First results of week 1

Posted on January 8, 2016 by Julia Budka

We just finished our first field in the field, working on the New Kingdom remains on Sai Island. Unfortunately, our schedule had to be slightly modified – on arrival we found out that tomb 26 was looted back in early summer 2015… So the first unexpected task was of course to document its present state, document the effects of the plundering and clean up the recent debris.

With some delay because of this unfortunate development at cemetery SAC5, we started work as planned in the New Kingdom town. New squares were opened in both sectors currently investigated by AcrossBorders, SAV1 East and SAV1 West.

At SAV1 West, the new extension lies in the south-eastern corner – we are hoping for more mud brick structures contemporaneous to the enclosure wall and located at the inner side of the town. The present findings closely resemble the results from 2015: much material of mid to late 18^th Dynasty date was re-deposited in antiquity and now lies on the surface of the area. Large areas of mud brick debris are promising and might cover some structures below.

At SAV1 East, we extended the squares towards the west in the southwestern corner of the area. One of the aims is to assess the east-west extension of Building A; another is to clarify whether a north-south street existed in this part of the town (as it was documented further south by M. Azim).

There are no surprises so far at SAV1 East – thick layers of mixed material comprising 18^th Dynasty, Ramesside, Post-Meroitic, Medieval and Ottoman finds are covering scarce remains of the New Kingdom. Possibly, we have already located another “negative wall”.

Contemporaneously with the excavations, processing of the pottery is conducted directly at the site in newly set-up sherd yards. The amounts from both sectors are very large – 135 baskets of sherds were processed in the first days from SAV1 East, 100 from SAV1 West.

Stone tools and all other categories of finds are registered by Meg Gundlach and Ken Griffin in the digging house. There are already a number of new fragments of firedogs, net weights, female and animal figurines and of course plenty of grindstones, hammers and pounders.

All in all, week 1 suggests a promising 2016 field season, confirming results from previous seasons, but also enabling us to draw further conclusions.

Looking back: 2015 papers and reports

Posted on December 28, 2015 by Julia Budka

The 2016 season of AcrossBorders on Sai Island has almost begun – we’ll be flying to Khartoum later today.

As kind of a teaser what one can expect from the upcoming work, I’d like to look back at some of the research conducted by AcrossBorders in 2015. Three relevant papers just appeared in the last days/weeks.

The Pharaonic town on Sai Island and its role in the urban landscape of New Kingdom Kush, Sudan & Nubia 19, 2015, 40–53, by Julia Budka

In this paper, I tried to summarize AcrossBorders field seasons on Sai from 2013 to 2015 in the sectors SAV1 East and SAV1 West – stressing the important new results on Ramesside activities, both in the town area and the cemetery SAC5.

Bichrome Painted Nile Clay Vessels from Sai Island (Sudan), Bulletin de liaison de la céramique égyptienne 25, 2015, 327–337 by Julia Budka

This is a preliminary report on one of my favorite group of pottery vessels : Bichrome painted nile clay jars, commonly attested in Egypt but also in Lower and Upper Nubia. I discussed their form repertoire and the most common decorative motifs; first thoughts about their possible meaning and provenience were presented.

Ein Pyramidenfriedhof auf der Insel Sai, Sokar 31, 2015, 54–65, by Julia Budka

I am very happy that the magazine Sokar with a focus on Egyptian pyramids, allowed some space in the current volume dedicated to SAC5 on Sai and our discovery of tomb 26 and the pyramidion of Hornakht.

Last but not least, the fieldwork report from 2015 is now available and free to download!

AcrossBorders 2016: the upcoming fieldwork season

Posted on December 22, 2015 by Julia Budka

In a few days, the first group of team members of AcrossBorders will be on the way back to Sudan. We will travel via Khartoum to Sai Island and will start our fourth season on January 1 (insha’allah). As in the previous seasons, AcrossBorders will focus on the New Kingdom remains on the large island of Sai. We plan to work in different sectors within the town area and to continue work in the New Kingdom cemetery SAC5, excavating tomb 26.

I am very happy that well-known team members will join us again – Martin Fera, Jördis Vieth and Sayantani Neogi. Other core team members, Sean Taylor, Vanessa Becker and Daniela Penzer, joined AcrossBorders in 2015 and will be travelling to Sai for the first time in the upcoming season. The object registration will be again in the hands of Kenneth Griffin and Meg Gundlach. Klara Sauter from Vienna will be working for the first time in Sudan, supporting the fieldwork in SAV1 West.

I am delighted that there are several newcomers from Munich joining AcrossBorders as student assistants: Bartlin Schöpflin, Adrian de Vries, Cajetan Geiger, Michaela Janker and Lucia Sedlakova. Furthermore, I am very happy to welcome Dietrich Klemm and Rosemarie Klemm – distinguished colleagues from Munich and well-known specialists on the geology of Egypt and Nubia.

Last but not least, the FWF START project will be again represented by Austrian physical anthropologists – Andrea Stadlmayr and Marlies Wohlschlager are more than keen on the prospects excavating the burial chamber of tomb 26.

Most important: our dear friend and colleague Huda Magzoub will join us again as inspector of NCAM – helping us in the field and gaining more experience in New Kingdom archaeology.

As in 2015, the 2016 fieldwork will focus on the continuous excavation at SAV1 East and SAV1 West, the excavation of our newly discovered tomb in cemetery SAC 5 and the documentation of already excavated material from SAV1E and SAV1W (sorting and recording of the material in the courtyard and working room).

SAV1 East

It is planned to continue and hopefully to complete fieldwork on the site SAV1 East. The remains pre-dating the Building A in the southern part of the site have to be investigated in detail, especially to establish an absolute date for them. For this we will extend our excavation trenches towards the south and especially towards the west.

SAV1 West

The interesting results from fieldwork in a site to the west of the Pharaonic town, labelled SAV1 West, from 2014 and 2015 allow us to continue focused work there. There are 3 major aims for 2016: 1) investigating the ditch in front of the enclosure wall; 2) complete excavation of the 18^th Dynasty structures in trench 1S; 3) extending trench 1 towards the east in order to investigate the building horizon within the town.

We will also continue the investigation of the ancient landscape of Sai – and plan to take several sets of sample for various types of scientific analysis.

Without doubt another busy season is waiting for us – with a team of both experienced scholars and newcomers and thanks to all of the support by our Sudanese friends and colleagues, I am more than confident that the results will be amazing and the 2016 season productive – providing more food for thoughts on the nature of the New Kingdom occupation on Sai Island.

Looking much forward to travel to Sudan and wishing all team members & friends of AcrossBorders very happy holidays and a perfect start into 2016!

AcrossBorders’ first public appearance in Munich

Posted on April 24, 2015 by Julia Budka

With our move from Vienna to Munich and all the logistic and administrative things of the last weeks, Sai Island seems like ages ago, but in reality only 5 weeks have passed since we left Sudan! Especially because of this sensed long distance, I am very happy that Sudan and archaeological work there is the focus of an upcoming event here in Munich. Tomorrow’s lecture event dedicated to Sudan in the Egyptian Museum Munich is also the perfect opportunity to present AcrossBorders’ most recent results to an audience in our new German home. I am very grateful for this chance to introduce my project and to talk about latest findings, new questions and planned tasks. Fieldwork within the New Kingdom town of Sai in 2014 and 2015 will be the focus, but I will also mention our newly discovered tomb in cemetery SAC5.

To illustrate the potential of tomb 26, I will show some of the nice complete pottery vessels from the shaft bottom. Together with the marl clay pilgrim flasks and amphorae, one almost complete stone vessel, SAC5 212, was found in the southeastern corner.

Stone vessel SAC5 212 found at the bottom of the shaft of tomb 26.

This clustering opposite of the entrance to the burial chamber already suggested that the finds are remains of a burial which was removed from the chamber and left in the shaft during one of the phases of reuse (or possibly plundering?). One finding from the burial chamber supports the assumption that the remains on the shaft bottom were originally deposited in the chamber: A small rim fragment of the almost complete stone vessel SAC5 212 was discovered in the debris just inside the burial chamber.

Post-excavation processing was unfortunately slowed down because of the transfer of the project, but I am positive that we will soon have results from the ongoing studies of the ceramics, small finds, landscape and micromorphology!

AcrossBorders 2015: looking back at a fruitful season

Posted on March 16, 2015 by Julia Budka

Thanks to the great help and support by our Sudanese colleagues, everything was arranged in the last days here in Khartoum and a set of samples is waiting to be exported; Martin and me are flying out early tomorrow morning – as the last team members of AcrossBorders’ 2015 field season.

Looking back, it’s a challenge to summarize these ten weeks in the field on Sai Island. The 2015 field season resulted in various important insights and added valuable information about the evolution of the Pharaonic town of Sai Island and its development from the early 18^th Dynasty to the Ramesside era. The four most important results can be briefly summarized as follows:

(1) The features unearthed in the southern part of SAV1 East pre-date “Building A” and probably belong to the early 18^th Dynasty. With feature 57, a terrace wall set against the natural gravel deposit, affinities to the building technique of the Kerma culture – dry-stone walls with galus/earth– can be noted. All in all, these southern remains mirror our findings in 2013 and can be interpreted as the northern extensions of the area excavated by Michel Azim around temple A. A dating to the very early New Kingdom (Ahmose? Amenhotep I?) is most likely.

Early 18th Dynasty remains along the southern edge of SAV1 East; including the terracing wall feature 57.

(2) “Building A” at SAV1 East provides a close parallel to the so-called residence SAF2 in the southern part of the Pharaonic town, probably also regarding its function. For the first time, large sets of seal impressions were discovered in the Pharaonic town of Sai, allowing reconstructing patterns of the Egyptian administration in Upper Nubia. The recent finds illustrate very well the importance of Sai as administrative centre during the time of Thutmose III, but probably already during the reign of Hatshepsut.

(3) The earliest phase of occupation within the town enclosure at SAV1 West is contemporaneous to the building of the town wall and dates to the mid-18^th Dynasty. There is clear negative evidence for an early 18^th Dynasty presence at the site. It has to be highlighted that we also have hints for Ramesside activities at SAV1 West.

Nothing predating the town enclosure was found in SAV1 West – the earliest exposed structures are contemporaneous to the town wall.

(4) More New Kingdom tombs are still unexcavated in the southern part of the major pyramid cemetery SAC5 – this is clearly illustrated by tomb 26. The findings in tomb 26 testify that there were burials during the 19^th Dynasty – of high officials like the jdnw of Kush Hornakht. This is of great importance for understanding the relationship between Sai and Amara West in this era and might be of historical significance for Upper Nubia in a broader sense.

The shaft of tomb 26 yielded a lot of interesting finds attesting to a multiple use!

Once again I would like to thank everybody who contributed to this very successful 2015 season – all international team members, all colleagues from NCAM and especially our inspector Huda Magzoub who did a fantastic job as usual, all of the house staff (Sidahmed, Abdelfatah, Osama, Moatez and Ahmed), the field staff and of course the local communities on Sai. Looking much forward to the post-excavation processing of this rich set of data, samples and finds and of course to the next season 2016!

The success of the 2015 season was only possibly with great team work!

End of excavation in the cemetery SAC5

Posted on March 11, 2015 by Julia Budka

AcrossBorders’ excavations on Sai Island have come to an end for 2015. It feels strange at the moment, especially that almost 3 weeks of work in area 2 in SAC5 disappeared under sand again – today we backfilled tomb 26 in order to continue excavating its chamber in the next year.

Backfilling of the shaft of tomb 26.

The shaft of our new tomb yielded a number of interesting finds – inscribed pieces of Hornakht, a complete stone vessel, two scarabs and a number of complete vessels, among them nicely decorated Ramesside Marl clay pilgrim flasks. The rock-cut chamber off to the north was obviously looted and we only cleaned its uppermost debris.

While the next two days will be busy with final recording, packing, storing materials and traveling to Khartoum, I wish to thank already today all of the local fieldwork staff – as in the last years, they coped with sand, wind, nimiti-flies and especially in the last days with a quite remarkable heat wave.

Without their skills and partly painstaking efforts, the results of this very successful 2015 season would not have been possible – the last days in the shaft and chamber were especially hard and a big “thank you” goes here to Mohammed, Hassan, Samir, Farah and Osman! Looking much forward to continue working with all of them next year insha’allah!

First finds in the shaft of tomb 26 at the end of week 9

Posted on March 5, 2015 by Julia Budka

After the discovery of the shaft of tomb 26 on Tuesday, the cleaning of the shaft kept us busy in the last days and is still ongoing.

It is a roughly rectangular shaft, orientated north-south – we have currently reached a depth of 3.2 m. The filling was in the upper 2.5 m a sequence of windblown and very fine sand with several traces of flood levels between. Obviously the upper part of the shaft was refilled over a long time. It contained a good number of pottery sherds – ranging in date from the mid-late 18^th Dynasty, Late New Kingdom to Napatan times – , small fragments of bones and several types of beads.

Mohammed carefully cleaning remains of a flood deposit in the upper filling of the shaft.

Today we reached a level with a number of stone fragments in 2.5 m depth, large fragments of pottery vessels and a large quantity of scattered bone. The most dominant feature was a large schist slab set against the Northwestern corner, extending along the west wall of the shaft. Obviously it was one of the original closing stones of the shaft during the 18^th Dynasty, but fell into the shaft at a later stage. The ceramics from this debris layer suggest a date after the 25^th Dynasty – so possibly during the last phase of plundering before the shaft was left open for some time.

One of the original closing stones of the shaft mouth was found collapsed in 2.5 m depth.

All in all, this collapsed schist seems important for understanding the use life of tomb 26 – Martin Fera documented its position with SFM.

SFM documentation of today’s situation in the shaft.

Another very interesting feature is an incised rectangular shape on the north wall, starting just a little bit above the slab – it resembles an opening to a chamber! Whether it was a trial and remained unfinished/was abandoned, or whether there is still a chamber below will become clear after this weekend! I am personally convinced that the chamber will open towards the north.

Thanks to the organizational skills of our rais Imad Shorbagi and the generous support of the local ferryboat crew we were able to get the equipment to remove the slab from the shaft – hopefully this was also a good training for dealing with more finds to come!

Ready for a well deserved weekend: successfully removed the slab from the shaft!

A new tomb in SAC 5

Posted on March 3, 2015 by Julia Budka

This year’s goal for the resumed work in the large New Kingdom cemetery SAC 5 was of course the identification of more tomb monuments – yesterday the first outlines of a shaft in our area 2 came to light, today we managed to clean the surroundings and to verify that we have found a previously unknown tomb!

Location of new tomb 26 (looking from pyramid tomb 6 towards the west).

The new structure, christened as tomb 26 of SAC 5, of which we found very faint traces of mud bricks and the shaft, is located between tombs 8 and 7 in the area dug by the French Mission (see Minault-Gout/Thill 2012). In this southeastern part of the cemetery, already 13 New Kingdom tombs have been excavated – and more are probably still to be discovered!

For now, it is still unclear whether we will be able to reconstruct the superstructure of the new tomb – similar to the neighbouring tombs 2, 3, 4 and 5, the shaft is the main feature preserved. With reference to the named tombs, I do expect a rather short shaft of maybe 4-5 meters depth and only one burial chamber.

Upper part of the shaft of newly discovered tomb 26.

The material we found so far in the sandy filling covers the mid to late 18^th Dynasty, the Late New Kingdom and the 25^th Dynasty/Napatan Period. It will be exciting to explore the different phases of use of tomb 26 further – and of course we do hope for some glue about the original owner of this burial place in ancient Sai.

Reference:

Minault-Gout, A./Thill, F. 2012: Saï II. Le cimetière des tombes hypogées du Nouvel Empire (SAC5), FIFAO 69, Cairo.

Cemetery, seals, pots and Nun-bowls in week 8

Posted on February 26, 2015 by Julia Budka

This week work focused again on fieldwork in the cemetery SAC5 and registration and studying of various find categories in the dig house.

Excavation in area 1 in the southern part of SAC5 proved to be very interesting: we now know that this large sector set between two small hill outcrops probably was completly void of tombs. No burial monuments were located, but rather various interesting topographical features exposed – Martin Fera will compose a digital landscape model in the next weeks attempting a first interpretation of this topography. The fresh information will allow some new insights into the landscape, evolution and size of the New Kingdom cemetery SAC5.

Area 1 with newly exposed topographies.

In agreement with Florence Thill, we started digging another area in SAC5: area 2 is located north of area 1, just next to various 18^th Dynasty monuments like tomb 8. The surface material discovered so far covers all the periods attested for the use of SAC5 as a burial site: mid-late 18^th Dynasty, Late Ramesside, Pre-Napatan and Napatan.

Today, a sandy depression was found, surrounded on three sides by bedrock – we’ll continue excavating there, of course hoping for a shaft opening belonging to a new tomb.

Promising new area 2 in SAC5.

Feature 15 keeps us busy in the digging house – most of the washing of the ceramics is now done, but sorting is still ongoing. 60 vessels have been reconstructed so far – dozens of more are still waiting to be joined. Oliver Frank Stephan concentrates on drawing the complete profiles and reconstructed pots. Registration of finds from feature 15 continued – Ken Griffin and Meg Gundlach have been very productive in entering different types of objects into the database. By now, a total of 329 small finds were registered from feature 15! And I am not yet done with sieving, some bags with material from directly above the pavement are still unchecked, for sure comprising more objects. Already 171 seal impressions were documented, mostly dating to Hatshepsut and Thutmose III. We continue to be a bit baffled about the large amount of clay sealings from such a small structure!

Exciting: this week a substantial number of new seal types were registered.

Sabine Tschorn started with drawing representative fragments of faience vessels – most of which are Nun-bowls, but other shapes like small chalices are also attested. The number of fragments from SAV1 West is much higher than from SAV1 East – probably related to the different character of the areas, but it could also be explained by the slightly later date of deposits in SAV1 West. The late 18^th Dynasty, a well-known heyday of faience production, is better attested in our western area than within the surroundings of Building A towards the East.

Happy with small, but diagnostic pieces of Nun-bowls from SAV1 West.

Happy about small, but diagnostic pieces of Nun-bowls from SAV1 West.

Last but not least I am very thankful to Stuart Tyson Smith and his team for welcoming us this week in Tombos – we got a splendid tour through the cemetery and the town site. There are many parallels to Sai Island and I am looking much forward to future results of the Tombos mission and a continous open exchange and collaboration.

First glimpses of Post-New Kingdom use in SAC5, area 2

Posted on February 25, 2015 by Julia Budka

Sai Island in Northern Sudan has been continuously settled from Prehistory to modern times being occupied by various people throughout the ages. It is well known that the New Kingdom monuments, both the town site and the cemeteries, were reused in periods after the Pharaonic era. We found plenty of evidence during our excavations at SAV1 West and SAV1 East this year – one very nice piece is the adorable giraffe graffito.

For the cemetery SAC5, a re-use of 18^th Dynasty tombs in the Late New Kingdom and in the Prenapatan and Napatan Period is well attested thanks to the excavations of the French mission (see Thill 2006-2007). This period, roughly the late 11^th century up to the 8^th century BCE, is still little understood in Northern Sudan (as it is the case for Egypt) – current excavations, especially at Tombos and Amara West, illustrate that much remains to be discovered from this era.

Today, we started the surface cleaning in a new area in cemetery SAC5. Thanks to the arrival of Florence Thill, who joined us for the upcoming weeks as external expert, we agreed to investigate an as-yet unexplored zone between the already excavated tombs.

Work has started in area 2, cemetery SAC5.

Work started in area 2, cemetery SAC5.

We are currently focusing on the southeastern surroundings of tomb 8. This 18^th Dynasty tomb was also used as burial place in the Napatan period – therefore it came as no surprise that the ceramics we collected today from the surface cover a large time span: mid-late 18^th Dynasty, Late Ramesside, Pre-Napatan, Napatan and Christian period! Most of the material dates to the 10^th-8^th centuries BCE – very exciting!

The sorting of the pottery fragments is undertaken at the site – wares and forms are counted, diagnostic pieces selected for further analysis.

Thanks to our amazing washing man, the diagnostics found this morning were already clean after lunch: nice painted pilgrim flasks, amphorae (including 2 oases ones!) and especially Napatan cups and beakers.

The next days of work will hopefully tell us whether there are more reused 18^th Dynasty tombs in this sector of SAC5, or even a Post-New Kingdom burial place. The first finds are very promising in many respects!

Reference:

F. Thill. 2006-2007. Les réoccupations “(pré)napatéennes” dans la cimetière égyptien 8B5/SAC5 de Sai, in: Mélanges offerts à Francis Geus, CRIPEL 26, 353–369.

AcrossBorders

This is the blog of the ERC starting grant project AcrossBorders (ERC grant agreement n° 313668)

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