Domuztepe dig diary
Week five: the dust descends
British Museum curator Alexandra Fletcher reports from
Domuztepe
There is always one bad week during an
excavation and this was it. We were hit by storms moving north from
Syria. They brought high winds, heavy rain, and a thick haze of
dust with them. Roads became blocked by mud slides and it became
too dark to start work at the usual time in the morning.
It quickly became clear that many of our tents
leak as they are designed for hot dry weather. In the high winds
one blew away entirely. After the storms the dust persisted,
coating everything in fine, choking silt. Even though the sun
struggled to break through all the dust it was
still incredibly hot and illness has also affected some
in the team, making for a tough week for all.
The dust finally cleared by the middle of the
week and we began the serious business of closing down the
excavation. After plans of the site were drawn, photographs taken
and notebooks completed we wrapped our trenches in plastic
sheeting and filled them in with soil, ready for us to return next
year.
The work did not end there though as many more things
need to be completed before we head home. Not least, we now have to
move all the objects from earlier excavation seasons into our new
storage facility at the Kahramanmaraş Museum.
In total 255 heavy crates full of objects need
to be checked, cleaned and moved across town, which is going to
take about six days. Objects from
this year also need to finish being conserved, packed and
taken into the museum and we are frantically recording, drawing and
photographing them to be ready in time.
Images (from top):
- Recording pottery in camp
- The sun tries to break through the dust
- Washing pottery in camp