| Entry: | The value of the talk at Catal’
• Few days ago I had opportunity to have a nice talk with Sean who hosted before Scott in the lithic-lab. Scot was interested in seeing the obsidian blades (U.23034) that were found within the cache (F. 8359) in B.131 (Sp.504), because he had not been at the site when they were discovered. Between those two gentlemen there must have been undertaken fascinating discussion, whose effect brought further considerations.
When Sean eventually came to speak with me he raised the question about the in-fill (U.23034) which sealed the blades. He pointed correctly that the sediment had no evidence of the burning. When we excavated the fantastic artefacts on the 10th of May 2017 nobody paid attention to the FILL itself. Obviously, everyone were captivated by the shinning volcanic glass that were transformed by skilled human’s hands into the masterpieces of weapon. I am sure everyone who was present at that moment in Sp.504 asked herself /himself about the reason and meaning of hoarding (unfinished) pressures blades and not using them in the designed purposes. In that circumstances it is understandable that an issue of the IN-FILL played secondary role - if any ...
It seems that the emotions must have subsided leaving space for scientific quarry and thorough investigation. That happened at least in that case and the Sean’s notion he came with was one of those revelation that you know from the beginning that it would bring highly productive reflections: Why the mineral sediment deposited together with the blades within the small cut (U.23033) had no sign of burning ?!!! the question is vital taking into account the fact that all of the layers and structures within B.131 characterize heavy burnt resulted by the fire that was set in the abandonment phase of the building.
We considered several scenarios. One of them concerned a possibility of setting the cache after burning event which might explain the lack of burned elements. I must admit the latter assumption would be remarkable if it could be confirmed because all of the hitherto discovered caches have been regarded as a sort of foundation deposits, not abandon ones. Noteworthy, is that since 2014, when the Sp.504 had been exposed there was no clear cut identified within the floors and make-up layers. The presence of such of the circular truncation on that level might have verified the hypothesis of the execution the hoard after the abandonment and burning.
The evoked above subject raises more questions that ought to be underlined here. Let’s image a situation that the inhabitants went down to the burnt house in order to perform a small hollow and place there the special (closure) deposit – what kind of sediment they might have used to cover back the blades? The simplest answer would be that they used the same material that was dug out previously during the earth-work. But if they had done so the in-fill (back-fill) of the cache would have had the same composition as burned surroundings, and it could not be identified at all.
The presented issue revealed in particular the distinctiveness of the FILL COMPOSITION (U.23734) that seemed to be sterile in term of the inclusions, which stood in contrary to the room-fill recognized within the described area. In that light, the notion that accentuates the distinct sandy-silt composition of the sediment (U.23034) becomes even more important because it implies especial intention to cover the blades by the use of the selected type of soil. Of course there are many questions that cannot be answered at this stage of the research or ever. But we will be able to testify hypothesis very soon, when we start excavating two oval pits F.8332, F.8333 located in the south central part of the B.132. Judging by the specific shape and the Southern position they both might be regarded as the potential caches. Worth mentioning is that an on-field examination has already revealed that the pits have discrete in-fills (U.32771, U32773 respectively) that varied evidently from the environment (U.32761) within whom they had been set.
After the fascinating talk with Sean, whose notions and conscience allowed us to develop productive considerations and raised motivating questions, I could not imagine other person to excavate the two oval pits in Sp.531. I expect personally that if the both features appear to be caches uncovering them by one specialist with the background and specified assumptions may resulted in the remarkable synthesis which will expand our knowledge about the special foundation deposits and their character. |
