I was so
tired the past couple nights that I didn’t have the energy to compose anything for the
blog! This has been a very long week, filled with too much to even remember.
But I will try to touch the best parts of the week.
One thing I
have learned this week, though: I need a better camera for this program. Thanks
to help of a photography friend, I think I have just the camera in mind! Thanks
to a decent tax return, I’ll be purchasing this camera shortly, and then you
will all see a dramatic increase in the quality of my photography!
This week we
focused on the tools needed for conservation work, particularly working with
photography in Photoshop and InDesign. It was a lot of fun trying out these
programs. Here’s a result of my first practice:
We also got
to take the tour of the Akko Prison and the Hospitaller compound below it. The
prison tour was very unique in that from the hundreds of years the prison has
been in use (and not its original use, by the way), the tour only focuses on
the Zionist or patriotic history as it relates to the modern State of Israel.
The tour traversed the life of the Jews imprisoned who resisted the British
control with film clips. The movies were very well done, though the complete
absence of any of the other history of the compound is gaping. The Ottomans
actually built a palace on top of the Crusader ruins and then later turned into
a prison and continued as a prison during the British Mandate.
Here are
some images of the prison:
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| The prison with a view of the Crusader building below it. For hundreds of year, no one knew the Crusader building existed because the entire thing was filled in to make the Ottoman fortress, which is what became the prison. |
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| Ottoman architecture |
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| Al-Jezzar mosque and the bay |
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| The Walls |
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| Graffiti from the Jewish prisoners |
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| Graffiti and the al-Jezzar mosque |
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| View from above the prison |
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| The cell where the Baha'ullah, the leader of the Bahai, was held prisoner. |
Then we had
a tour of the Crusader ruins below with the prominent archaeologist of the
Galilee, Eliezer Stern. Taking tours with prominent archaeologists is fun
because they get to take you areas where the public isn’t allowed! Here it is,
the Hospitaller compound!
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| The caverns of the Hospitaller compound! |
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| Hallways. Most of this wasn't open to the public, though it will be eventually. |
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| Remains of Hellenistic Akko with the Crusader built above it! |
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| Parts of the tunnels that haven't been excavated! |
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| This hall is being revamped to become a crafts center to teach about Crusader crafts - kind of like an all-year Ren Fair. |
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| They had to inject mortar into the vaulted ceiling to keep it from collapsing! |
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| This will become a restaurant. Fitting, as this was the dining hall for the Hospitaller Knights! |
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| More areas left unexcavated. The whole compound was filled with sand and debris by an Ottoman ruler to create his palace fortress, which later became the prison. |
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| ANCIENT TOILETS! No privacy for knights! |
We also got
to hike up Tel Akko with Eliezer. There’s not much to see as they’ve covered up
the site to protect the remains, but it was enjoyable to hike around.
Wednesday we
got to take part in the salvage excavations at Achi’yud junction! I loved
getting my hand dirty! The salvage work there is in preparation for a rail line
that will go through the area. The excavations have uncovered remains of a
Chalcolithic settlement of at least two phases, between 4500-4000 bce. The buildings and findings show
that they were probably agricultural herders. They were also coming upon
remains from the late Neolithic period, as well! That’s where I got to work!
I’ve never worked with anything so old, where there is barely anything to show
for occupation, because pottery hadn’t been invented yet. The only thing they’ve
found in the area I worked were multiple burn layers, suggesting some kind of
cooking area directly upon bedrock. I was supposed to take charcoal samples and
collect any stone that looked like it had been worked on! I actually found a
tiny obsidian blade fragment! Maybe only 1cm x 1cm! Mostly it was just soil
with little charcoal and then I hit bedrock. Barely anyone spoke English, but I
was able to get some practice in with my Hebrew. The supervisor, Osman, really
enjoyed my work and was excited to learn that I was an archaeologist. He talked
to me a lot in Hebrew but I couldn’t respond too well. But I understood a lot
of what he said! I think he liked that. Haha.
Sadly, I
don’t have images to show.
We also had
a chat with Ella, who works for the tourism department, about the many projects
she’s working in the Old City and in places all across the region. Her work
really inspires me, and I’m seriously thinking of doing a final project that
will bring me in to work with her. She encouraged us to get to know all the
people who live in the city. So what did we do after chatting with her? Had a
chat with our neighbor who owns the storefront in front of our apartment! She’s
a very nice woman who sells juice and coffee to make money for her family. We
also set up an appointment to go to the hamam, a Turkish bathhouse! We’re going
on Monday evening! I am so excited!
Today I also
took a hike with James back to the tel and we stumbled upon a Christian
graveyard and decided to take a walk around. A man came up to us as we walked
about to ask if we were looking for anyone or something in particular. When he
found out we were conservation students, he got very excited and started
showing us around the graveyard. Many of the graves are from the late Ottoman
period and many are even much much older and all are in very poor condition.
The man, Salem, told us that since he retired, he’s been coming to the cemetery
every day to fix it up because it became a bit of a trash heap. Slowly slowly,
he’s been cleaning it up, fixing up the fallen gravestones, and planting
gardens. He was very excited to know if we would take any interest in helping
him and I have to say, that the entire time he toured the place with us, I was
on the verge of tears at how passionate this man was about taking care of the
graves of all the people buried there. His motivation has given a lot of the
people living in the city the motivation to help and he has received many
donations to fix it up. I am seriously considering helping this man and making
this my final project.
Not only is
this a sacred space that deserves the respect to be cleaned up and preserved, but
the research possibilities of studying the burial practices there are phenomenal.
Luckily we will be discussing possibilities for our projects this week. I took
the man’s contact information and I think I will be in contact with him to at
least volunteer my time if not somehow make this my project. We shall see.
