July 30, 2001

Today we decided to make the NE part of L3019 a new locus. It is now L3029, a fill layer above a known surface. The known surface that we are aiming for is a lighter colored surface which the pottery seen in the north section of L3029 is lying on. This is a few cm above the locus found the other day L3027. As we dug into this locus from the north we found pieces of what looked to be oven fragments and then a feature running south made out of the same material as an oven. At first we thought that we had a very large oven but as we followed it we found that it turned sharply east at a right angle into the baulk. I am not sure now that it is an oven. We are finding flecks of carbon in the dirt around the feature which could mean it was used in oven related contexts. Also just outside the oven feature we found an 8 cm long, 1/2 cm wide metal pin KT3239. It could be a small hair pin or a pin to a fibula. The feature is L3030, the area outside it is L3031 and the area inside it is L3032. I closed L3029 as we have reached a definable surface.

We also started taking out the feature L3015 which is just south of L 3031. We are taking it out slowly because the slag in it looks to have been put on it when it was wet and it flowed between the spaces between the rocks. The way to see if this is true is to take off the rocks slowly and see if there is any physical connection between the slag parts and to see if it has adhered to the sides of the rocks. So far it looks as if the slag once touched but the connection has been broken by animal burrows.