This season the ODQ team has done several strategic excavations around Fuwairit, including one trench that focused on providing more information about the structure and date of the city wall. Coastal towns in Qatar often had defenses such as city walls to protect from raiding.
There are references to the Fuwairit city wall in the historical record; The Persian Gulf Pilot in 1932 describes Fuwairit as: “on the shore of a small inlet… a walled village in which are several towers.” Earlier editions of The Persian Gulf Pilot had described it as “a little walled town.”
Ruth Hatfield and Dave Mackie excavated the city wall and found a low base made of solidified limestone, perhaps the foundation of the wall. There was some evidence that it was higher at one point, and had a flattened top. There were middens–the remains of garbage dumps–heaped up against the wall.
It was difficult to date the wall from the artefacts that we recovered, but after the pottery is properly processed and analysed, we should have more information.
This photo demonstrates how the city wall looks above and below ground. Can you see how the wall continues toward the horizon?
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