2002 TRENCH PC 23 Robert Vander Poppen, Field Supervisor Josh Moran, Assistant Supervisor Week 3: Robert Vander Poppen explains PC 23 during Week 3 trench tours. Field School Participants: Tamee Bollinger, Michael Glover, Sarah Titus, Elizabeth Wallace, and Nat Kerr This week marks a pair of landmarks for the PC 23 crew. It is the first full week we have worked as a trench team on our section of Poggio Colla, and we have also began to reach the levels of stratigraphy that contain the highest levels of artifact density. These levels, besides being a great deal of fun to excavate, also hold the keys to the questions we are attempting to answer this year in PC 23. Status of Trench PC 23 during Week 3. Already we have excavated the northern three loci of the trench down to the level of Stratum 3, which I believe may be the floor level of our building. I am beginning to suspect this due to the nature of the soil contained in this stratum. It is a darker soil than the previous ones, and contains far more inclusions of carbon, ceramic, metal, and bone bits. Examples of finds from this layer are things such as burnt bone, uncovered by Josh, a metal runner (after-product from molding metal) found by Tamee, and some small sherds of black glaze pottery discovered by Sarah. Our goal for the upcoming week in this area of the trench is to remove the section of mudbrick in the southern end of the trench and create a cross-section in order to determine the stratigraphic relationship of Stratum 2, our mudbrick fall, and Stratum 3. Assistant Field Supervisor Josh Moran cleaning scarp in PC 23. In another area of the trench Liz, Mike, and a volunteer named Nat, have been working on the area around the pit our site robbers dug in the winter of 2000. We are now beginning to gain a better understanding of what attracted the looters in the first place, and what they might have gotten away with. Near the pit Mike removed a number of pieces of iron slag, and not far away Liz discovered a disk of hammered lead. I am confident that the density of amorphous metal surrounding the looter's pit is what attracted them in the first place. I am hopeful that such material is what they took away from the site with them. View of Trench PC 23 with clandestini pit visible. In this area of the trench, over the course of the next few days, I hope to discover the relation of our ancient pit, still largely undisturbed by the looters, to Stratum 3. This will be key in determining how to use the artifacts from the pit to date our layers. This is compounded by the supposition that Stratum 3 is a floor level, as it becomes even more important to contextualize its date. Field Supervisor Robert Vander Poppen digging in Trench PC 23.   Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7 - Final Report   Director, Gregory Warden gwarden@mail.smu.edu Director, Michael Thomas michael.thomas@tufts.edu While the team is in Italy during the summer field season, send e-mail to: mvap3@dada.it To email an individual on the team, enter the person's last name in the subject heading. Excavation house phone: 055-844-9834, or, when calling from the US: 011-39-55-844-9834. Introduction | 2004 Field Season | Poggio Colla Field School | What’s New | Staff | Students Site History | Directors' Diaries | Student Diaries | Excavation Friends | Facilities | Conservation | Surveys Robert Belanger | Katherine Blanchard | Josh Moran | Caitlin Vacanti | Ivo van der Graaff | Robert Vander Poppen QuickTime VR | Site Set-Up | Dig Daily Life | Excavation Process | Field Manual | Lectures | Season's End Archives | Finds | Research Projects | Publications | Bibliography | Mugello Area | Home