During the first training session of the 2008 season, we conducted excavations for fifteen days between April 7 and April 23, 2008.We worked with Thanasis Notis (pickman), Billy Papanikolao (shovelman), and Andreas Oikonomou (barrowman). We worked under the supervision of Guy Sanders and Alicia Carter. Initially, our assigned area was approximately 32 square meters, spanning from 1020.00 to 1027.80 N and 262.00E to 266.00E. Subsequently, it also incorporated the area from 1027.80 to 1030.50N and from 262.00E to 265.00E. In its total size, our area is located west of the room north of Room F and Walls 5218 and 5284 (these were treated as a single wall by the excavations of the 1960s and of 2007, which called them Wall 39 and the West Wall of the room north of Room F,West respectively). It is east of the foundations of the Turkish House and Wall 5217, the Turkish Wall which is currently under rebuilding as part of a conservation project. It is north of Wall 5215. Our area was for the most part level, although there was a shallow slope moving from south to north. On its west side it has been severely affected by the 1960s excavation, with some fill and a retaining wall erected along our western scarp (east of the foundations of the Turkish house), and a rock pile thrown together just north of Wall 5285. Our goal for this area was to clean and discern how our area related to the 1960s excavations and to excavate down to the Middle to Late Roman contexts as part of a greater effort to phase the walls and other features of the entire area south of the South Stoa and north of Nezi Field.


Middle Roman
The Middle Roman period is represented in our area by the fills bounded by Walls 5216, 5218, 5215, and 5217 and starting securely at 85.47 El. (5248). There were many contexts after this which were all Middle Roman and seemed to be associated leveling fill (5248, 5266, 5277, 5311, and 5320). After taking only a thin layer off we started to come down on a large secondary deposit of tile (5311). This along with the contexts below it down to 85.02 El. (5320), where we stopped digging, turned up dates to 300 +/- 25 CE. This all seems to be part of a leveling fill.


Late Roman
The walls whose foundation trenches we have excavated have been dated to the Late Roman Period. The foundation trench of 5218 was excavated in two discrete deposits. The upper layer was dated by pottery and coinage to the 5th and 6th centuries and the lower one to the 4th. In any case, the deposits from this foundation trench show that Wall 5218 was constructed during the Late Roman Period, no later than the end of the sixth century C.E. This interpretation supplements the previous work done by Heidi Broome-Raines, who gave the trench for the east face of this same wall in the room north of room F,West a Late Roman date based on a coin deposited in it from the late 4th century (context 5060). This coin gives a secure terminus post quem for the trench and wall. The pottery and coin finds from the west side of the wall locate this trench and its wall within the fifth or sixth centuries.
The foundation trench of Wall 5216 was extremely complicated to excavate, but its deposits most likely indicate a Late Antique construction. More specifically, the pottery and coinage of three of the four deposits within it date to the Middle or Late Roman periods. The fourth deposit has almost certainly been contaminated with a Frankish sherd and two Byzantine/early modern sherds, which were collected in Context 5326, where the foundation trench meets the west scarp created in the course of the 1960s excavations of the Turkish House. In addition to the fact that the contamination can easily be explained, the remaining pottery from this deposit and the secure dating of the other deposits date this trench to the Late Antique period. Unfortunately, we are still examining whether the 1960s excavations dated the foundation trench of this wall further east of our area, and nothing can be said with certainty until we find information about the lotted pottery from its foundation trench. Yet, we have found an indication of an early Byzantine or Late Roman date based on “associated sherds” in one of the notebooks (Corinth Excavations, Notebook 229, p. 143; the foundation trench is mentioned on pp. 185-6, 190, and the pottery lot is given as 684 within these pages). Also, the foundation trench for Wall 5216 cuts the foundation trench for 5218. Accordingly, while Wall 5216 postdates Wall 5218, it also probably has a Late Antique date.
The sum total of this information indicates that Walls 5216 and 5218 were constructed in Late Antiquity, although with 5218 perhaps being built before 5216. The lack of a corresponding wall to the west prevents us from arguing that walls 5218, 5216, and 5215 (at the south) were intended to frame a single room.

Byzantine
A pit (Contexts 5171 and 5183) containing material dating to the first half of the fourth century CE was filled along the north face of Wall 5215. It appears that this pit cuts into the foundation trench for Wall 5215, but since we have not excavated the totality of the foundation trench, it is difficult to say for sure. While the pottery of this pit is dated to the fourth century, its elevation is consistent with that of other Byzantine contexts. The pit was therefore either filled to create a level space before the laying of the clay floor (contexts 5168 and 5170) or we originally misinterpreted this feature and it is actually associated with part of the currently unexcavated foundation trench for Wall 5215. The shape of the deposit and is elevation indicates that it was in fact a pit and not part of a foundation trench for Wall 5215.
As for the clay flooring, neither pottery nor other related finds give a precise date. A Late Antique or Early Byzantine date is probable since the clay floor deposits are located above our Middle and Late Roman elevations. Although the clay floor represented by Context 5170 did not abut Wall 5218, it was on top of the foundation trench (Context Cut 5236) which dates to the fifth or sixth century, and it is therefore later. The clay floor 5168 did not abut Wall 5284, but only a small gap of 0.05m separated them, and this suggests that floor 5168 is later than Wall 5284. At this point it seems likely that 5168 is above the foundation trench for Wall 5284 since this foundation trench has yet to be fully identified.
Otherwise, within the area between Walls 5216, 5217, 5284, and 5285 we excavated a series of fills dated to the Byzantine or Late Byzantine area (Context 5286, 5290, 5292, 5297, 5303, and 5306), but it is currently difficult to know that these deposits are related. Terracing and leveling are a likely scenario.


Frankish:
Only the top elevations of our area indicated a Frankish date. Deposit 5205, which was excavated in the areas north of both Walls 5215 and 5216, is datable to the Frankish period. All the other Frankish material comes from archaeological cleaning or very broad early passes. Context 5205 went over the top of wall 5216, providing a possible date by which it went out of use.

Modern:
Excavations conducted in the 1960s just west of our area left visible marks upon the portion of North of Nezi which we excavated. In addition to the rock pile north of Wall 5285, the excavations of the Turkish House to the west created the scarp along the west side of our area, stretching from 1020.5 to 1030N and a retaining wall (5197) for holding dumped fill (5190, 5194) at 1023.60N. The material that we accumulated from scraping back this scarp and excavating this fill typically dated to the Byzantine or Frankish periods, but it was very likely deposited there during the 1960s excavation. Even more important, the contamination for one of our deposits (5326) of the foundation trench for the south face 5216 can be attributed to these excavations. This deposit extended to the scarp, and it may explain the Frankish sherd and the two late Byzantine/early modern sherds that appeared among our accumulation of mid-late Roman wares.

Conclusion
It is clear that major leveling occurred in Late Antiquity in the area south of Wall 5216, and it can be associated roughly with the construction of Wall 5218. Although this is a tentative hypothesis, we believe that Wall 5216 was built subsequent to Wall 5218, and it divided the area to its south from that to its north, which was increasingly leveled off during the Byzantine period. There are two courses of action that will be useful for the next session of excavation in this area. The first would be to finish the context assigned as 5320, since this was ended at an arbitrary level. However, before this can be dug, the possibility that a foundation trench for the north face of Wall 5215 has been identified. It should be explored and possibly dug first. The other and later option is to excavate the area north of Walls 5216 and 5285 in order to resolve the two following issues: the dating of the foundation trench for the north face of 5216 and the relationship between the area north of Wall 5216 and that north of Wall 5285. Special precision should be applied in determining and isolating the foundation trench for Wall 5216, even if this means creating a martyr between the wall and the rest of the soil to the north. The latest soil in the area north of Wall 5216 is a loose layer that runs along the south face of 5285 and into the area north of it. A coin (2008-72) probably dating to the fourth or fifth century was found while sweeping this loose layer.