Jul 25, 2012

Decorated Pot and Worked Flint

The weather was back to cool, breezy, and overcast today. (Yesterday it was sunny and almost too hot for me, but luckily I didn't get a sunburn.) It is now sunny which is apparently rare.
I was working in the same place today. I didn't find anything too exciting today except for a piece of decorated pot, and a piece of flint that was obviously a chip from some tool. The piece of pottery I got was about 3x2 inches. It's back was up, so it was the first thing I uncovered. after I realized it was more than just a little chip, I switched to using a small "leaf trowel" and excavated a little more carefully until I was able to lift it out and brush the dirt off of the back side. Then I found the ridge of decoration. It was pretty neat because I discovered, and excavated the entire thing all alone, unlike the large piece I was working on yesterday.
Toward the end of the day I was moved to another section of the midden and on my second trowel full, I found a nice chip of flint that our supervisor said was very nice.
I'm good at recognizing worked pieces of stone, thanks to my background of arrow-head hunting, but distinguishing pottery from stone from burnt stone, is more difficult for me. I'm starting to figure it out though.
We are attending a lecture this evening given by one of the professional archaeologists who works on site with us. I'm not sure what the lecture will be on, but possibly iron-age brocks. That is apparently this guy's expertise.

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