ARCHAEOLOGICAL EXCAVATIONS IN DUPNITSA (Petar Leshtakov – junior_1_bg@yahoo.com) The explorations of the stratum with materials from the Chalcolithic period, the Early Bronze Age and the 1st millennium BC, documented in 2010, continued. It was located in Sector 1 in the highest area of the fortress. Thirteen pits were explored. Twelve pits dated to the Late Antiquity and cut the earlier stratum. They contained fragmentary building ceramics, sherds and iron objects. Part of the pits could be interpreted as related to building activities, others were storage pits. Pit No. 3 contained Thracian sherds of the Early Iron Age (11th – 6th centuries BC). A burned building of the Early Iron Age, 9 m by 4.10 m in size, was partly explored. A significant part of the building was destroyed during the building activities in the Late Antiquity. The layer with debris was 10 – 25 cm thick and contained fragmentary wattle-and-daub and sherds. A stratum, 5 – 40 cm thick, containing sherds of the 1st Phase of the Early Iron Age (11th – 9th centuries BC) and partly destroyed by the later activities, was documented.