TGIS. Today was a long, but productive day in T38. We completed the two meter extension to the north and are now left amidst the never ending task of cleaning, cleaning, and more cleaning. Hopefully we will be ready to take drone photos when we resume our work on monday. In the extension we uncovered the continuation of the previously visible capstone. According to Ruben, this construction style is consistent with EBI burials. A large capstone surrounded by smaller stones (which were exposed to the north). While it remains unclear if some of those stones are collapse from locus 15, further cleaning should provide more insight. Locus 20 to the north and locus 16 to the east of locus 9 continue to proffer impressive ceramics. The material culture from the latter in particular are significant sizes and fairly diagnostic.
Today I also resumed the difficult task of cleaning locus 19, which contains the scatter of human remains. This has proven to be a time consuming endeavor. The remains are not in any logical order -- i.e. the cranium is situated near the pelvis and the ulna near the femur. It does seem that these remains were crushed by the collapse of stones (locus 13) on top of them. While this does not explain the orientation of the remains, it does explain the broken nature of them. All things considered, however, the state of preservation is impressive. Unfortunately due to time constraints, I had to leave the remains on site. I have collected only a few. Tomorrow I am working through the day off -- dragging Levon to the site to help me make sense of it all. I also plan to sketch, photograph, and remove the remains. This is a requisite step for continuing our operations in the trench, including the opening of the capstone immediately to the north of these remains. While the relationship between this individual and the probable burial in the chamber is unknown, hopefully we will find in situ materials that can cast some insight.
We also spent part of the day cleaning locus 13/16 near wall 10. To date it is still unclear what the relationship is between this long wall and locus 15. It seems as though they may in fact connect.