Day 6 - Rest day.

Today the group refrained from digging and spent the day doing other things. Most of us went to visit the amazing wonder that is the ancient Nabataean City of Petra. This comletely lives up to all expectations from the breathtaking opening into the city to be confronted by the now famous treasury, to the extreme vistas throughout this vast city once of 30,000 souls. Suffice it to say all new visitors were awestruck and those that had been before could not resist re-visiting.

Internet connectivity problems have prevented the uploading of a gallery of images from the first week. Hopefully this will be sorted out tomorrow and it will be added together with the update from the first day of the second week of this season's dig.

Day 5 – Wadi Rutm and Batn Al Ghoul.

What an amazing day! On the Eastern escarpment above Wadi Rutm station, we have now identified a complete military complex which includes a large dry stone wall built redoubt, several smaller outposts and five trenches. Much of this came about by following some painstaking research into a document consisting of a sketch by a First World War pilot of some trenches on the hillside above the station.

Also work continued excavating and recording the Ottoman Army camp North of the Wadi Rutm station. This is what archaeology is really all about. Today we excavated an Ottoman army position amidst the stunning scenery of Wadi Rutm, and it turned out to be a possible pre-historic megalithic structure! Four to six thousand years of Near Eastern heritage, encapsulated in a single landscape – this is why we are dirt monkeys!

Elsewhere, at Batn AL-Ghoul old station one team began a geophysical survey in the area of the disappeared station buildings. Nearby metal detecting began in an area of apparently Ottoman military tent rings which were discovered yesterday on a walk along the railway line between there and Wadi Rutm. This unearthed many Turkish army buttons one of which was attached to the cuff of a uniform. Further digging unearthed most spectacularly large fragments of an Ottoman army uniform which contained in a pocket a wad of desiccated printed paper which could be anything from money to cigarette making paraphernalia.

Meanwhile a small team investigated an intriguing scatter of thousands of corroded and often flattened tins believed to have originally contained meat, fish and possibly soup. This represents a side investigation into objects that were not First World War but which are found superimposed on ww1 sites elsewhere. They almost certainly belong to a period somewhere between the 1960’s and 70’s and thus represent a unique case study in ‘contemporary archaeology’. By investigating these objects, we will better understand their presence and significance on ww1 sites.

It gets better! A chance encounter with a Bedouin man and a trek into the hillside above Batn Al Ghoul lead to the discovery of an impressively large Ottoman walled complex, previously unknown to us, with the remains of large stone built dry stone wall structures. Just outside the walled enclosure is a large and almost complete oven structure. This site totally dominates the Wadi Rutm ad would appear to be a kind of command post for the Turkish military presence in the whole area. The oral tradition appears to suggest that this was indeed occupied by the Ottoman commanders. Part of the area was said by the Bedouin to be stabling for officers horses, and indeed a horse shoe was found in that area.

As days pass we are only just beginning to come to grasp with the extent and wonder of this fascinatingly rich militarised landscape.

Day 4 – Wadi Rutm.

On the way to the dig site at Wadi Rutm the party stopped to take a brief look at three extremely interesting coupled 1913 dated German manufactured rail wagons on the old-line between Ma'an and Wadi Rutm. Showing the signs of age and wear and tear from their fierce desert environment, they are desperately in need of conservation and we hope we can be able to find some way to encourage and support this.

Following on to Wadi Rutm the party as usual split into various teams. The detectorists went on to a site near to South of the station itself where a known spread of ancient and modern coinage and artefacts had been found the previous season. After a shaky start and in intense heat with no option of shade they worked on for 3 hours, locating 12 coins ranging from medieval to 1955. This site would definitely benefit from a return, albeit preferably in more hospitable climes.

In the afternoon two detectorists revisited each of the tent ring features at the site to re-sweep and code any new finds. One went off with three others to two sites to the west of Rutm station that had been found in the walk yesterday. These consisted of approximately 8 tent rings and a suspected outpost. Only one fragment of a fired bullet was located.

Elsewhere the western end of the tent rings and gun emplacement recording (both drawn and written) continued. Tent ring 4, the most extensively and professionally constructed, (i.e. it has the largest placed ashlar!) produced unexpected small finds. These included a piece of Turkish WW1 barbed wire, a desiccated date stone, (you can imagine the Ottoman soldier chewing and spitting whilst keeping guard over the Wadi), and even fragile paper.

Once the recording was complete the excavation team moved west – to begin the next challenge: further tent rings, not all circular (more info to follow tomorrow), small gun emplacements and features as yet undetermined. And, the non-cesspit is now definitely a cooking pit and square into the bargain. Burnt seed/corn husks are just some of the finds surfacing.

Today’s heat also made us feel like trapped Ottoman soldiers awaiting the Arab anvil. Other groups forayed out to seek further exciting locations and to confirm the worthiness of some already found. Reports back from these were unfortunately too late to make today’s blog, but will hopefully be included tomorrow.

Over the past few days we have had a number of visitors including local village children and adults, police of various sorts and a party of four Brits who found out about us via the GARP website and in spite of a very outdated map managed to find us in the desert. They were very interested in the project and came to have a look at both to Ma’an and Wadi Rutm, with a view to potentially bringing a larger party back next year to visit the fascinating site of this First World War conflict.

Day 3 – Wadi Rutm.

Today the party split into two groups with one exploring to find Batn Al-Ghoul station which was approximately 10 km north of Wadi Rutm station and the site of which was found with some difficulty. Almost all physical trace of the station had been erased from the landscape. Every stone of every building had been removed.

A short distance away from where the station would have stood was a probable Ottoman army camp represented by stone tent rings and on a nearby hilltop probable military breast work.

They then followed the old pilgrimage route south down into the wadi which cut across the abandoned railway embankment. They followed the embankment south and roughly midway between the site of bag and Wadi Rutm stations they came across a substantial military breastwork on a hilltop and nearby a group of probable stone tent rings. They then walked on to meet the main party who were excavating the Ottoman army Camp at Wadi Rutm.

This larger group spent the day continuing the excavation, metal detector survey and field walking which had begun the previous season. The detectorists undertook a full and systematic sweep of the entire plateau finding a number of Ottoman army uniform buttons, together with a range of other metal artefacts including spoons, coins, a lock and a pen nib. Four other teams excavated apparent tent rings at the western end of the encampment whilst the gun emplacement that had been uncovered last year was methodically recorded. Evidence of tent pegs both wooden and metal and centralised post holes indicating tent poles and the use of Turkish bell tents was found.

At the end of the day a suspected stone circled cess pit was investigated. This turned out not to contain cess but rather revealed evidence of burnt material which will be further excavated tomorrow.

Day 2 - Ma'an

Ma’an station, a major station on the HIJAZ RAILWAY, is at the centre of a complex of hilltop trenches extending outwards from the station designed to protect it and a garrison of up to 6000 Turkish troops in 1916 – 1918. The whole party went to the site for the first time today. The various teams went off to develop their work in the following areas: the metal detectorists spent the morning investigating a section of the crenulated trench to the north of the Hill of the Birds and discovered one particularly heavy concentration of expended cartridge cases and incoming rounds possibly indicating the location of a single firing site during the battle. The surveyors roved across the wide expanse of the lower levels of the site and located the foundations a number of new buildings and other feature. These were further investigated in the afternoon by the detectorists. One digging team excavated a section of front line firing trench and communication trench serving it. A second digging team excavated what was probably a hastily constructed support trench for the front line firing trench at a slightly higher level. Unlike in the front line the frontline firing trench, no expended munitions were found in the support trench, which implies it postdates the battle in April 1918. Two other digging teams working on the southern redoubt, one excavated a short section of frontline firing trench and its’ serving communications trench, and the other excavated a possible machine gun placement.

We were also visited by the Inspector of Antiquities for Ma’an Hani Falahat, who took one of the directors to se be Birket Ma’an, where there is a gigantic Ottoman cistern fed by a spring which supplied water to the whole of Ma’an including Ma’nn station and the Turkish garrison during the first world war. This enlarges the defended landscape of which we are aware and are attempting to define.

The plan is that tomorrow the team heads out into the desert proper to Wadi Rutm, to continue investigation of a Hijaz Railway station and Turkish military encampments. We also hope to publish edited extracts of the Site Diary beginning tomorrow.

We are most grateful to the Candles Hotel Petra for their kind assistance with access to Internet facilities for the uploading of this blog.

Day 1 - orientation.

The remaining party arrived at Amman safely at around 10.30 pm local time on Monday evening. Unfortunately to a problem with the official paperwork two had to stay in Amman overnight waiting for clearance for flight cases of equipment, including the metal detectors. This resulted in the rest checking into the hotel at 4.00am local.

Undaunted the remainder had a late breakfast and, together with the advance party, met to discuss the project in broad terms and to allocate teams for different areas of the work and become aware of the health and safety issues associated with a project of this type in a Middle Eastern country.

We then boarded our transport and headed up to the first principal dig site at Ma’an, a journey of some 50 minutes from Petra.

Once there the new recruits and those visiting for the second time walked the various points of interest over the range of the site. During this Neil Faulkner, David Thorpe and others outlined the historical context of the features, their archaeological significance and the extent to which they had already been investigated plus the general plans for the development of the work.

Many thanks to the College of Archaeology at Al-Hussein Bin Talal University for their help in providing an internet connection to upload this blog.

Pre-dig info

Advance party has been there for a couple of days now. Everything sounds good, although there are apparently no internet facilities in the hotel.

The good news is the Jordanian Department Of Antiquities have promised us access via the university at Petra, which means this blog looks like it will actually happen and be updated live every day from tomorrow onwards. Exciting stuff!

UPDATE -

A forward party comprising of Neil Faulkner, David Thorpe, David and Angie Hibbitt flew to Jordan on Friday 26 October 2007, arriving at Wadi Musa in the early hours of Saturday morning. Their remit was to prepare for the remainder of the party, who would join us in three days time.

This year the Project is fortunate in having the assistance of two lecturers from the Al-Hussein Bin Talal University (Zeyad Al-Salameen and Mansour Shqiarat) as well as Jeyad Kafafi, a Curator at the Jordan Museum. All three will be contributing their expertise and knowledge and will be working on site as part of the team. The University has also kindly agreed to loan the Project a Total Station which will be huge asset to the surveying team.

The two Dave’s spent some time on Monday acquainting themselves with this equipment while Neil, Zeyad and Angie went to Ma’an to meet with Mansour and Hani Falahat, who is the Inspector of Antiquities for the Ma’an region. Hani worked closely with us last year and we are pleased to resume our working relationship with him.

A site visit followed at the Hajj Fort of Fassu-oh, which is approximately 60km south of Ma’an. The fort is one of a series of Ottoman installations and protected the watering place which was later used to supply water to the Aqabat-Hejaz railway station. We spent some time carefully exploring the fort which is largely intact but has been subjected to some digging by treasure hunters. The fort is isolated, lying at the bottom of a Wadi, surrounded by hills. There are two water reservoirs adjacent, typical of the type found elsewhere in Southern Jordan. The site is ripe for further investigation.

A check of the over looking hills revealed two possible observation posts and two trenches.

We also visited the site of the Aqabat-Hejaz Station, which is roughly 2km east of Fassu-oh. There some standing building remains here, as a well as a water reservoir which may have had a building on top of it. There also appeared to be a later addition of a fortified wall around these station buildings.

These are both exciting new sites that add to our growing knowledge and understanding of the activities of those involved in the Great Arab Revolt in this area.