2008.07.31. Thursday. in the AM today we finished cleaning the topsoil (locus 116) off of the carpet of fallen football- sized stones (locus 124) in the northern half of the trench. I then drew the extent of the stone-carpet locus and took some levels within it (we got 2 data points today on boulders to the immediate east and north), before starting to remove the stones starting from the top of the trench and moving down towards the middle. Despite getting somewhat mired in the middle of the day (a combination of heat and recalcitrant rocks i think) we had the majority of this rock-collapse lens removed by the end of the day. In the morning BM did some trowel- work in the western part of the operation, digging over from the end of the westernmost LB wall which enters the north baulk in the main trench of T19 ( wall locus 119). she removed some pieces of what might be slag, as well as the usual finds from the wall in th enorth extension, which i have designated locus 126. meanwhile, beneath the rock carpet in the eastern trench is a layer of uppersoil with a fair quantity of cultural material: this was designated locus 127, and was the primary locus in which we worked today. BM successfully uncovered three or so large granite stones within locus 126: these seem to be leading off to the northwest, perhaps in the direction of the proposed Gegharot gate(?). (this is definitely an interesting prospect, as it implies that the EB levels and the bedrock would have been dramatically cut in a sort of channel curving out of the gate into the citadel). Also at the end of the day yesterday one of EGAF's workers was digging down at the foot of the rock carpet area, near mid- trench at the north baulk, and at the very end of the day started to bring up dark shiny soil coming out from underneath the thick lower deposit of locus 127. Today ATS directed the clearing of loci 124 and 127 back off of this soil layer. tomorrow while the workers continue to take down the eastern section, i will do a solid shovel pass (in the am when the soil is damp) across this dark soil to define its perimeter and then i will assign it a locus.