Despite the troubles in the Lebanon, the expedition is scheduled to go ahead. We will be leaving Toronto on the 3rd August, and arriving in Damascus the next day. By the end of the day, we will be at the monastery - inshallah! Research at Deir Mar Musa in the 2006 season is aimed at a number of objectives, but the primary one is a survey of the caves and other features in the desert mountain behind the monastery. Deir Mar Musa is what is known as a "Laura", a community in which the monks lived in hermitages spread around the landscape, and only came into the main monastery buildings on Sunday to pray together, and collect materials they needed for the rest of the week. At Mar Musa, they actually lived in small caves spread around the landscape. Our objective in this season is to survey these caves, to see how many there were, and how many were occupied. The team will comprise myself; Joelle Chartrand, who is the other archaeologist on the team this year; Francesca Scorsone and Tiago Varella-Cid, who are climbers I will need to have explore some of the more inaccessible caves in the study area; and Jovanna Scorsone, project museologist, who will work on preparing materials from previous seasons for the proposed museum.
Robert Mason
Robert Mason
