In the July – August 2009 the archeological expedition of Volyn continued its excavations at the archeological site at Shankiv Yar. The area of excavation was 280 m2.The cultural layer was 0,4 m deep, 0,3 m in width andwas filled by wheel-made and hand-made pottery of the Wielbark culture, Slavic pottery of the end of 10 – the beginning 11th, and individual finds of the Early Iron Age and Pomors’ko-Klyoshova culture. There were three buildings and a shrine of the Wielbark culture, and three buildings of Slavs of the 10thcentury on the site of the excavation.
Building 116 of the Wielbark culture was an irregular oval in form, 5,1 × 2,4–3,4 m in size and oriented east–west. The walls were uneven. The ground walls were 0,15–0,2 mdeep. At base of the building were postholesplaced along the long axis of the floor. This wasconfirmed by seven small pits, 0,09–0,17 m depth. There was an iron knife, spindle whorls and a lot of hand-made sherds, which date this buildingto the earliest phase of settlement at the end of the 2nd cent. AD.
Building 111 of Wielbark culture was a rectangular sunken-floored building 4,6 × 3,6 m in size, sunken .0,7m. The location of the postholes on the floor points to wattle and daub construction. A hearth is suggested by charcoal and ash at the center of the building. There were 59 fragments of hand–made pottery and 7 of wheel–made pottery, as well as an amphora fragment, three iron knives, a fragment of a sickle, a bone awl, a fishhook, two spindle whorls, a bead of glass and a Roman denarius. Building 114 was also a dugout. It was 7,0 × 4,8 m in size,and 1 m below ground level, oriented east–west. There were 89 fragments of wheel – made pottery of the Chernyakhivs’ka culture (bowls, ladles, jugs and pots) and 96 fragments of wheel – made pottery in the construction trench. These comprised a clay sinker, an axe – celt, a knife – a dagger, the tip of a dart, an iron knife and fire-steel, two bone awls. a few spindles and many animal bones.
The most interesting building was the sacred site. It may be that this was a community altar. This was locatedat the center of the group of buildings, which belong to the second phase of the existence of the settlement. The base of the shrinewas 5 × 4 m in size, paved with a clay layer with organic matter, 0,1 – 0, 15 cm thick.. The construction was orientedNorth – South. An altar that looked like a hearth was situated at the center of the western wall. It was round in shape 1, 22 m in diameter and consisted of four layers. The area to the west of the shrinewas nearly14 × 7 m and 0,35 m deep. It was covered by a layer of gray – brown clay. There were many animal bones. Among them were skulls ofpredators (wolf, fox, boar) and pets and also a fragment of the skull of a 23 – 25 years old man and a few children’s bones. There was wheel – made and hand – made pottery, which can dated this shrine between the second half of the 3rd and the middle of the 4th century AD.