National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

[Chap. IV

128   IN THE BAMPLTR BASIN

Husain. Patches of ground close to the well showed distinct traces of having been cultivated at a not very distant time.

The reported old site lay about half a mile to the north of the well behind a ridge of high stationary dunes and surrounded by others. On examination it proved of considerable size and unmistakable antiquity. It forms a mound measuring some 400 yards from north to south and about 500 yards across where widest (see Plan 11). It rises to a maximum height of 22 feet above the patch of fairly level ground, covered with coarse sand and fine detritus, which surrounds it within the area left clear of dunes. Fig. 34 shows the general appearance of the ground as seen from the south-east. What at once attracted attention was the abundance of worked stones, blades, scrapers, cores and flakes, which could be picked up on the surface by the hundred (for specimens excavated, see Pl. XXX) . Fragments of painted ware as well as of well-made plain red pottery were also to be found in plenty all over the mound and along its foot. Behind a sand ridge to the north-east was seen another but much smaller debris area. In spite of the close search we made on the surface, assisted by our `Sultan' and a number of his soldiers, only very few small pieces of bronze or copper could be found, and not a single fragment of glazed ceramic ware. The great variety of designs, all geometric, to be seen on the painted potsherds was very striking.

The arrival of about forty labourers collected overnight from Sardû enabled us to start excavation next morning by a trial trench, A, opened eastward from the top of the northern high portion of the mound for a distance of 80 feet.2 Carried to a depth of about 6 feet it passed everywhere through fairly soft soil,

evidently composed of refuse and decomposed clay from habitations, without   ~c
striking anywhere recognizable structural remains. Coarse pottery, mostly

hand-made, was found throughout, and worked stones, blades, borers, flakes,   j

and a few cores ( Pl. XXX ) , from a level of 18 feet downwards. Painted potsherds   ti

were met with from a 16-feet level downwards, and were particularly numerous   /I

in the stratum from 12 feet to 14 feet. In this were found also a well-finished bone   ,I

needle, together with fragments from high-polished bone implements. Interesting finds made at 16-feet level were part of a large grey vessel decorated with a black painted and raised garland midrib, 11 ( Pl. XIX), and the fragment of a black glass bangle inlaid with a brilliantly coloured pattern, 47 ( Pl. x). From approximately the same level came the fragment of a vessel, 17 ( Pl. XIX ), pale buff with an incised ornamentation of comb-drawn horizontal and wavy lines.

On a level about 2 feet lower there turned up a quern, similar to those

4E

2 Objects found in trench A are marked Hus. those from C, Hus. 539-84; those from D, Hus.   ii;

1-107; those collected on the surface of the mound, 585-7.   Ob

Hus. 108-459; those from trench B, Hus. 460-537;

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