Redazione Archaeogate, 06-02-2006
Pag. 2 di 2 
English
A delay in funding caused our fieldwork to be postponed at the end of the year. Moreover, an administrative restriction reduced its duration to a couple of weeks. Therefore, the team was increased in number, in order to deal with the large amount of work to be achieved in a short period. Head of the Mission was Professor Alessandro Roccati, accompanied by Arch. Carlo Cataldi Tassoni (Field Supervisor) and Sergio Barberini (Draughtsman). The Archaeologists Maria Novella Sordi and Dr. Grazyna Bakowska (from Poland), who had already been working in the previous season, were joined by Simone Lanna, preparing his PhD. Dr. Roberto Gozzoli was a guest of the Mission during its entire stay, in his quality of an historian of the Napatan period, and also helped in the fieldwork.
Moreover our team was backed by two geologists from the University of Turin, Professor Giorgio Martinotti, together with his wife Evelyn Blum, and Dr. Luigi Perotti. They provided valuable advice on the nature of the soil, checked the topography of the site in order to settle some controversial points, and introduced new observation methods by means of satellite photographs. In addition to them, the topographer of the Mission of Cassino University, Cristiano Puzzolu, kindly granted his help to fix some benchmarks of the buildings we were excavating on the map.
Finally, Miss Manal al-Amin Sherif was the kind official appointed by the NCAM for our Mission. Our financial resources were ensured by Rome University and the (Italian) Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but several members came at their own means. It is, however, a habit of our Mission to house anybody seriously interested in the same topics and researches. Some technical advancement for updating our work to modern research was obtained through the collaboration of the aforesaid geologists along with a surveyor of the American team under the direction of Professor Tim Kendall. Our hope is that such mutual cooperation will further enhance the results achieved by both teams.
Our operations started on December 2nd with a general inspection of the site, and were closed on December 17th after a continuous period of work, reckoning seventeen working days. The weather was fine all the time, though still somewhat hot. The workers engaged totalled about forty, and were employed in three main points of archaeological investigation. This was the prosecution of previous work inside the archaeological area of Jebel Barkal, near Karima, where ancient Napata was located.
Excavations were resumed inside B 1500, the so called Natakamani's palace, in a severely destroyed spot on the South-West of the central Peristyle Court, in order to confirm the symmetry of the layout of the casemate foundations. In spite of a thick layer of sand and debris, covering tangly remains of mud brick walls hacked by the ancient sebbakhin, quite good results were achieved. The supposed line of an original staircase was confirmed, and a side room was located, under which the casemate foundations appeared filled with mud.
Another dig was continued inside the B 2400 Palace. More fragments of Greek-styled columns were uncovered and the foundations walls better outlined. In a quite small area, where the ancient floor was missing, an in-depth sounding was carried out as far as the virgin soil was reached. This was attained at the depth of 1.50 metres under the extant walls. Inside the network of the foundation walls in mud and red bricks, some walls with different orientation could be noticed, which had been cut by the subsequent building. These walls look of lesser quality and smaller, probably related to some dwellings of humbler origin, and existing previously to the construction of this palace. They remind of another wall which was found outside the South-West corner of B 2400 and not further excavated. The pottery fragments connected with such buildings were rather scanty and coarse.
Restoration of the outer wall to the South and the East of B 2400, and of the "Greek Peristyle" was also completed, in order to preserve the ancient masonry, which was earlier uncovered by our team. Moreover, one of the aims of such restoration was to make the main structures visible to future scholars and people visiting the site, so that they may get some idea of the original plan on the ground-floor. A new examination of a badly preserved platform abutting the outer wall in the middle of its eastern side conveyed the opinion of a supplementary entrance.
The greatest effort was concentrated in the area to the West of the "Palace of Natakamani" (B 1500). Some ancient dumps in the nearabouts were surveyed and we realised that they are the consequence of previous unrecorded excavations, older than the Italian ones. As a matter of fact, we found evidence of former archaeological work, and surmise that some unpublished notes could preserve further information about an (earlier) less troubled situation.
In the 2004 season a monumental structure, resembling a peristyle court, was brought to light (B 2100). Looking for the nature and width of this building, a large trench was opened next to the area where a stone basin had been long recorded. A hitherto unrecognised building in red brickwork turned out , and this year it was possible to demonstrate that it belonged to a different building (B 2200), which was similarly aligned to B 2100 and B 1500.
Here a U-shaped corridor was entered from an open court to the North. Its walls were completely lined up with red bricks and, although most of the red bricks had been removed, it can be implied that they were tied with mortar, while the walls and the floor, where preserved, were covered with a thick layer of whitewashed plaster. This construction method looks like Roman masonry, but here it might be due to the nature of the edifice, where a fragmentary pipe was found, and in which a massive basin was still located in its original place. It is a huge sandstone monolith, leaning against the wall, intact and completely plastered inside and outside on the visible surface. A hole in the middle of the southern side allowed water to flow out, and here the floor was hardened by means of a thick paving in red bricks under the plastered surface. One more basin of lesser dimensions became visible to the south in a parallel location to the large one. Some more small stone basins were scattered around this area. Another smaller and shallow basin also of sandstone lies buried in the sand near the B 300 area. All that confirms some use related to water, and it is possible that a well was available in that area.
To the West of B 2200 an area with many random brick fragments suggested the existence of a kiln. A surface survey produced the discovery of an almost intact mould of one of the glazed tiles used on the walls of Natakamani's Palace, representing a lion grasping the crescent.
Anyhow it is the target of our Mission to find out the connections linking B 1500, B 2100 and B 2200 buildings, which seem to be related to each other and contemporary. They are likely to have had complementary functions, which can be demonstrated only with a comprehensive and careful investigation. Therefore it must be stressed once more that the exploration of B 1500 cannot be fulfilled without a knowledge of its sorroundings.
At the end of this fruitful campaign some considerations lie on:
- the rather large chronological stretch spanning the different buildings traced in the area to the edge of the temples. The span of time is from (before) the Hellenistic times (B 2400) to the Roman Empire (B 1500, B 2100, B 2200), and it is apparent that these buildings were not all contemporary to each other;
- the unsatisfactory information provided by a simple survey of surface evidence concerning the display and framework of the buried ruins;
- the awareness that the area was visited by some hasty previous archaeological operation.
We believe that only a longlasting and careful search on the ground can provide sound archaeological data and shed light on a completely ignored epoch of African history. Due to the abundance of ceramics excavated in every site, a thorough study of chosen samples was entrusted to members of our Mission, and we hope to present some results in the next Warsaw Nubian Conference. Attached to this report the results of the survey provided by the team of geologists of the University of Turin are also presented. We expect that they will lead as soon as possible to a full archaeological map, replacing the provisional one used until now. The utility of such a map will be especially in the possibility of updating it after every campaign by the insertion of the new acquired data.
On the way back Prof. Roccati delivered a lecture in the Greek Cultural Centre of Khartoum about "travelling in Sudan around 4000 years ago".
As ever, it is a pleasure to state our debt of gratitude to the Sudanese Authorities for their friendly and steady assistance.
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