Back to top: Chronicle and History of work in Unit A20
Introduction
A20 was one of the last excavation carried out at Urkesh and it was investigated for two years (2008 and 2010). The work on documentation has been resumed several years later, in 2024 and 2025 under the funding of the Balzan Prize (add link).
Back to top: Chronicle and History of work in Unit A20
The 2008 season
The 2008 season began with the opening of 8 squares to the north of unit A18. The primary goal for this new excavation is to serve as a link between excavations in area A and the eastern excavations in area J by focusing on a west to east exposure. Another goal is to concentrate on a horizontal exposure of the Mittani phase towards the north and east, a continuation of A18’s exposure of Mittani which was excavated several years ago resulting in several Mittani mud brick structures, cooking installations, and pebble pavements. A20 is also subsuming A19, a trench formed by three loci, originally part of J1, excavated in 2001 to find the eastern limits of the AK palace. The season began on the 13th of July 2008, and ended on the 27th of August, 2008. The results achieved show the presence of a large number of small romm with pebbles pavement, a possible open area with some stone installations and a lot of ash dumping probably related to some tannur located in the southernmost loci and in the nearby A18 unit. Moreover to the north a long (about 20 meters???) wall flanked by another wall it seems to indicate the presence of a large building, perhaps a public building possibly extending immediately to the north of the A20 area.
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The 2010 season
The excavation was resumed in 2010 and it was carried out only by the students without the employment of workmen. The unexpected lack of founding, it has turned into a great opportunity for the many new students joining the team for the first time this season, to learn the excavation methods and the data management system (UGR-Urkesh Global Record), without the rush and tight deadlines typical of a normal excavation season, as well as training the skills of excavation in a Near Eastern site, a completely new context for many of them. On the contrary the initial idea to work on (how many loci???) was not achieved and the amount of soil excavated is not that large, but the results area still important. The season began on the 13th of July 2010, and ended on the 27th of August, 2008.
The excavation lasted three weeks, four loci (k23, k24, k25, k34) were excavated and the 2010 goal to expose a possible, large public building dating to Mittani Period was reached only partially, because some other structures and rooms were found, but still we do not know if the large wall uncovered in 2008 really belongs to a public building.
Back to top: Chronicle and History of work in Unit A20