Archeological Excavations

Sham's father is an archeologist. Bolgar Complex is their project since Sham was just a kid. The place has become a significant place for the family. Since their father works there, they spent most of their summer holidays in that small town and sometimes they would take part in the excavation as their summer activity. 


At the first day of our arrival, his father showed us his latest excavation project. They still didn't conclude what exactly was the site about but there were few very interesting discoveries visible already. I got some pictures from the site.

 So, this is the half of the site, partly cleared up. down there is Volga river.

 That picture where I am showing the black line with my finger, it the layer of its history. The black line suggests the Mongol period. It was the time when Mongols came and burned the village where Bolgars were inhabiting. On the top of the black (burned woods and ashes) layer is another layer which is made of bricks. The bricks were a reconstruction after everything has been burned from their houses. The bricks layer was put up during Russian times. 

 Me, from down there and Sham from the top ground. I am not clear of what was this area exactly was before because but the archeologists said that it might be some kind of Administrative building. The excavation continues till the day we left the town.

I was lucky to get too close to an archeological excavation per se. I only see them from television and I was always asking myself what do they find so interesting in them. I thought archeology is one of the most boring jobs/profession (lol). But I was wrong I admit. When I got there, I felt the whole process of archeology, the unfolding of history right in front of  my eyes. I felt the thrill of being able to touch a part of centuries when my parents didn't even meet yet. I slowly crawled up and down checking some traces of whatever I see and tried to understand what it was according to my NON-archeological logic (lol). As I got closer, I would see the layers of earth which comes in different type of ground and composition. As I have mentioned above, there were 3 layers and each explains during what era and what happened during that era. Isn't it interesting how archeologists could tell such facts? Oh, I guess if I'd be given another chance to study again, I perhaps study Archeology. I tried touching some things which are suspiciously not a natural ground until I found out that I was touching a bone. I freaked out because I didn't expect anything like that. Yeah, I know, I have seen mostly from tv that they dig such things but I guess I wasn't ready to see and discover one myself? hehe. Then I burst into laughter as I got scared and excited of what I just saw. Well, it wasn't that big though and it was hard to say if it was a human or animal bone since there were many of them scattered into pieces.

Archeology therefore is an amazing thing. It is a thread that connects history to present. Next time, I would love to take part in the real action, when they will just start excavating, digging and screening the earth ... looking forward to discover something which is left untold.