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We are on the final stages of the countdown for the 2009 season which starts this Sunday! Things seem to be in place, plans are moving as they should, the “evil forces” around us seem to have chosen to be stay in their “holes” for the summer (….) and I looks like we will be able to say very soon: “Houston, we have liftoff!” :-)
This, Thursday, I’ll be out at BIU, Revadim and the site with some of the team, to bring some of the equipment from BIU to Revadim and have some last-minute discussions on our strategy for the season in Area A and F.
It’s definitely looking good!
Aren
On Monday evening, I was invited to give a lecture on the Tell es-Safi/Gath excavations to the Tel Gezer team, directed by S. Ortiz and S. Wolff (who are staying at Naveh Shalom). Needless to say (:-), I wowed them with our finds. Steve Ortiz, co-director of the Gezer excavations will be coming to lecture to the Safi team during the excavations.
Yesterday, Tuesday evening, I drove to Ashkelon to visit the Ashkelon excavations directed by L. Stager and D. Masters. After showing me around the excavations areas and some of their finds (including some really cool stuff which I suppose they will announce in the near future), I also presented a lecture to the Ashkelon team on the excavations at Safi. As usual, Larry Stager and I argued about the interpretation of the so-called “Goliath inscription” (discussed before on the blog more than once) – but that is already a regular part of the show…
During our season, Daniel Masters will be coming to present the Safi team about the Ashkelon excavations as well.
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Joe has just added to the website a link to the Manual for Volunteers & Students and Schedule of “Extra Dig Activities” for the upcoming 2009 season. Please do take a look at it and feel free to download.
I do hope that in addition to the updates that will appear on the blog, we will also be able to add new materials to the website during the season.
Enjoy!
Aren
The schedule for the lectures, field trips and other “extra-dig” activities during the upcoming season at Tell es-Safi/Gath is now ready. For those of you who are interested, here is a link with the schedule:
Aren
Today, June 14th, we are exactly 3 weeks before the beginning of the 2009 season (July 5th-31st). Things are beginning to fall together for the season, and a few updated are in order.
First of all, in the last few weeks we have had quite a few last minute/late signups, and the team has grown to quite in impressive size.
As of today (and today I received a registration package from someone!), we will be about 60 team members in the first week, 90 in the 2nd, 80 in the 3rd, and then 25 in the 4th. In light of the small numbers that had signed up up to quite recently, this is quite a nice development, particularly in light of the tight economic situation throughout the world. Who knows – perhaps we can serve as one of the indicators that the world financial crisis is over the worst…
As far as the plans for the summer season, we will be focussing our work in Area A and most of the team will be there. Our main objectives in Area A are to excavate in the Iron Age levels and in particular, to reach various Iron Age I levels in an extensive exposure as possible, including the earlier phases of the Iron I, which in previous season have only been exposed in a very limited manner in Area A (and in Area F as well). We hope to get a nice, “robust” representation of these important phases of the early stages of the Philistine culture.
In addition, we will have a small group working in Area F doing some very focused probes (directed by Jeff Chadwick) and perhaps, a small group working with Itzik Shai in Area E (depending on the results of the analyses carried out a few weeks ago. In addition, we will have a large team of archaeological scientists (up to 22-23 in the 3rd week) working in Area A with us, including the students in the archaeological science field school.
All told, it looks like we are going to have a great season and we should have some great finds.
I hope to keep updating on the blog, both in the preparations in the next few weeks, and needless to say, during the excavations as well.
Aren
Today, I visited the tell as part of field trip of Bar-Ilan University students to sites in Philistia. We spent about 4 and 1/5 hours on site and managed to cover a very nice amount of the major issues and finds relating to the site.
In general, the site is in great shape and the various areas show very little, if at all signs of “wear and tear” from the last time I visited. Also, due to the fact that it was a relatively dry winter, there are not a lot thorns and thistles in the excavation areas, which will make it much easier for the team when we begin working in July.
At the very end of the visit, after finishing a visit to Area C6 and portion of the siege system in the eastern side of the site, we walked by a really nice field of sunflowers that were in full bloom, just to the east of tell, right under Areas E and A.
See here some very nice pictures of this.
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