I was able to nearly complete the Neolithic house by Cal Day, which was nearly a miracle. I would still like to add more pottery, obsidian, bucrania, and the like. I would also like to add embedded links to images of excavated materials like baskets and murals to show what the reconstructions are based on.
I found this exercise to be highly interesting and useful, once I understood more or less how the building tools worked. As an excavator, I usually destroy rather than create, so building layers instead of removing them was nice for once. I also got to see the house in different light–sunrise, sunset, midday, night–the colors changed astoundingly. While the reconstruction isn’t perfect in that respect because there is ambient light that wouldn’t really be there, it was still educational.
Ruth mentioned that she felt a little lost trying to identify the exact house where the reconstruction was. How would you remember which house was yours? How would an outsider figure out where to go? Does this imply some kind of markings on the outside of the houses as identifiers? I added a big column of smoke to help visitors find the house.
Anyway, I probably will not have enough time between now and my orals to do much to the house, but I hate to put it aside. I need to make middens! And houses in disrepair! The list just goes on….
Colleen Morgan 