Blog
18May

Deir el-Ballas 2021, Week 3: 5/15 – 5/19

We have finished up our work for this short season and turned our reports into the Antiquities Inspectorate at Qena and had a meeting with the Governor of Qena Province to discuss the importance of the site and its preservation. In the final week of the season, we undertook some more reconstruction on the casemates at the western face of the North Palace that were beside a modern roadway and in danger of being driven over. Piet Collet completed surveying the “South...

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16May

Deir el-Ballas 2021, Week 2: 5/8 – 5/13

We finished up our restoration work on the ‘South Palace’ for this season, stabilizing the façade and the inner stairway wall, and will move on to the North Palace next week. We also exposed two large areas in the South Wadi (tentatively designated Areas 1 and 2). In just cleaning the debris off the surface we can see two very different patterns of construction here: a very long, large building in area 2 made up of a number of small rooms,...

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11May

Deir el-Ballas 2021, Week 1: 5/3 – 5/8

Having been delayed by the pandemic, we are back for a brief season to continue the restoration work in the North Palace and the ‘South Palace’ as well as exploring what we think was the administrative area for the settlement in the mouth of the South Wadi. Given the excessive heat - 112 F and Ramadan we are working on-site from 5:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m., it is just too hot to work after that. But we are busy in...

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31Jan

Deir el-Ballas 2019-2020, Week 9: 1/25

The last day for the season. We have covered up the exposed ancient brick with sand to protect it until next year when we can cap it with new mud-brick to protect it. Vicky Jensen has taken on the herculean task of seeing the registered objects to the Antiquities Department storeroom and securing the sherd material and samples for next season. Our report is turned into the local Antiquities Inspectorate office in Qena and we are off to Cairo to...

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26Jan

Deir el-Ballas 2019-2020, Week 8: 1/18 – 1/23

The last week for the season. Restoration of the North Palace’s main enclosure wall on the south side of the palace and the restoration of the casemate core of the palace itself are continuing. Bettina Bader has joined us to look at the ceramic material. House E revealed that in addition to New Kingdom pottery there were Kerma Beakers and a Canaanite amphora. We are doing the final object recording with Piet, Vicky, and Bettina drawing away. The objects found...

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19Jan

Deir el-Ballas 2019-2020, Week 7: 1/11-1/16

We are now in the home stretch, just one more week to go. We have begun the restoration of the North Palace’s main enclosure wall on the south side of the palace and are continuing the restoration of the casemate core of the palace itself. At the ‘South Palace’, mud bricks are being made and left to cure for next season’s restoration efforts. The floors in House D are getting a final cleaning for recording and Tom is planning House...

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11Jan

Deir el-Ballas 2019-2020, Week 6: 1/4-1/9

We continued the cleaning off the North Palace’s main enclosure wall on the south side of the palace including what we think was part of the original entrance to the Palace that incorporated a large rock outcrop. We have also begun the restoration of the casemate core of the Palace itself alongside a modern road cut which has damaged part of the foundation. The cleaned southwestern face of the casemate core of the North Palace Plan of the casemate core of the...

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03Jan

Deir el-Ballas 2019-2020, Week 5: 12/28-1/2

We started off the New Year continuing the cleaning off of the North Palace’s impressive enclosure wall on the south side of the palace. Much of it is only a single course or traces of the massive bricks used to make it. Like the bricks used in the palace itself, they average around 53 centimeters long, equal to the royal cubit measure. We also have found the North-South boundaries of the wall and a line of the whitewash used on...

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29Dec

Deir el-Ballas 2019-2020, Week 4: 12/21-12/26

Although we had a trimmed staff and a short week for Christmas, we managed to get quite a lot accomplished. Piet finished clearing the ‘egg’ deposit in House F, and amongst the many jar sealings, found a lovely red burnished wine jar. Hassaan was able to find a clear a large section of the southern enclosure wall of the North Palace and began screening some of Reisner’s old dumps to fill in some of the casemate foundations to prevent people...

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21Dec

Deir el-Ballas 2019-2020, Week 3: 12/14-12/19

This week we sadly said goodbye to Tony Crosby who returned to Texas after finishing the reconstruction of House D. Nick Brown and Vicky Jensen continued clearing House E finding several intact deposits of fallen roofing in the structure proper and evidence of chipped stone working to the immediate east of the house proper which was a yard that also contained traces of a pair of round, mud brick silos. To the southwest of House E we began exploring a structure...

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