Report on the 1955 seasonH. de Contenson

Henri de Contenson

The trenches, whose supervision Mr C. Schaeffer had entrusted to us in 1955, were opened to the North and South of the 1949 area and are distributed on either side of an East-West street, to the North of a second East-West street lying to the South of the first and to the West of the first North-South street cleared so far, which cuts the East-West axes at right angles. This urban network will serve to delimit the various regions of the excavation.

1°. To the North of the first East-West street.

In the eastern part of the area, a narrow strip was explored along the northern edge of the most northerly East-West street. This region, much disturbed by clandestine pits, did not yield coherent architectural remains. One can only recognise two occupation floors: one at 0,40 m., the other at a depth of 1,30, on 1 metre of virgin soil.

On the upper floor, a biconical spindle whorl of stone engraved with dotted circles (Pt. 35) was recovered, and a hand-made pot with a handle, not very characteristic (Pt. 26).

On the lower floor, a number of objects were encountered at a depth of 1 m.: two earrings, one of bronze and the other of silver (Pt. 33), a squat vase (Pt. 32), an alabaster lid (Pt. 28), a fragment of bone style, polished (Pt. 44), a piece of cut green stone and a cup foot with base and small ring foot (Pt. 26). At 1,20 m. lay a conical stone loom weight in grey stone (Pt. 34). Immediately above the floor, at 1,30, the pottery remains of the beginning of Iron I were abundant: globular cooking pot with flaring rim and a handle, in blackened burnt earth (Pt. 40), vase with strainer spout and vertical handle, with triangle patterns opposed at the apex, in red paint, vase with short tubular spout decorated with a brown radiating motif, sherd with red geometric decoration, sherd with red concentric circles, sherd in orange fabric with glaze [illegible] … continues