Bad weather made week three a short one. We worked from Monday to Wednesday then held up until Sunday when we had one extra day. We had heavy rain, thunder and lightning on both Wednesday and Thursday, which made it quite dangerous to be up on site. Our workmen went home already with the first drops since their company has a policy which says that no work can be carried out in rain.

A visit to the local pottery treasure in the museum of Salemi

On Wednesday afternoon, we made a visit to the local museum in Salemi, mainly to get a presentation of the ceramics from House 1. The museums store our finds, and have an exhibition about the material from Monte Polizzo, Mokarta and other Bronze and Iron Age sites in the region. One of our aims with the project is to give the participants a broader perspective on archaeology in general and of the site and the context in particular. Learning the ceramics is a crucial step towards a deeper understanding of the site.

Later that day we made a visit to our colleagues from Chicago Northern Illinois, which are excavating inside the Norman castle in Salemi. For further info see their website at: http://dig.anthro.niu.edu/sicily/sic_home.htm

Parts of their goal are to find traces from the earliest occupation in Salemi, which we believe also were an important indigenous centre at the time of Monte Polizzo. The difference is that the occupation on Salemi seems to have been continuous until present day. This makes archaeology a bit more complicated in Salemi since most of the earliest traces have been disturbed by later occupation.

We make a steady progress in our own excavation. We found several important artefacts which will help us to date our structure more precisely, among them is an iron dagger with a hilt that is quite unusual. We are excavating in-situ find layers in two of the rooms, the find layer is about 20 cm thick and contains many different types of ceramics, both indigenous and imported. However, it stands clear that the find layers from House 1, excavated from 1998-2001, is unique in its variability. The luxury items from what we now call House 2 is not as elaborate as the finds from House 1.

The never ending unearthing of walls

Further down the slope we have been able to trace two adjacent walls to the wall found in the first week. This is particularly interesting since it points towards yet another type of architecture compared to House 1 and 2. We will hopefully reveal even more next week when we will get another 8 workmen to our site.