of B.106 that is very difficult to understand, predominately due to the scarce architectural remains that potentially hold stratigraphic information concerning the construction and ‚phasing’ of the building. This small left-over from last years excavations lies to the south of buttress F.3301 along wall F.5058 and contains two plaster layers as well as some burnt brick material. During initial excavations in buttress F.3301, with the intention of further exposing the inner section of the feature, the ‘transitional’ plastering layer previously located below wall F.2427 in the east, and presumed to run below all walls and features of this building, was also located under F.3301. As a result work was paused in order to examine a potential connection to a plaster feature extending into the centre of Sp.454. Another small area of plaster that obviously slopes up to both wall F.5058 and buttress F.3301 may constitute the last remains of a floor level. The exact direction and dimensions of these plastered areas remain unclear as some seem to run under the architecture of B.106 and must therefore predate the building, while, as previously stated, other parts connect to the features and are therefore later or contemporary.
A further puzzling situation is the corner between walls F.5058 and F.3351 in the southwest of B.106. Here the plaster on wall F.5058 was removed exposing the construction and possible phasing of the feature. Samples of the plaster were also taken. In the upper section of the wall a continuation of dark-grey mud-brick layers previously excavated in both walls F.2427 and F.2408 was visible. In the middle and lower sections neither this type of mud-brick nor the line of white preparation plaster to be expected below the dark-grey mud-bricks was traceable. In this part, the mix of light-grey patches, brown spots, yellow and black chunks and dark-brown bits reminded more of a choc-caramel-vanilla ice cream with nougat and cookie inclusions rather than an architectural feature. The recognition of the later may have been more pleasing for the interpretation of the building, although the thought of ice cream was hard to subdue on a ‘virtual Monday’ afternoon. |
