Vindolanda 2017 Day Seven

Chasing features.  Well, they are not going anywhere so tracing features would make more sense.

Our "Demolition Rubble" north of our cement floor actually has under it an interesting pebbled, compacted floor.  It rather looks water proof which would be in keeping with the theory that this is some sort of bath suite for the commanding officer.  Elsewhere there might be a "plunge bath" coming up but it is covered over with a later floor surface which may make the proof impractical.  This area of the excavation only has a few more weeks of excavation scheduled.

A few pictures.  Feel free to refer back to earlier posts where high hopes for underfloor heating, etc were being entertained.

Here is an end of day over view.  Our earlier cement surface on the left. Our work today is the lower, and presumably older, surface to the right.

Here is the transition between the compacted cement stuff in the upper part of the photo and the new pebbled surface below.  There is a somewhat arbitrary line of rock left dividing them, our prior expectations of a wall being unrealized.

Worm's eye - oh, they don't have any - view of the pebbled surface.  If you squint really hard you can imagine that the pretty stones were placed on purpose.  If that is the case then the delightfully warm sunshine has started to effect you.

And as to what it means.  Who knows?  For certain there were multiple layers of flooring in the same "room", and the room might have expanded and contracted in size over the roughly twenty years of occupation.  Or was it occupied earlier?  Or later? It sure would help to find a nice coin on the floor but whoever was detailed to tidy it up at the end did a very efficient job.