MICROMORPHOLOGY AND SAMPLING
by Wendy Matthews
Objectives
The principal objective in studying depositional sequences is to contribute to interpretation of human activities and uses of space at Çatalhöyük in collaboration with analyses of architectural layout and internal features, burials, and the distribution of artefacts and bioarchaeological remains, as in previous studies at this and other sites. The type, thickness and frequency of floors and occupation deposits within buildings at Çatalhöyük can vary both spatially in different areas within rooms, and through time during the life-history of each building. In the 1997 field season we studied and sampled occupational sequences in buildings and midden areas in the Mellaart, Summit and North areas on site, and palaeoecological sequences in KOPAL Trench 2, to the north of the East Mound.
Sampling strategies
In order to study spatial and temporal variation in floor sequences, samples for organic and inorganic analyses and archive were collected at 50 cm intervals from each unit of excavation. Sections through floor sequences were studied in strategic baulks set at 1-2 metre intervals. All sequences for microstratigraphic analysis were photographed, drawn at a scale of 1:5 and described in detail.
Sampling strategies were designed to enable study of deposits at a range of different scales of analytical focus and sample size.
Organic materials
Excavations in a range of contexts this year uncovered an increasing number of whitish remains in the form of organic materials, all of which were sampled, usually as intact block samples. During microscopic analysis of these remains in the field laboratory at magnifications of x5-80, whitish translucent fibres c. 12 µm in diameter, frequently associated with salts, were identified in a number of samples
These remains require specialist analysis in order to identify the organic materials and taphonomic processes.
Traces of organic residues have been identifed in samples collected in previous seasons. The results are currently being analysed and will be discussed in a report by Dr R.P.Evershed, University of Bristol, early in 1998.
The principal focuses of microstratigraphic analysis and micromorphological sampling in 1997 were: floors and occupation deposits, room fills, possible collapsed roofing, and palaeoecological sequences.
Floors and occupation deposits
In the Mellaart Area sequences of floors and fire-installations were sampled in Spaces 109, 112 and 113. Many of the floors were well plastered. These sequences correlate with Mellaart's Level VII, and had been partially excavated by Mellaart in 1960's.
Detailed horizontal sampling of floors was initiated in Building 2 and Space 151, and will be continued next season during further excavation. Microstratigraphic sequences in both of these buildings vary within distances of 1-2 metres, and range from lenses of ash and charred remains around fire-installations to thick layers of white plaster on top of platforms. Internal divisions of space within these buildings were delineated by low plastered ridges on floors, retaining ash from the oven in Space 151 for example; thin plastered dividing 'walls', and a series of low platforms. The microstratigraphy within both buildings is complex, and has been subject to a series of truncations.
In the Summit Area, in Building 10, an unusually deep accumulation of at least three phases of thick white plaster floors was studied and sampled for micromorphological and microchemical analyses, from an exposure in the edge of a Byzantine pit.
All floor areas in Building 1 in the North Area had been sampled in 1996, and were not sampled for micromorphological analysis during final stages of excavation of this building in 1997. No floors were reached during the first season of excavations in the large building, Building 3, in the Summit Area, but room fill and possible collapsed roofing were studied and sampled .