Polish Archaeology in the Mediterranean (12.2000(2001))

TELL EL LARKHA

EGYPT

A structure of younger date and of a size
that may be designated as monumental
comprises a wall 2.5 m thick following
a NE-SW direction, which is common in
Tell el Farkha. At the southern extreme, it
ends in a big rounded corner (Fig. 2). Since
sections of the same wall have been
identified in one of the new pits abutting
the explored trench on the northeast, it may
be said that the structure measured at least
17 m in length and 12 m in width. The wall
was actually made of two differently
constructed sections (Fig. 3). The inside part
was erected of yellowish brick with a
considerable amount of sand, bonded in a
dark-gray mud mortar. The outside face is
definitely of mudbrick bonded in a light
yellowish mortar tempered with sand.
Within the wall, at the junction of the inner
and outer parts, three round pits (1 m in

diameter) were distinguished next to one
another, the distance between them being
1.25 m and 1.00 m. As the same layer of
burning and mud that covered the building
lay on top of these installations, they must
have been integrally connected with the
structure. Small potsherds and ashes found
inside these pits do not help in identifying
the function. The pits may have had
a structural purpose or they may have been
used as a place for installing big storage
vessels. In the latter case, however, the wall
would have been of different width in the
top part — from 0.5 to 1.00 m — something
that seems fairly unlikely, considering the
apparent homogeneity of the bottom part,
constructed, as described above, of the two
kinds of bricks (Fig. 4). Inside the building
there was a much damaged brick floor
(cf. cross-section of the structure in Fig. 3).


Fig. 4■ Western Kom. Outer wall. View from the south
(Photo R. Slabohski)

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