At 0922 hours (yeah), the Tsaghkahovit team including myself arrived at the namesake site. Ian, Gor, and I set up the TotalStation (TS) at benchmark BmE. Gor left for town to bring Ian’s excavation crew a sledgehammer (which eventually broke), and took the day off to do some other work, bringing brother Gaghi to the excavation team as a substitute. After setting up the TS at a sufficiently level position, we attempted again to connect the data collector (DC) to the prism (P). We got the DC to detect the P, but could not manage to connect the two. We did however set the TS to track the P, by pressing and holding the yellow-and-black button in the center-top of the prism. Thankfully, technical support in Indiana was contacted and the situation rectified.
The rest of the day was occupied by Ian’s excavation at SLT9 to the east of the citadel, 5m east of SLT5. A 5m x 5m gridline was set up and datum established. Sod was then cut and removed from periphery followed by interior. By the end of the day, potsherds filled up ¾ of the gallon-sized ceramics bag; bones filled the next highest amount, and obsidian filled the lowest. A few rim sherds were found, including a rather large and robust section. A body sherd was also excavated, of a profile I have not yet seen—it’s likely it’s from Iron III (sherd exhibits s-shaped profile). Most bones found were likely from small animals.
During the course of the excavation I took about an hour total leave to walk around Tsaghkahovit and surrounding hills to the east, just down to the valley west of the tall cromleched-slope, or about 400m SW of the citadel. Here I saw the loosely-rectangular surface architecture (perhaps too strong a word?) typical of the citadel’s environs, however, visible were six (?) such walls adjacent, the northern most perhaps encompassing a flagstone floor. At the hill due west, or 250m SSW of the citadel, an interesting circle of stones line the perimeter of the hill’s crown. The geography circumscribed is bowl-like. A depression just north (?) is circumscribed by another stone circle. This site is interesting in that at the southern end sits a large tuff boulder, with a basin depressed in the center. A notch one section of the lip seems to have been eroded by liquid. This stone-circle-encompassing-a-depression-with-a-tuff-basin phenomenon appears NNW 250m, with a basin that appears to have been worked, as the basin and basin lip appear very circular. This basin also contains a smoothed V-notch. The interior of the basin is coated with dark brown, granular matter, perhaps otherwise known as soil.
I also noticed three 3m boulder lines strung out 2m from each other, on the slope east of the aforementioned valley. This tripartite line complex is located at an elevation greater than the cromlechs scattered about the hill, and is manifested perpendicular to a ramp-formation, perhaps a cattle trail. On the northern slope of Tsaghkahovit, three level elevations exist. The first is the citadel, which isn’t technically part of the northern slope I suppose. Farther down the slope, 100m is the first, followed by another at an additional 25m. It seems to me that it would behoove a defensive functionality to the fortress to construct defensive works at these locations, forming a tiered-defense—perhaps accounting for the terraced appearance of the hill. To further imagine a defensive function of Tsaghkahovit, the northern-most corners of the wall at SLT5 have a vantage point that offer an unobstructed view down to the foot of the hill and the plain beyond. However, this vantage point only offers such a view from NNW to E. The western angles are obstructed by the north slope’s geography. 2 meters to the west and at a slightly higher elevation, however, is another wall formation. This formation covers the previously-mentioned wall’s blindspot, interestingly, and has a view N to NW. Such placement of two possible bulwarks suggests an effort to allow individuals to view the northern slopes of Tsaghkahovit from a protected vantage.