June 28, 2007

Area D

Trench 6

Jason Kennedy and Barish Uzel

Today we began by removing the stonewall in Locus 170 after noticing an ashy layer below the locus after removing Locus 178 between Locus 170 and the wall in Locus 159. This layer of ash suggested that wall 170 was of a later date than the house structure represented by wall Locus 159. While the workmen removed the wall, Barish and myself worked on removing the floor of the house (Locus 172) in hopes of uncovering an earlier floor. After about 10 cm we discovered a layer of slightly ashy compact soil with a few flat lying artifacts that should represent an earlier floor of the house. We also had the workmen attempt to articulate that floor in the house extension (Locus179). After completing the removal of Locus 170 we began the removal of the mudbrick wall (locus 181) in front of the retaining wall of Locus 170. The wall was highly eroded and no rows or courses were visible during removal. After completing that we removed the fill left below locus 170 in the southern portion of the trench (Locus 183) in hopes of uncovering an extension of the earlier stonewall present under Locus 170, which was given Locus 182. Unfortunately some of the stones for the underlying stone locus 182 may have been removed in the initial removal of Locus 170. We also noted that the pit in Locus 174 was probably lined with stones, most of which were removed as assumed stonewall collapse.