Week 2 summary, week ending July 12, 2001

The primary goal of this week in D5 was to get it ready for proper digging, which involved taking out the baulk separating D1 and its northerly neighbor D2. Seemingly a simple task, it quickly became clear that the majority of the western part of the baulk was, in fact, a mudbrick wall almost completely concealed in the baulk (possibly some bleed into D1)--L5004, 5005, 5012, 5014.

The next stage was to nicely clean the entire trench and set up loci. Having already found the E-W wall, we had the whole trench sprayed with water and found a lot more mudbrick, mostly along the western baulk (L5008, 5019, 5018). From a couple early soundings (L5017/16, 5009 and 5007) it appears the extended feature may be a mudbrick road of some sort as it seems to have only a single course.

Another layer was removed from the N-central feature (L5015), and it is now down to a surface (which appears to be the last, thanks to sounding L5006) which looks contemporary with the mudbrick architecture. A coupe theories floating around about its purpose, including the possibility is served as a small staircase. Lots of pottery and lithics, no bone whatsoever.

After more digging in the NE pebble jumble (L5020), it continues...

The rest of the trench (the majority of the eastern portion) is occupied by areas of fill and possibly some pits. The lack of architecture might be because it was never there or because it is much nearer to the original surface of the tepe and whatever was there has been degraded.

Next week it would be good to finally be rid of the N-central stone feature, find the context of all the mudbrick architecture and possibly remove it, and look into the surface that is appearing immediately below the mudbrick level.