By Edward Johnson
Archaeological Conservator
Günter Heindl
Architect/archaeologist
Ashraf Abdel Aziz
Archaeologist
and Brian V. Hunt
Trying to visualize living space from an architectural plan
can be challenging. Walking around in a 3-dimensional space provides a different
perspective on the use of that space.
Over a period of more than ten years, AERA archaeologists
have exposed and analyzed a number of architecturally varied
structures at the Giza pyramid settlement. In the autumn of
2005, AERA initiated a project to not only conserve but to
reconstruct one architectural unit of the ancient Egyptian
settlement we are excavating.
Of three candidate test structures, which varied in form and
content, we selected the building with the smallest surface
area and volume. The structure sits among
other ancient Egyptian housing at the eastern reach of our
concession, an area we appropriately call Eastern Town.
Our test object, Eastern Town House (ETH), is an almost completely
intact house foundation with clear evidence of remodeling
during the period in which it was inhabited, during Egypt’s
4th Dynasty (ca. 2575-2465 BC).
Dan Housel and Emma Hancox excavated ETH in 2004 and
recorded six phases of ancient remodeling. The layout of
the house, the objects found, and attested to activities
of a family household, like houses at the
Middle Kingdom pyramid-town at Lahun.
ETH included an enclosure wall, courtyards, a vestibule
separating public and private areas, a main room with a
sitting bench, and a sleeping niche.
There was an area for grinding and storage facilities,
pottery jars set in the floor, and a small circular granary.
The second set of courtyards could be entered both from the
front and the back of the house. Here we found traces of
baking and cooking.
The spaces inside ETH would have been crowded and bustling, with no
provision for the kind of individual personal space taken for granted
by many cultures today.
Conservation challenges
There is little in the Egyptological publications about
mud brick conservation, although a number of archaeological
missions have carried out extensive conservation projects.
Our colleagues from other missions gave us valuable input as we surveyed existing
mud brick conservation near Giza, Abu Sir, Dahshur and Abu Roash.
Every conservation project is unique, due to the
local environmental exposure and the construction materials
used in building. The ancient inhabitants built Eastern
Town House of mud brick, with a few elements of undressed
stone and possibly wooden columns. Ancient mud brick presents
great challenges to conservation due to its fragility.
Options
We needed to use a conservation technique that was best
suited to the environment and structures at Giza.
Enclosing ETH in a protective structure was less than ideal for
aesthetic and practical reasons. Such an enclosure would also have limited
effectiveness. Capping the ancient walls with a new layer of
mud brick was inadequate because it might actually
accelerate the deterioration. The original walls would
still be exposed to rain—water being mud brick’s greatest enemy. Chemical
consolidants arry their own problems and limitations, penetrating
only the surface of a wall, creating stress with the raw core.
Backfilling ETH and burying the structure would effectively
protect the ancient mud bricks and provide a base for reconstruction.
Backfilling and reburying
The reason these ancient walls survive to our time is because they
were buried and protected beneath the sand. We chose to rebury Eastern
Town House to recreate its pre-excavation environment.
To isolate our reconstruction from ground moisture, we
backfilled the walls beneath a deep layer of clean sand upon which we
constructed a platform of mud brick. The raised, mud brick
platform provided a base for the reconstructed house.
As we built a framing wall around ETH, workers backfilled directly
over the ancient structure, allowing us to reconstruct ETH at
the same site and with the same orientation as the original.
The platform
The platform had to be strong and stable to support
the reconstructed house. We examined several options
for building the platform, including single- and double-layered
solutions.
The single-layered options may have been adequate, but caution
led us to carefully consider the pressure the walls would be subject
to with being walked upon or bearing the weight of the reconstructed walls.
We chose to lay a double-layered mud brick platform directly
on the sand. We bonded the bricks with sand and mortar, and covered
with a plaster made with Nile clay, chaff, and water.
We constructed the lower layer with stretchers, headers,
and half-bricks arranged relatively irregularly (long,
continuous joints decrease stability). We laid The second layer in
a herringbone pattern. We now had a solid base on
which to construct new walls.
Material
Proper techniques require that everything we do in
conservation and reconstruction must be reversible
(which is a problem with chemical consolidants). Future archaeologists
and researchers must be able to undo what we have done
so that they can study the original structure underneath.
Best bricks
AERA archaeologist, Ashraf
Abdel Aziz, is creating a typology of ancient mud bricks.
It is interesting to note that he has identified
differences in bricks from buildings across the Giza Plateau. Ashraf
brought his knowledge to our reconstruction project and was involved
in our analysis of other conservation sites in Egypt.
We wanted to use brick of similar material and of the
same approximate size as the brick originally used in the
construction of the Eastern Townhouse (28 x 14 x 8
centimeters). We estimated that the platform base, framing
wall, and house walls of ETH would require approximately
24,500 bricks.
Salah, our longtime guard at the site, of somewhat advanced age,
had agitated from the beginning for an opportunity to make
bricks. When he persisted, we acquiesced in order to raise
the production rate.
To our delight, he made the best bricks of all, using
a somewhat different technique from all the other brick
makers. He put the mixture in the brick-forms without re-watering,
the wet mortar, packed it down forcefully by hand, and added a little water on the
top surface to smooth it down.
He made a very well-formed brick (without any temper
other than sand) with clean sharp edges, completely filled
ends, and without any melting or slumping from excess water.
He was a bit slower than the younger brick makers, but
his product was so superior, that we continued to rely on him
in this capacity until we finished.
The walls
We used varying heights of walls to demarcate different
parts of the house complex. The completed reconstruction has:
- four courses of bricks for features like the silo
- six courses for the courtyard walls
- eight courses for the central building—the core house
There are enough substantial walls left in the settlement
to allow us a clear understanding of the ancient construction
techniques. We built our new walls in exactly the same way
that the old walls were built.
We filled the wide joints with brick chippings and mortar.
The corner bricks of each layer were measured and adjusted to
the same height using an automatic level.
As the brick layers rose we incorporated doorways. We
built a limestone threshold for the main entrance in the
west wall based on examples we have excavated at the site.
For the entrance of the private quarters, we installed an
exact copy of a stone door socket that we excavated in situ.
The floor
To level the floor, we used a layer of coarse plaster
followed by a finer plaster made of sieved Nile clay, sieved
sand, straw, and water. We left the plaster to dry for a few
days with a watchman on duty each night to protect the floor
from damage by feral dogs.
Reconstructed features
Finally we added the grain silo, the bed,
two wall extensions, and what may have been a grinding vat.
The ancient grain silo was originally constructed as an
ellipsoid, because a full circle would have left too little
room for people to squeeze between the silo and the adjacent walls. We reconstructed
the silo to reflect this interesting example of how the
occupants adapted the structures of everyday life to the tight spaces in the house.
Based on comparative evidence, we estimate ETH could have
housed four to eight people (perhaps more). The house
had only one bed platform, which raises the question of how many people
actually lived, slept or otherwise utilized the house.
Conclusions
We may surmise, based on what we know about ancient Egyptian
society and households that Eastern Town House was a crowded place by
the standards of housing in modern, developed societies but perhaps typical
for ancient Egypt. Our reconstruction revealed a little urban estate that
felt much more roomy than the footprint we mapped during excavation.
Within the confines of the house and courtyards, the cooking
and craft work in and around ETH would have made for an often
smoky place. Inhabitants would have constantly negotiated space with other people,
stored goods, and animals, including sheep, goats, and possibly a pig or two.
While the original structure is now unavailable for viewing,
Eastern Town House is now protected from the elements. The reconstruction
represents an extremely faithful model of what this structure really looked like and how it functioned.
Our techniques are entirely reversible and future researchers can undo what we have done.
Reconstructing Eastern Town House and building other test
walls on the Giza settlement site help us understand the living
spaces and construction methodology employed by the ancient
pyramid builders. The test walls allow us to monitor erosion—caused
by wind, rain, and rising moisture—before proceeding with
further conservation.
We look forward to doing more of this kind of work at the
city of the pyramid builders.
Incorporating interdisciplinary, experimental archaeology into
our mission broadens our interpretation of the reality of the
ancient Egyptians and reinforces our methodology.
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