In 1968, a team of USC researchers traveled to Israel to perform excavations on a site called Khirbet Mazra’a, near the Mediterranean coast. The team returned to USC with a trove of artifacts and notes for the campus archaeology lab. But the researchers never published their findings and their expedition was nearly forgotten.

Fast forward to early 2006, when three archaeology majors – Georgiana Nikias, Kristin Butler and Hannah Marcuson – enrolled in Religion 494. The term project for the class was to complete a research assignment on an artifact in the archaeology lab. The three students realized that no one had produced a comprehensive analysis of the work done at Khirbet Mazra’a and were upset by how little attention the expedition had received, especially after a class discussion on the ethics of archaeology.

“An archaeologist is responsible for publishing his findings in a timely manner so that others in the field know about what has already been done,” Butler said. “But it had all just been sitting there. It hadn’t been discussed, and it hadn’t been published.” Nikias also was indignant: “You’d pick up these old notes and the edges would just crumble.” The students took it upon themselves to assemble a report on the work that had been carried out at Khirbet Mazra’a nearly 40 years earlier.
During their first semester on the project, the students decided to look only at the first three layers of one area of the dig. The entire excavation has eight areas, with between 10 and 12 layers in each. “We just barely scratched the surface,” Marcuson said.

Butler was assigned to study the pottery that had been found by the team. Marcuson looked at Turkish clay pipes, which were numerous in the excavation. Nikias examined the architecture of the site, trying to piece together its purpose. To date, the students’ best estimate is that Khirbet Mazra’a was a suburb of the nearby port city of Tel Dor, and its citizens engaged mostly in manufacturing for trade. “Our hypothesis may change entirely by the time we get to area three, but that’s the beauty of it,” Nikias said.

The team has established a Web site to publish their findings as they move forward with the project: http://khirbetmazraa.coolinc.info. The site won them first place in the humanities category at last spring’s Undergraduate Symposium for Creative and Scholarly Work. Currently, the researchers are on hiatus while the archaeology lab is relocated, but they are planning to dig in again as soon as the move is complete.

Do you know of someone who takes learning, especially undergraduate research, beyond classroom walls? If so, please e-mail Mark Kann at mkann@usc.edu to suggest a feature for this column.