.bk J01 .fl S707rE.j .fd daily journal ;.fn included S710re.j,S712re.j,S713re.j,S714re.j,S715re.j,S716re.j,S717re.j,S719re.j (U812lC). .ei rE .ed S707 .rd S706 .ri rE -dy yesterday we had a meeting at the tell with gB, mKB, fAB, jW, pC and rE because bPW is coming today and we need to find out where to put the control points and the markers. In J1 we need to put 7 control points in the section. On friday pictures should be taken by dM before cleaning the area to show the damage which effected the area during the winter. The plastic bag that covers the east section and the stands which explained the area the previous season are damaged. -sg Before the excavation this area needs to be cleaned by the workmen and taken down 5cm. fAB suggested to think about the different elevations of the specific q-lots.This year we plan to resume the excavation that has been going on for several years. The last excavation ended at a very sensitive area at the base of the wall. .rd S712 .ri rE --i This year we plan to resume the excavation that has been going on for several years, J1. The last excavation ended at a very sensitive area at the base of the wall. This area is very complicated because there are many features close together but at different time periods. We are going to excavate f250 and above this feature was a Khabur feature excavated last season f240. We expect to find Phase 4 material underneath this feature. As we know from last season we found late Chalcolithic material f195 when we cut into the escarpment on the base of the wall. This was suprising and we think that underneath this third millenium mound is another fourth millenium mound. Gb described the various aspects of the excavation. Our group will be excavating the J1 area. The section that was most important was the Mittani at A20 where Laura is going to be excavating and even though we are lower than A20 we will be excavating the same material of Mittani. Between the German trench and the A20 there is no structures due to this perhaps being the main plaza area/meeting area keeping the area clear and bowl shaped. The Mittani layer was found five meters down on J1 while at A20 the Mittani layer was around two meters down. On the area J1 no structure was found but some pottery shards were found. -sy Barbara placed seven control points on all the sections. .rd S712 .ri rE -sg Yesterday we had a staff meeting at the Tell. Gb described the various aspects of the excavation. Our group will be excavating the J1 area. Between the German trench and the A20 there is no structures due to this perhaps being the main plaza area/meeting area keeping the area clear and bowl shaped. The Mittani layer was found five meters down on J1 while at A20 the Mittani layer was around two meters down. On J1 no structure was found except some pottery shards and floor level were found. Gb mentioned that in the future the area behind the wall will be removed in sections creating a stair to get the effect of the temple as the ancients, the direction of the stair is being discussed. J1 is 1 1/2 meter above the palace courtyards pavement. The east section in J1 is very well protection against the winter and the levels of strata are straight - maybe this could have been a sacred place. Our goals now are to reach the Phase two floor and follow the down slope to the south. This area is important because of the chronology of pottery being in thick layers in a very good time sequence. -sy bpW placed seven control points on all the sections. -dy Today we attended a meeting with mKB to show us the pottery of the different phases. She thought this was important because we are going to be excavating features that are sloping downwards. These features may be very thin and we must be careful while we excavate not to mix up the pottery from these different features. mKB explained and showed us the differences between Phase four to Phase one. We will be looking at f195 which has the late Chalcolithic pottery. Today we had pictures taken of the damage done to the site; the stands were damaged, plastic coverings had been torn apart by the wind as well as some trash around the site. .rd S713 .ri rE -sg fAB discussed the site with us and gave us some ideas. We could either expand or go downwards cutting into the layers, downwards was agreed upon paying careful attention to the pottery layers. fAB also asked if we could finish our goals in six weeks realisticly and expand afterwards time allowing. We will not be removing the stones directly touching the wall because they are important to show the boundary of the plaza, but we will be removing the stones not connected to the wall in the unit. fAB suggested to go down 10cm but after finding several large bone fragments on the surface after it had been cleaned we have decided to start at the top. Tomorrow morning we will set up the elevator to help remove the dirt before working and we will continue removing the baulk. We are going to print out the sections from the last season and compare them to what we see now. -dy Today was the first day of the excavation so we started by cleaning the entire area, this took around four hours. After cleaning we took pictures of the entire area and of the cement staircase before we removed it, which was the starting point of the excavation. We took out the cement steps of the entire staircase then we started to remove the baulk directly to the right of the staircase from ground level, feature by feature. We found some body sherds of pottery and we looked at them and discarded them. gB said for everyone to stay away from the wall as much as possible as it may become unstable. He also mentioned for us to take three photos from the east, west, and south sections to see the differences between them. The east section is well protected but the other two sections are not protected and have wind damage. We should also scrub the sections so that the layers are clearly defined. -sy We removed control point 4683 that was attached to the baulk by the staircase. -wk We have in our unit eight workmen who are Sa'ud Ibrahim, Abdl-Rahman Hassan and Masoom Hassan are the pickmen. Azad Muhammad, Fawwaz Khalil, Nazim Mahmood are the shovelmen. Hejar Mao and Rezan Omar are in charge of the wheelbarrel. .rd S714 .ri rE -dy Today we started the excavation in k120 which is the down step in the south section. bPW put four control points, 4726,4727,4728,4729. The workers set up the elevators first thing in the morning, two were required. Some bones found where the stair was, this peice of baulk which is next to the cement stair is still being removed. then we moved to k120 and started removing the topsoil f251, then f252 which is the accumulation under f251. f252 is still being excavate and should be complete by tomorrow. k 120 dy This is the down step in the south section. We decided to remove it because we want to expand more to the south and to have wider area helps us to follow the sloping of the escarpment to meet the plaza which we think it is 1m and a half below. So we assigned this step as a new locus K120. Barbara made a control point to this locus which is around 74N and 382. We assigned the features as the features from MZ19 season which are shown clearly in the east section. But we gave the first three features in K120 new features numbers because the first f251 we considered it top soil, due to the fact that it's mixed as it's left from several seasons. f252 which is under f251 is an accumulation and we found it in the section but it has not feature number as f253 which is a thin feature consiste of many shardes of pottery, bubbles and some peices of kiln waste, which is also shown in the section but has not feature number, until we reach f233 softer accumulation contains few shardes of pottery and stones, which shows in the section and we assigned it f233 the same feature number. -sg Discussed with fAB regarding expanding the section. It was decided that the down step in the south section would be expanded to within 25cm of the ledge behind it. The east section will be looked into later in the season, so far it is being discussed regarding moving it back so that the presentation of the site will be better. fAB also mentioned that perhaps the south section could be inclined as to avoid falling rocks. The east section will be sketched soon due to the ant/bird damage that has already been done to it, and a template made as well. .rd S715 .ri rE k 120 dy today we resumed removing f233 then we reached f231 which we assained it from MZ19 season cause it's the same in the section. under f231 we were expecting f232 which is a surface made of small pebbles, stones, sherds and containing some bones, found in MZ19 season, and it shows in the template number(J01t0214 V19d1159 Qx05 lC), But we didn't find it in k120. but under f231 we found lamination f254. then we stopped there for today. -sg gB suggested to expand to the east by removing the down step in the east section. .rd S716 .ri rE k 120 dy today we started removing f254 which is a very hard lamination has no shardes of pottery inside, then we reached f235 and we stopped there for today. k 121 dy it's the upper part of the down step in the east section. Consisted of two features f251 and f252 which we assained it from MZ19 season cause it's the same in the section. first we removed f251 then f252. -wk today lO who is the Zooarchaeologist came to the tell and gave a talk to the workmen about recovering animals bones from the excavation area. .rd S717 .ri rE -dy today we placed a new baulk to divide the new locus areas to assign k122 and k123. then we started digging in k122 which is the south step in the east section. We removed the pig jaw which was laying on the surface of f250 from last season, we removed it before starting excavation in this area because it was on the surface and we didn't want to step on it. k 122 dy this locus is under k121 which is the south step in the east section, we assigned the features in the locus the same as k120 cause it's continuation of them, and we can see this in the section from MZ19 season. So we started removing f253 which is a thin accumulation consisting of many sherdes of pottery and small pebbles, then we removed f231 and f233 until we reached f254 which is the lamination under f233. we assigned the feature number as in k120 because it's the same continuation. -wk today we got a new shovelman his name is Edrees. -sy today we removed marker number m4726 which is the northeast marker in k120. .rd S719 .ri rE -dy then we moved to k120 to remove f235 and make it level with the other features.