August 9, 2000

First thing I did today was sift the last bucket from L1004 from yesterday. It was more like a 1/2 bucket and I was able to get a few scraps of bone out of it. I closed that locus yesterday but didn't have time to sift that last bucket.

The workers are now trying to level the trench on top of the rock/pebble surface which appears to be concentrated in the centre of the trench heading East to West. On the south side of the surface we are finding a very hard clay-like surface which may indicate a floor. We cleaned and measured the newly leveled surface then took a photo. We changed to the following locus numbers: L1005 is the fill North of the rock surface, L1006 is the rock surface, L1007 is the fill south of the rock surface. We began by digging a small sounding about 1/2 meter long at the western end of L1005.

Of course, while cleaning L1006 for phots we found yet another burial. It is lodged in the eastern baulk on top of the rock surface of L1006. There is a definite pit around the skeleton and the skull appears to be crushed. We have uncovered a lot of upper torso such as the ribs, skull, teeth, and arms. We articulated it as best we could then photographed it. Hopefully we'll box it tomorrow.

Meanwhile the sounding in L1005 was being dug about 5cm deep. We were trying to find the next layers of the rock surface in L1006 there appear to be few stones continuing, but that might just be tumble.

We also began digging in L1007 to see what was on the otherside of the rock surface where we found a very hard clay-like surface that felt suspiciously like mudbrick. The soil close to the baulk was a darker grey while the soil away from it was the same as the rest only it was harder packed and had orange and black spots indicating burnt clay. Bradley decided it wasn't a mudbrick and we chopped through it.

Last we screened all the dirt from L1008 and cleaned up.