The Dig...Finally
So as I was writing this, I was sitting on a train in the middle of a train strike waiting to go to Pisa (and am so far a half hour late). Now seems like the perfect time to reglect on the last six weeks of my life. As you can tell, the dig I was on has just ended. Yesterday, I left out home away from home, Radda-In-Chianti, for maybe the last time. Some people would say that is bittersweet...not me. I had so much fun this summer that I just didn't want to leave. The work I did was amazing, the friend I made both supported and challenged me, and the whole experience may have been the best yet.
I might as well start with the reason I came back to Italy: the wine. Actually, it was the dig so I'll get to the wine later. Before I left this year, I was promised by DG (the director) that I would be a supervisor. I'd have my own trench and be teaching "newbies" the ways of archaeology. I was excited, but as it turned out, my patience was tested just as much as my knowledge of archaeology. I didn't begin with my own trench. The trench designated for me was to be opened more for the purpose of mapping and understanding the relationship between two nearby structures than it was for pure discovery. You see, about 30 years ago, an italian archaeologist came to the site, called Cetamura, and did surface cleaning and surface mapping of the several visible structures on the site. There were many areas that he either mismapped or just didn't notice, and that is where my trench came in. Based on those original and flawed maps, there seemed to be what looked like a drain in my area that ran into a large, known, Etruscan cistern. However, this being the possible last season of the field school, DG wanted one more shot at pure discovery to help her understand the whole site more, and therefore other trenches were opened first.
It was difficult playing second fiddle to another trench leader, even if it was my friend Mac, who really did a kick-ass job. He would often consult me on theories, methodologies or other questions which made me feel less like a straight worker and more like an assistant supervisor. He and I, and the other two in our trench, Jenny and Erin, worked really hard with deliberate speed and moved a lot of dirt. Ours was the first trench to hit bedrock but during the excavations we uncovered part of a wall and a beaten earth floor. The pottery finds at Cetamura are usually fairly sparse and therefore we have to sift every bucket of dirt we dig up to find each piece.
I had written this out earlier and put in a paragraph in which I vented about a few things, but decided not to put it here, so if you want to hear about some of these, I can tell you later.
Ok, back to the real archaeology. I was finally allowed to open my trench with about 10 days left in the dig. Aaron and other revolving diggers were my crew. We had to really move dirt, and they stepped up to the challenge. I was so proud. We found found five separate walls in the trench. Although digging a wall trench can be difficult, you only have to clean the tops of them once, and the rest of the time you can dig deep to uncover more wall courses and find all of the loci involved with these walls. Aaron worked hard on the first job. He cleaned the walls as if he expected us to eat off of them, and went through a thin spoil heap, top soil (with patience-trying roots) and uncovered a great locus underneath that which, although unexcavated, told us a lot about surrounding structures. My job was to go deep...quickly but methodically. I worked in the corner of the proposed drain. First, I dug through top soil until I found another of those damn spoil heaps. *Note: a spoil heap is a layer of dirt that had been sifted by the previous archaeologists and packed down tight underfoot.* I also notice a wall in the way of the proposed drain that pretty much obliterated that theory. Instead, we had a sort of room with 3.5 walls and perhaps an entrance. The next task was to tear throughn the spoil heap (usually void of finds) and find new loci and perhaps the floor. Alas, it was not in the cards. This spoil heap turned out to be actually two of them, and went deeper than anyone expected. The top heap had a few good finds, but without context they were almost useless. It dated to only 20 years ago. The second, however, seemed to be an ancient fill layer packed tight against the wall with lots of sandstone, a few large rocks, and a few pottery sherds. One piece was particularly helpful and was found on the last day. It was a piece of very datable pottery that came from right next to the wall and it helped us to date the wall. All-in-all, I dug a meter down in about a week and found no end to the fill and spoil layers. Perhaps that will be the job for the next archaeologists.
The other trenches found a ton of interesting things that were invaluable to DG and the site. It is too bad I can't talk about them here, though.
The last day on site was a particularly difficult one. It was backfilling day. The metric tons of dirt that we removed had to go back into the trenches to protect the structural finds and to prevent site robbers from destroying it all. There is nothing more depressing to an archaeologist than to see the weeks of hard work, blood, sweat, and tears get re-filled in a day, no matter how necessary it is.
DG had announced several times this season, and I am inclined to afree that this was the best crew one could have. Virtually everyone worked their tails off with a minimum of complaints or problems. It was a very successful season, and we all hope to persude those in charge to open it up again.
The next post will have more of the extracurricular activities that archaeologists do when not digging.
I might as well start with the reason I came back to Italy: the wine. Actually, it was the dig so I'll get to the wine later. Before I left this year, I was promised by DG (the director) that I would be a supervisor. I'd have my own trench and be teaching "newbies" the ways of archaeology. I was excited, but as it turned out, my patience was tested just as much as my knowledge of archaeology. I didn't begin with my own trench. The trench designated for me was to be opened more for the purpose of mapping and understanding the relationship between two nearby structures than it was for pure discovery. You see, about 30 years ago, an italian archaeologist came to the site, called Cetamura, and did surface cleaning and surface mapping of the several visible structures on the site. There were many areas that he either mismapped or just didn't notice, and that is where my trench came in. Based on those original and flawed maps, there seemed to be what looked like a drain in my area that ran into a large, known, Etruscan cistern. However, this being the possible last season of the field school, DG wanted one more shot at pure discovery to help her understand the whole site more, and therefore other trenches were opened first.
It was difficult playing second fiddle to another trench leader, even if it was my friend Mac, who really did a kick-ass job. He would often consult me on theories, methodologies or other questions which made me feel less like a straight worker and more like an assistant supervisor. He and I, and the other two in our trench, Jenny and Erin, worked really hard with deliberate speed and moved a lot of dirt. Ours was the first trench to hit bedrock but during the excavations we uncovered part of a wall and a beaten earth floor. The pottery finds at Cetamura are usually fairly sparse and therefore we have to sift every bucket of dirt we dig up to find each piece.
I had written this out earlier and put in a paragraph in which I vented about a few things, but decided not to put it here, so if you want to hear about some of these, I can tell you later.
Ok, back to the real archaeology. I was finally allowed to open my trench with about 10 days left in the dig. Aaron and other revolving diggers were my crew. We had to really move dirt, and they stepped up to the challenge. I was so proud. We found found five separate walls in the trench. Although digging a wall trench can be difficult, you only have to clean the tops of them once, and the rest of the time you can dig deep to uncover more wall courses and find all of the loci involved with these walls. Aaron worked hard on the first job. He cleaned the walls as if he expected us to eat off of them, and went through a thin spoil heap, top soil (with patience-trying roots) and uncovered a great locus underneath that which, although unexcavated, told us a lot about surrounding structures. My job was to go deep...quickly but methodically. I worked in the corner of the proposed drain. First, I dug through top soil until I found another of those damn spoil heaps. *Note: a spoil heap is a layer of dirt that had been sifted by the previous archaeologists and packed down tight underfoot.* I also notice a wall in the way of the proposed drain that pretty much obliterated that theory. Instead, we had a sort of room with 3.5 walls and perhaps an entrance. The next task was to tear throughn the spoil heap (usually void of finds) and find new loci and perhaps the floor. Alas, it was not in the cards. This spoil heap turned out to be actually two of them, and went deeper than anyone expected. The top heap had a few good finds, but without context they were almost useless. It dated to only 20 years ago. The second, however, seemed to be an ancient fill layer packed tight against the wall with lots of sandstone, a few large rocks, and a few pottery sherds. One piece was particularly helpful and was found on the last day. It was a piece of very datable pottery that came from right next to the wall and it helped us to date the wall. All-in-all, I dug a meter down in about a week and found no end to the fill and spoil layers. Perhaps that will be the job for the next archaeologists.
The other trenches found a ton of interesting things that were invaluable to DG and the site. It is too bad I can't talk about them here, though.
The last day on site was a particularly difficult one. It was backfilling day. The metric tons of dirt that we removed had to go back into the trenches to protect the structural finds and to prevent site robbers from destroying it all. There is nothing more depressing to an archaeologist than to see the weeks of hard work, blood, sweat, and tears get re-filled in a day, no matter how necessary it is.
DG had announced several times this season, and I am inclined to afree that this was the best crew one could have. Virtually everyone worked their tails off with a minimum of complaints or problems. It was a very successful season, and we all hope to persude those in charge to open it up again.
The next post will have more of the extracurricular activities that archaeologists do when not digging.