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Archaeological survey of the Khashuri district  

The survey team, composed by Giulia De Nobili and Giorgi Khaburzania, did not work on the field this year because of the unfavourable seasonal conditions (heavy vegetation cover and presence of cultivated fields before the harvest season everywhere in the region), except for one day, which was devoted to re-checking some sites discovered in the course of the 2011 survey. 
     The season's work, which lasted ca 15 days, was devoted, instead, to completing the analysis and the interpretation of the material collected during the 2011 season, in order to prepare it for publication. Unfortunately, most of the collected material did not show high dating potential. From a total of more than 2800 collected pottery sherds, we ended up with only 222 diagnostic ones. These were analysed, photographed and drawn. Since most of the sherds were too small to give an idea of vessel morphology, our analysis concentrated on decoration/surface treatment typologies in association with fabric types. With this method we were able to divide the material into 6 main period categories: Early Bronze, Late Bronze/Early Iron, Iron, Hellenistic, Antique, and Medieval (Fig. 9). Many discussions arose for the distinction between Late Bronze, Early Iron, and Iron age material. The Late Bronze/Early Iron class groups together sherds dating to the beginning of the Late Bronze period, as well as later materials that clearly show a hint of transition toward Iron Age pottery traditions. These differences are specified in the description of individual sherds, but for the sake of the overall sherds count and statistics all this material was treated as a single large class. Some of the surveyed sites did not yield any diagnostic sherds and remain therefore problematic. 
     Last year survey focused on two main purposes: the survey of Khashuri region and the survey of the Natsargora’s lower settlement. The results of the two surveys are summarised in the following.
     The Khashuri region survey concentrated around 36 modern villages and their surroundings. We collected a total of 949 sherds, most of them were not diagnostic. As we already noticed last year at the end of the field season, 90% of these sherds are Medieval in date, although some Antique and some LB/EI sherds are also attested. Fig. 10 shows the distribution of sites according to their periodization. The Natsargora’s survey was differently organized: we surveyed the fields S of the mound along 3 lines: 2 E/W and 1 N/S lines (Fig. 11), in order to understand the extent of the settlement, possibly in its chronological development. The results of this survey are not completely satisfying: as the image shows, since the distribution of pottery appears to be rather random, possibly due to heavy agricultural re-working of the area in recent times, and to the runoff of sherds along the slope. It is however clear that the majority of recovered sherds belong to the LB/EI period.