So we've been perambulating pretty far from the actual business of digging recently, as the day to day affairs of the work is pretty straightforward. I suppose I could talk about more nuanced things, like soil consistency and Munsell charts and the like, but to be honest, the only way anyone ever really understands that is if they're working with the soil every day, which, as readers of blogs, I assume you probably are not.
Fortunately, in this week there was a change of pace. Rather than the usual in-trench digging, the section I was working in, Beta-Theta East, had just begun to open up a well to excavate, one of the more interesting things one can do on a dig. As the process of excavating a well is much more complicated than digging in a straight line and trying not to break anything important, this week I will give an in-depth account of the process.
The process of digging a well begins as any other excavation: the area is sectioned off into its own basket, and the fill is removed as per usual archaeological process (I presume, I wasn't actually present for the first part of the excavation). However, once you dig deep enough into the well in which soil can not easily be removed (usually once you have to start lifting soil overhead), then things start to get more complicated. In order to keep digging, you have to install a winch overhead, and, because manpower is cheap and gasoline is expensive, this winch is probably going to be human powered.
Now this is when the operation starts to get a bit more labor intensive. By the time that you install the winch, it is probably going to be too dark to sift through dirt and, increasingly, mud for artifacts, so you have to bring in sorters. If you've got an enthusiastic digger, this will necessitate several sorters, as you can dig a lot faster if you don't need to be constantly scanning for artifacts, and by this point about 1/2-2/3s of the trench's manpower is devoted to digging this one basket: One digger, two winch-pullers and two to four sorters. By the time you hit the water table, which we already had by the time I entered the scene, you also need a pump to draw out the water in the well. Don't get too enthusiastic about the pump though. Even when it was in perfect working order the pump served less to drain the well and more to keep the water at a tolerably waist-deep level. One final addition which, from what I heard, was a new innovation was a metal cage to prevent the walls from caving in. I must admit, that I was slightly worried that this, again: from what I heard, was not usually employed. As it was, the safety provided from cave-ins was somewhat undermined by the danger of cutting yourself on the exposed metal edges while digging in muddy water. Still, I'd rather have tetanus or gangrene than be buried alive. I'd prefer neither, to be honest, but beggars can't be choosers.
Of the well-related tasks, I must say, my favorite by far is winch-pulling, which should come as little surprise to regular readers, as winch-pulling is by all accounts, the easiest job in a dig. For the most part, your job is to stand around the well making sure that the well-digger is all good and not having a panic attack from the claustrophobia or anything, occasionally cranking a handle to bring up another haul of gravely mud. More to the point though, your proximity to the well gives a nice cool draft, which is great since you're basically standing around in the sun the entire day, and your upright posture means that you can listen in to most conversations around the well. As a matter of fact, the only real labor intensive task is replacing the ladder when the well-digger had enough of being trapped in a dark, watery hole in the ground, which happens infrequently enough to be a nice change of pace.
Speaking of being tapped in a dark, watery hole in the ground, I am sure that you all are eager to learn what it's like to dig in a well. Fortunately, I subjected myself to the task just for your edification. The first step of digging in a well is to equip yourself appropriately: a hard-hat, of course, and one of several pairs of galoshes, none of which really fit but you're sure as hell not going down there in your shoes. Now, suitably prepared for the task, you descend into the well, either by a ladder or, if the well is deep enough, lowered down by the winch-pullers. Once you are in the well, your galoshes immediately fill with water and bracing yourself against the cold, you realize that your shoulders are far too broad and legs too thick to comfortably crouch down and dig here, but you're already wet and the last guy lasted four hours down here without a break, so you might as well give it a go. You clumsily situate yourself between the ever-obstrurent pump, ignore the fact that you are currently sharing a muddy pit of water with a steel cage and a submerged, high-voltage machine, and get cracking. Any illusion that the upper half of your body at least will remain dry is shattered as water streams down from your dust-pan down your shirt. After about twenty minutes of digging, your supervisor leans his head over the well-head and informs you that it's picture day today, so you need to get out of the well. You dissimulate the fact that you are very happy that you're not in the well for the entire picture-taking process, and then after its over you go back down into the well for another forty-five minutes or so to make a good show of it. Once you get out, you spend far too much time trying to get your galoshes off, as their small size and suction-cup like grip means that they have clamped fast to your foot. You resign yourself to sorting, which, despite how muddy it is, is a pleasant task, as you get to sit down and generally doesn't require too much effort. Your replacement then goes down the well and spends the next five hours down there, digging out more mud every fifteen minutes than you did for the entire hour. Fortunately, all the energy which you are saving in the sorting job can be employed to repress the shame for being such a terrible well-digger.
So overall, I'd give the whole experience a 6/10. I would recommend trying it out at least once, as it makes basically every other part of an archaeological excavation seem much more palatable in comparison.
Michael
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