| Entry: | The season began much as we left off last year, taking space 117 in building 2 down in large spits or units ranging between 1000 and 2000 litres. We were aware that discrete dumps were perhaps being missed within the overall dumping process backfilling the room . The cover and shading has helped enormously in the preservation of colour within and between deposits, drying out last year being a major problem (ask Craig this year). The policy of leaving in soil baulks along the walls to protect them also seems to have been a success, although subsidence and the leaning of walls appears to have been an ancient problem, one perhaps accentuated by Mellaart’s removal of soil to the south of the building, and perhaps by continued movement of the mound (does anyone monitor this if it is happening?). The removal of large spits does however provided its own problems and maybe we need to discuss the drawbacks of doing this against the bonuses exposing rooms quickly for publicity ,sponsorship etc, ie what information we may or may not be loseing. Taking soil out at a relatively fast speed may give the impression that the deposit was lain within a similar time scale, ie rapidly. This may impression may be further reinforced by the similarity and bulk nature of the roomfills. Certainly my feeling was that the rooms were rapidly backfilled, which the specialist/priority tours did nothing to contradict, most of the material being at the end of there use life(except the ubiquitous sharp bone awls and perhaps the dumped mud brick which surely could have been reused?). However closer inspections of the deposits along the south and west walls (63 and 93 respectively) has led to me rethinking about the nature of 'rapid dumping' in how long a time span are we taking about, days, weeks, months? perhaps Wendys thin sections may give us a clue. If my first impressions are correct then it appears that the western room of the building, as yet not excavated appears to have been backfilled prior to the demolition/ collapse/ removal of the west wall of the central room, as dump material from the west room appears to overspill through th crawl hole into the central room, this in turn is sealed by wall collapse. The owl pellets are also intriguing, as Peter may be able to find out how many small animals were ingested and perhaps work out some time scale for that accumulation to build up, before being sealed by the next roomfilling phase. Certainly it suggests the building had a phase of semi dereliction and that it possibly stood higher than the buildings to the south, otherwise why would a bird of prey perch there( unless there was a nest which suggests partial roofing, but this couldn't be if the posts and timbers of the building were reused etc etc). The tours have been much more acceptable and helpful this year possibly because people are focused and don’t run off at distracting tangents which didn't help last year. I'm much more inclined to ask for specialist help this year, if only to show them the problems of digging the stuff out the ground, no seriously they’ve been a help this year, although there is still a tendency for folks to jump the gun and demand answers before I’m sure I have any (how anyone can pre-empt the archaeology faster the King predictor himself namely me, who’s invariably wrong never fails to astound me, in the fact I find myself saying "slow down slow down" to however it is). Another point while were on specialists it has come to my attention that although each Lab person is very precious, say about bone or lets say sections, they dont seem to be so about other disciplines for example while taking a soil sample the person doing it will think nothing of going through a bone, or while removing a bone, a person will think nothing of defacing a section, each to there own I say and its only a minor point Working in tandem with Frank also proved successful and maybe that’s the way forward while exposing and stabilising walls. 31/8/97Entered By: Roddy Regan |
