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January, 2001
My first job in the trenches is to knock down a Hellenistic wall using a pick. I chip away at fill to level off behind a string-line while large stones topple around my feet. Then I clear them away. After lunch I trowel out foundation fill, mainly pottery shards, but also a tiny piece of oxidised copper, and some minute pieces of flint. For the last 20 minutes I continue destroying the wall, keeping it cleanly vertical with a plum-bob.
I gradually learn that archaeology is another name for destruction. I bash away at a wall with a monkoosh and then clean up the mess I make with a hand shovel and a mustereen. I expose and smooth a silky grey surface: Electra demolishes it.
I become enamoured of my monster pit. There my job is clear: to delineate and excavate. It’s my pit, my familiar place, where I feel competent. After a Friday trip to Umm Qais I whizz back down to the dig site to look at it.
I’m not so competent when it comes to baulk-cleaning, where I have to be very sure nothing tumbles down to contaminate meticulous layering. I know I’m not good at this, so when Stephen yells “Straighten it up. It’s as round as a whore’s bum” I’m amused rather than affronted.
Sometimes I am snappy and tearful: I can’t manage the plum-bob; I crack the back of my fingers and make them bleed; and Electra calls me “Margaret”. Sometimes Maggie gives me a quick succession of jobs, none of which I have time to get stuck into. Sometimes when I clean a clump of rocks ready for photography, Steve says “Great job” and I suspect sarcasm. Sometimes it’s hard on the wrist: “scrape hard enough to make your wrist hurt” is Maggie’s standard.
But I become more agile, hopping around the trench as it becomes noticeably deeper, and gradually learn to yell “Bidi goofah” to summon a man to empty my bucket made from a recycled tyre. Try to do it myself so I don’t have to shout orders, and they glare at me. Sometimes four men line up, chanting as they pass the buckets along the chain.
On the second last day, it begins to rain. When I poke my head above the trenches at knock off time, I’m dazzled by the sudden greening of Tell Husn, till now quite barren.
Every time I look around the past is visible, and so is the meticulous task of unearthing it.
It sounds fascinating there ‘in the trenches’, but it does look a bit of a warzone. My fingers are bruised and battered just thinking about it. Not a place for the naturally clumsy. 🙂 🙂
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There’s a whole language of archaeology to learn isn’t there? Monkoosh and mustereen, don’t’ tell me I like the mystery 🙂
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Not so much the languages of archaeology, as the Arabic of the trench! Tools and equipment. And just as well you don’t want to know beyond the context. Not saying why!
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You have to have a lot of dedication and patience to do this kind of work, Meg. How long did you work on this excavation?
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9th -28th January. I’d always been interested in archaeology, and it was a chance to see how it worked.
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I’m glad you got the chance to participate. That’s nearly 3 weeks, probably longer than I could have lasted! 🙂
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Some marvellously ‘clean’ sections in your photos, Meg. So yes, hard work. I never worked on a multi-period site in my archaeology student days, wherein I had enough problems following the archaeologist’s interpretations of what had been exposed. What spark took you digging in Jordan?
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Where did you dig? What period? Any treasures?
The local blokes with picks did the really hard stuff. We had talks most nights about various specialties. The dreaded Maggie was glass-woman, Stephen gave an historical and contextual overview, Ben talked flint tools (for our walk to nearby Sone Age Wadi Hammah, and Karen was a specialist in bones.
I went to Jordan because all my mob were having adventures and I wanted one too! And I saw an ad in the Saturday paper. And I’d just inherited from the uncle who introduced me to archaeology. The Middle East was sort of familiar because I’d spent a few weeks in Egypt with my daughter in 1996.
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Although I love to think I could join a dig, I know in my heart of hearts I’d give up after a day or two of the hard slog you describe, so my admiration of your doggedness is tremendous. I’m glad the experience was so positive. Loved the post – and the pix.
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Work was only mornings and trenches alternated with the cleaning tables. It was also nearly 20 years ago!
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Wow, well done Meg…sounds like hard work in the heat
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Cold. It was January. Even snow near Amman.
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Oh, OK! But still very tiring work, I’m sure
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I’m getting lots of kudos for hard work. I don’t really remember it as such. My main trench suffering was from bully-Maggie, trench supervisor!
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Ah, well there’s always one…. Anyway, you were enjoying the work, which is why you don’t recall it as particularly arduous
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I don’t think that I could have done this, ever. Full marks to you. How long did it take for your body to recover from all that effort?
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I was younger then, and it wasn’t as arduous as I expected it to be. I was tired at the end of every day, but fresh-ish each morning.
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That must have been a very rewarding experience.
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I wouldn’t do it twice, but I learnt so much about reading the past – not least the stretch from object to theory! This site was particularly diverse – the crossroads of trade routes.
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Sounds gruelling but informative
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