Rowan Eng-Kryston
I have been assigned to EU 39, along with Kendall, Kyna, and Caroline. We are led by Emilie, our lovely trench supervisor. The trench contains a room that is clearly defined by four walls. This room is one of the larger ones on site and three columns were placed in the center of the room to provide additional support for the now collapsed roof. So far we have been clearing the baulks between our EU and two others. Kendall and I have been assigned to the baulk that runs east-west, while Kyna and Caroline have been assigned to the north-south baulk. The north-south baulk has been cleared down to the level of the floor in the adjacent EU. Kendall and I have removed 5 stratigraphic layers from east-west baulk.
We started by removing the topsoil, then we removed a thick layer of fallen mud brick, and now we have stopped at a loose pebbly layer. We initially thought that our baulk contained a threshold/doorway (due to a break in the wall, with two large rocks bracketing the break), but that has been called into question as an intentional line of large rocks sits about a foot past where the pseudo-threshold is. The baulk was separated into two SUs so we could further accentuate the line of rocks.
One possibility is that these rocks are associated with the drain in EU31 to the east. There is also a possibility that this space was an alleyway between buildings as it is between two walls, one in our EU and another in the EU to the north. However, it is difficult to tell right now because the baulk has not been excavated down to the same level as the interior floor, but that will have to be done next season because our trench supervisor has had us move onto the floor (which has been a highly anticipated event) in EU29.
The interior of the room is separated into two SUs by the three pillars in the center of the room. One SU is slightly higher than the other, since it was not excavated down to floor level last season like the other was. So far we have removed a thin layer of mudbrick collapse on the south-side SU and the plan is to make it level with the north-side SU.
Cool update dude