Polish Archaeology in the Mediterranean (18.2006(2008))

NAQLUN

EGYPT


Fig. 3. Pit for storage jar and step down faced
with brick in the southern pastophory
(Room 6) (Photo W. God lews ki)

walls of the oratory were covered first with
a thin coating (2-3 mm thick) of pale gray-
beige plaster with chaff and then with an
even thinner layer (1 mm or less) of almost
cream plaster, produced from raw material
of desert origin with chaff as well. The
engaged columns and mensa in the niche
between them had a coating of lime plaster
(up to 2 mm thick) painted with a red
ornament, laid on an underground of pale
gray-beige and partly dark gray mud
plaster.
The plaster on the walls of Room 6 was
mainly the pale gray-beige variety with
chaff and sand as temper. The interior of the
apse initially had a finely smoothed cream-
colored plaster with moderate chaff as
temper. At one point, engaged columns
with profiled offsets were added to the front
of the apse from the nave. The columns were
made of a hard lime-sand mortar in a pale-
gray-beige color. Traces of red paint have


Fig. 4■ The installations in Room 3, view looking north
(Photo W. God lew ski)

210