Polish Archaeology in the Mediterranean (15.2003(2004))

TELL QARAMEL

SYRIA

oval house with walls made of big flat stones
plastered with mud, partitioned by a mud
wall into two interiors. The western room,
c. 1.2 m in diameter, had a floor of tamped
mud laid on a layer of pebbles. The eastern
room was a kind of small cellar c. 0.5 m
deep, covered with flat stone slabs. North of
the cellar, there was a small oval structure
with walls made of upright pebbles. Also
connected with the house was an oval
subterranean hearth found to the northwest
of it, about 0.6 m in diameter; an older
hearth seems to have preceded it on
practically the same spot (slightly further to
the north and partly damaged by the later
facility).
Belonging in layer XV were two oval
structures unearthed in the northern part of
the trench (loc. 29, 30) and a section of
another one in the southeastern comer (loc.
31; Fig. 7). Locus 29 was an oval house,
c. 4 m in diameter (only the western part
has been explored), surrounded with
a bench made of tamped mud (c. 0.6 m
wide; c. 0.2-0.3 m high). Big pebbles were
used in the construction, the inside of the
house being further covered with a mud-
and-lime plaster. The floor was rather
typical, consisting of a layer of tamped mud
on a pebble bedding. In the northern part of
the house, there were oval mud bases, each
c. 0.6 m in diameter.
A terrace of tamped mud extended east
and south of locus 29, reaching locus 30,
SQUARES K-3 B, K-4
The area of the said squares, situated on the
lowest part of the southern slope of the tell,
south and southeast of square K-5 b,d, has
been the object of exploration for the past
two seasons.4^ Layer IV with the unique
“grill house” (loc. 10) of PPNA date
4) Cf. PAM XIII, op. cit., 301, 303; PAM XIV, op. cit., 323'

which was an oval semi-subterranean
building of c. 2.8 m diameter. The interior
consisted of an oval pit, c. 0.5 m deep and
2 m in diameter, filled with big pebbles.
The fill was covered with hard mud.
A hearth surrounded with a thin mud wall
was located centrally. A mud bench ran
around it, on a level c. 0.2 m higher up.
Locus 31, of which a small section was
unearthed in the southeastern corner of the
trench, is presumed to have been yet
another oval house with mud walls. Its fill
(c. 65 cm deep) contained layers of ash
mixed with red mud and bits of lime and
charcoal. The bottom of the locus consisted
of big pebbles and a layer, c. 0.2 m thick, of
white ash with charcoal.
The youngest excavated layer this
season, XIV, is represented by locus 27
{Fig. 8). Pise walls (0.2-0.5 m thick) were
raised on stone foundations and both floors
found inside this locus consisted of a layer of
mud, apparently laid before the walls were
constructed. Inside the locus, there was
a distinct round structure, c. 0.8 m in
diameter. Its foundation had been sunk into
the ground, partly destroying the older
locus 30. A hearth lay to the north and
a paved terrace to the south. A big animal
jawbone found in the pebble pavement may
have been a sacrificial offering. Near the
house, there were some storage pits, hearths
and roasting pits, indicating that the area
was used chiefly for food preparation.
B,D, L-3 A, L-4 A,C
continued to be explored this year {Fig. 9).
The house consisted of two parts: the
eastern one measuring c. 5.5 m by 4.5 m
with the inner grill construction and an
oval central room some 5 m across at the
longest. The walls, preserved to a height of
-325 and Fig. 10.

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