Our Day Being Archaeologists (by Maggie)

We woke up one morning in Israel to the sun shining. We got in the car and headed to an ancient city called Tel Maresha that was around 2,200 years ago. When we arrived, we met our guide named Elena. She told us about the history of this ancient city and what we were going to do that morning.  Archaeologists dig at Tel Maresha because they want to know what their ancestors were like.  Tel Maresha was a Jewish city until the Greeks took over more than 2000 years ago.  When the Greeks took over, the Jews were given three options: 1) switch religions, 2) die, or 3) go somewhere else.  The reason we get to dig at the site is because the Jewish people who decided to leave just took what they could carry, but did not want the Greeks to get their things (pots, vases, urns) in their homes, so they pushed it all in to their basements.

We were going to be archaeologists for the day! First, we went into what was a basement 2,200 years ago.  After Elena showed us how to use the tools, we started digging and digging.

I found my first piece of pottery!! Elena thought that it was a piece of a bowl that hadn't been touched since 200 years BCE. We kept digging and found more pieces of bowls, plates, and even bones and teeth!

The biggest bone that I found came from a camel, Elena said.   We put our "finds" in one bucket and all the dirt in another bucket.

The next step of being an archaeologist is sifting.  You might be wondering what sifting is. Sifting is when we go through the bucket of dirt to make sure we didn't miss any finds.  There are two people who hold two handles of a board with a screen in the middle, and shake, shake, shake the dirt through.  Here are pictures of us sifting:

After these two steps, all the pottery and bones that we found go to a lab where they try to find clues to what people used to be like.  It was an experience that I'll never forget.  So if you go to Israel, you should definitely be an archaeologist for a day!