Pit W

Context Title: Pit W     
Context Name (Publication): Pit W     
Context Name (Excavation): Pit W     
Context Description: Pit W was excavated from the bottom of area PG near Pits Y and Z in order to more fully explore the Seal Impression Strata discovered running across the cemetery. Since these strata contained so many early seals and tablets it was clear that they were essential for dating the graves and for learning more about the administration of the city of Ur. In order to observe the strata more clearly, Pit W was much larger than most exploratory pits in the cemetery region, laid out to be 15x7 meters. It was dug from the northeast side of PG/1631 but its horizontal extents were not mapped and Benati (2015) believes that PG/1631 was mistaken for PG/1648, placing Pit W somewhat farther SE. Its published stratigraphic profile shows that PG/1631 (possibly 1648) was actually somewhere near the middle of the long side of the trench and Woolley states that Pit W was placed so as to virtually fill the gap between Pits Y and Z, but was set a few meters northeast of them. This allows for a relatively accurate placement of the pit. Pit W quickly ran through the seal impression strata but Woolley continued it down much farther, as he had with Pits Y and Z, to reach about a meter below sea level. He thus uncovered many graves earlier than the main Royal Cemetery, and because he believed them to be from the Jemdet Nasr period, he began JNG numbers for them. This discovery, combined with early graves in Pit Y, spawned the conception of a Jemdet Nasr cemetery running beneath and south of the Royal Cemetery, and in season 12 Woolley would seek to expose it in Pit X.     

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Objects: Pit W Export: JSON - XML - CSV

Object U Number Museum Number (UPM Date Reg Number) Museum Number (BM Registration Number) Museum Number (UPM B-number) Description (Catalog Card)
18679 (none) (none) (none) Stone bowl. Limestone [Type] 27. [drawing]
18681 (none) (none) (none) Stone bowl. Limestone. [Type] 27. [drawing]
18682 (none) (none) (none) Stone bowl. Diorite. [Type] 9. [drawing]
18683 (none) (none) (none) Stone cup. Black steatite. [Type] 28. [drawing]
18684 (none) (none) (none) Stone bowl. Limestone. Imperfect. [Type] 8. [drawing]
18685 (none) (none) (none) Stone bowl. Limestone. Imperfect. [Type] 22. [drawing]
18686 (none) (none) (none) Stone bowl. Coarse limestone. Thick and roughly made: the rim cracked and warped completely out of shape. Flattened base and convex side.
18687 (none) (none) (none) Stone bowl. Dark steatite (?). In fragments, and incomplete. Sides nearly straight.
18688 (none) (none) (none) Stone bowl. Very coarse basic diorite (?). [Type] 9. [drawing]
18692 (none) (none) (none) Bead of clouded pale mauve chalcedony. [drawing]
18713 (none) (none) (none) Clay jar painted. Fragments of a large jar painted black design on greenish-drab: type al Obaid type.
18714 (none) (none) (none) Clay pot. Type JNG j12. Decorated with vertical stripes of reserved slip.
18715 (none) (none) (none) Stone bowl. Pink limestone. Broken and imperfect. [Type] 4. [drawing]
18716 (none) (none) (none) Stone bowl. Limestone. Imperfect. [Type] 16. [drawing]
18717 (none) (none) (none) Stone vase. White marble. [Type] 50. [drawing]
18719A (none) (none) (none) [A] Lead tumbler cover [for] [B] clay pot. Lead tumbler completely distorted, but approximate dimensions 8cm height x base 7 covering the neck of spouted jar type JNG sj3.
18720A (none) (none) (none) [A] Lead tumbler with [B] clay pot. Lead tumbler distorted, but approximate dimensions diam 012, height 0055, covering the neck of spouted jar type JNG sj8. (but without line of ornamentation round shoulder). dimensions height 022, diam 016-5 base 008 made of light yellow clay.
18722 (none) 1933,1013.244 (none) Clay pot, painted. Drab clay with design in red on the shoulder. Type JN sj.8 but with 2 spouts side by side. [Note on back card reads Beads missing. JNG 15 - lozenge shaped carnelian.]
19247 (none) 1935,0112.80 (none) Beads. 1 shell tube, and 2 oval shell frontlets; diamond beads of lapis, mother-of-pearl, paste and limestone, paste balls, small shell rings, quartzite rhomboid and square paste spacers.
19277 (none) (none) (none) Stone vase. White limestone. Type J.N. 26.
19424 (none) (none) (none) Stoen vase. White limestone. JN 26
18438 (none) 1933,1013.166 (none) Beads. Carnelian tubes, large and small. Lapis cylindrical, balls and flattened balls, one chalcedony flattened oval, one carneliandate shaped, on agate date-shaped.
18502B (none) (none) (none) Shells. [A] 1) A cowrie, large, cut to form of cup. [B] 2) Conch shell cut as a lamp. [C] 3) Shell . [drawing]
18502A (none) (none) (none) Shells. [A] 1) A cowrie, large, cut to form of cup. [B] 2) Conch shell cut as a lamp. [C] 3) Shell . [drawing]
18719B (none) (none) (none) [A] Lead tumbler cover [for] [B] clay pot. Lead tumbler completely distorted, but approximate dimensions 8cm height x base 7 covering the neck of spouted jar type JNG sj3.

Media: Pit W Export: JSON - XML - CSV

Media Media Title Title Label Author Omeka Label
Ur Excavations IV; The Early Periods Ur Excavations IV; The Early Periods 1955 Woolley, L. (none)
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Context

Ur > Royal Cemetery | PG > Pit W

References

Woolley, L. . (1955) Ur Excavations IV; The Early Periods, Oxford: Oxford University Press.