Field Class--Week 2, or really 1.5

Evidence of Sophisticated Behavior.

Our first couple of weeks in the field were abbreviated by an unsettled weather pattern, which brought one cancelled day and one significantly shortened one.  Nevertheless, we've made some progress.


We're close to completion on a 2x2 meter unit we opened up in an area that 2012 testing showed to contain a diverse and dense assemblage of artifacts.  We continued to get a good number of pieces, though this deposit might be a bit more of a trash pile than a pit.

From a method perspective, we did uncover a neat (at least to me) feature. In the first image, you can see a circle of yellowish fill.  That's the remains of a shovel test pit from 2012.  And thankfully, it's exactly where it should be when the unit was mapped onto last year's base map.

Trench

We're still in the midst of excavating a 4 meter trench across a couple of wall visible on the ground surface.  My gut tells me these walls were part of a single structure as we pulled lots of sheet metal from between these walls in 2012, likely a part of the superstructure of the building.

The current excavations have recovered a considerable amount of metal as well, but mostly smaller pieces and many that are in better condition and are likely identifiable once we get to some lab analysis.

The award for coolest artifacts of the week also goes to this unit.  Fragments from two different porcelain doll heads were recovered. The presence of these two dolls might be indicative that this site was the scene of a residential occupation and not solely one specialized, economic activity like sheep pasturing.

Now that the crew has been out for a couple of weeks, the work is starting to click along at a good pace.  We'll be opening up a new unit in a previously unexcavated structure on Monday and likely start another trench connecting the trash pile area to a near by wall.

Team Dynamo, or Dino-Mo

Dynamo Mascot