4.2.1 Timing and coordination

• Before you can start writing any kind of publication, it is vitally important to make sure that all constituent parts for the task are completed and available:
• Time is allocated for the author/s to proceed with writing
• All database entries, analytical tables and text files are printed
• All specialist reports, catalogues and tables are complete and available in a relevant format
• All publication plans and other illustrations are digitised or drawn

4.2.1.1 Specialist reports and stratigraphic assumptions

As mentioned above, you should never start writing your final text before all specialist reports are completed. Otherwise you will most certainly have to make some annoying unforeseen changes. In such a case you as the principal author will loose time because you are the last inline to draw the conclusions. Although there may be several alternatives how to interpret a site, your name stands for the most likely solution. Therefore you need all the evidence before you start writing.

4.2.1.2 Illustrations

Publication drawings summarise the evidence as phase plans. Usually the labelling omits context and group numbers and publishes only building, room, open area codes and other general headings. Drains, hearths or pits may also be numbered if they need reference between location on plan and the text. The trench outlines confine the areas of excavation. Structural evidence is illustrated in three ways (Figure 12):

• Black - walls newly introduced during this phase of construction
• Hachured - the conjectured parts of walls either not excavated or not found
• A lighter kind of hachure - for walls retained from the previous phase.

It is also very useful for the understanding of plans to illustrate the absence of evidence in areas of intrusion, for instance by grey shading.