Bright and early at the temple, Elaine opens the supply magazine door. Her team carries ladders, pottery baskets, dig tools, a level, meter poles and more every morning out to the excavation units. |
While Elaine works behind the Sacred Lake, work continues in other areas of the Mut Temple by a Brooklyn Museum team. |
Elaine sets up the level while work continues in the square behind her. Measurements are taken numerous times each day, in order to accurately record the vertical coordinates of each level (usually around 10cm of soil) removed. Levels are calculated based on a fixed point, so that levels on different parts of the site can be easily compared. |
Work in the trench is going well. The team has isolated the walls, and is now digging inside the “room” formed. Elaine is hoping to find evidence for a surface, and the nearly complete vessels littered around this area have her hopeful. |
Here is a great shot of Gufti Shergawy. He is working on clearing around a vessel still lodged in the dirt. |
Because Elaine hopes to document activities that occurred in the building, she is sieving the material found inside. Here her workmen wheel the dirt removed from her square up the hill, and dump it directly into the sieve. |
A vigorous shake and swing sends the sand and small dirt through the sieve, leaving any small pottery sherds, bones, and other small objects missed by the workers in the trench. |
Elaine and her Inspector, Ghada, discuss the pottery. This one appears to have painted stripes. |