Site 346:Wadi Trench:The expedition also placed a 60 metre long trench across the wadi to the immediate south of the site. This trench, cut up to 2 metres in depth through the wadi bed, revealed fluctuating and meandering water run-off channels and irregular rates of debris deposition. For instance, in the past several decades (to a maximum of 100 years), 50 cm of stones, sand, and modern debris have filled the wadi bed. This depositional amount decreases towards the west, away from the waterfall (see below). |
South Sinai
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Beginning to dig the trench south of Site 346 (Photo: P. Carstens). |
The 60 metre trench cut across the wadi bed (Photo: P.Carstens). |
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Waterfall no.1, Southwest of Mound:The project examined an adjacent natural waterfall area (active during winter flooding), which had previously led to a perennial pool of water beside the site. The excavation of this waterfall revealed at least 50 cm of debris accumulation in the past 50-100 years, which would suggest a much lower level for the basin during the New Kingdom. Further in the past, this waterfall probably flowed into an estuary separating El-Markha Plain from both the northern shoreline and Site 346 (along the foot of the West Sinai hills). With today’s sea level occurring about 5 metres below the current waterfall base, and a deposition rate possibly as high as 50 cm per century, one can estimate that the waterfall’s base lay at sea-level by 1000 AD, and presumably well-below sea-level in the New Kingdom (1550-1069 B.C.). These are conservative estimates, even after incorporating the known 2 metre rise in sea level in the Mediterranean Sea since the end of the New Kingdom.
Wadi bed leading west from waterfall no.1 beside Site 346 (Photo: P. Carstens).
Wadi bed and waterfall side to the south of Site 346 (Photo: P. Carstens).
Laying out geological sounding in
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