Daily Trench Journal

Area D

Trench 5

July 13, 2002

Following the previous successes getting the general trench level down, we were able to take some time today to continue exposing the southern organic material (L5098) and found that it certainly continues and we will need to get still more of the trench down before we see its entire extent. Of note, a loom weight (KT 5098.14) was recovered from the material, and several good samples were taken (KTs 5098.17, 5098.18 and 5098.19). It will be interesting to see whether the feature/floor continues under the "hearth" feature of L5080; preliminary inspection indicates it does not.

L5103 was excavated to its S end at the N mudbrick wall of the structure. Excitingly, flat-lying painted white sherds were found encased in the organic material against the wall (and the material clearly came to the wall and stopped). To me, this finally ties all the contexts together. Of course, this will have to be further verified, but at the moment I am confident in this assertion. L5103’s eastern neighbor, L5101 was also excavated, but without any notable findings.

Finally in the S of the trench, a small test sounding was made from the level of the depression (last season’s L5064) to the E through the mudbrick structure to confirm last year’s surface designation which now appears to have been verified.

In the N part of the trench, two loci, L5105 and L5106 were excavated. The former is arbitrary as it appears the in the NE portion of the trench we may still be working our way through tumble. More westerly, L5106 may eventually come down on contexts related to the central and southern Ubaid contexts, but to date nothing related to such has been found in the northern third of the trench.