Stratigraphy
Limestone rubble covered most of the excavation area to a depth of 0.40 to 0.50 meters, occasionally up to I meter against the face of the tower. This scatter of stones was continuous between the tower and the inner face of the enclosure wall in area 2S, while in 3S and 4S, the scatter generally ended 3 meters from the tower. Roof-file fragments were found
in this rubble as well as below it, amidst smaller stones on the soil or bedrock surface. Fragments of pottery were also found on the soil or bedrock surface immediately below the scatter of rubble.[6]
Below the rubble, islands of bedrock protruded from the soil, although not so prominently here as elsewhere in the enclosure. The soil around this bedrock, with the exception of dark-gray surface patches formed by the decomposition of plant remains, was uniformly a loose, crumbly red earth, usually mixed with a moderate amount of small stone chips but sometimes free of them. Alongside the tower, and up to two to three meters away from it, this soil frequently contained large concentrations of roof-tile fragments, filling cavities and depressions in the bedrock (figure 27). Roof tiles and earth together formed a layer usually no more than 0.20 meters thick, depending on the contours of the bedrock below. This red earth is certainly the disintegrated debris of sun-dried mud brick which has eroded and washed over the site.[7] Part of this mud brick, however, had been deliberately laid down, with the concentrations of files as a packing to level the ground in connection with the construction of secondary structures to be described below. Sherds were found in this mud-brick debris, both with the concentrations of tiles and in earth relatively free of tiles. It is significant that sherds associated with the tile concentrations were always found among the uppermost files of those packings.[8]
The soil below this, wherever bedrock lay deeper down, was a red earth similar to the mud-brick debris but distinct in that it contained many stone chips and pebbles, all somewhat worn and rounded by water, whereas the chips in the upper layer had rougher edges. This lower soil also contained no sherds or tile fragments except at its uppermost
level. It is evident that this sterile soil formed the original ground level before the deposition of the mud-brick and tile debris.