Field work continued as usual, and, like last week, three of the team members were working with Ashraf el-Senoussi to get an introduction into recording ceramics. This day Mohamed Hamed (Qena), Hisham Abd el-Mumen (North Sinai) and Mahmud Yusuf (Sohag) were practicing pottery washing, sorting, and drawing.

The need was felt to spend more time on paper work: filling in the unit sheets, working on the stratigraphical matrix, and phasing of the trench. After lunch, John Lynch brought out the whiteboard for the discussion on interpretation with his team 3, while the other groups found suitable locations in and around the camp to work together on the field notes. That night the daily lecture was held by Willeke Wendrich on the principles, methods, and uses of ethnoarchaeology, which is a form of ethnological research from archaeological research questions.

After a long hard day in the field, the teams left the site to travel to the village of el-Nazla. A lunch break in a coffee shop on the road revived everybody enough to face the next assignment: plan and describe in as much detail as possible different aspects of the pottery workshops in this village, which is famous for its combination of wheel-thrown and hammer-and-anvil technique pottery. The assignment included a long list of points of attention for observation of the work and interviews with the potters. The group spent several hours at el-Nazla. The assignment was an eye-opener and nobody seemed to mind that shower time and lunch time had to be given up for this field trip.

Colleagues from the Supreme Council of Antiquities (Cairo office) came to visit the field school today and joined us for lunch: Attiya Redwan, Director of Excavations and Missions in SCA; Mohamed Abd el-Fatah, Director of Upper Egypt Antiquities Office; Ali Bazidi, General Director of Fayum Antiquities; Bahgat Fanous, Assistant Director of Upper Egypt Antiquities Office.

In the evening an hour was spent on a discussion on the assignment of the previous day in preparation of the report that each trench will write on the Nazla potters. The amount of information that was gained even in the relatively brief time span spent in Nazla was impressive. The lecture of this day was given by Nigel Blackamore on photography.

Some of the team members in the field were involved in surveying the trenches and their surroundings. Immediately after lunch Hans Barnard gave a lecture on the principles of surveying and worked with group 1 and 2 separately on practicing the use of different instruments, such as the theodolite, EDM and total station. Emphasis was put on the fact that the principles of surveying are the same, whether you use an expensive total station, or the much cheaper solution of surveying with just tape measures.

The end of the week came incredibly fast. All specialists joined the field crew for second breakfast on site, after which Ken Stuart (here photographed by Nigel Blackamore) made a panorama photo of the entire team. The trench tour started immediately after. Today there were lively discussions at each of the trenches on details of excavation as well as overall interpretation.

Most people left Thursday night for the short weekend, to return on Friday night in order to be ready for a fresh start at 4:30 the next morning.