had been excavating
- past perfect progressive of excavate.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The archaeologists who were led to the cave in 2018 had been excavating early modern human sites in Laos’s lush Annamite Mountains for 15 years.
From Science Magazine ● May 17, 2022
In that year, a blue-ribbon panel of researchers took a hard look at evidence presented by Tom Dillehay, then at the University of Kentucky, from a site he had been excavating in Monte Verde, Chile.
From Time Magazine Archive
Evidence of this prehistoric jaunt was reported last week by U.S. geologists who had been excavating hillside sediments that were once part of the lake.
From Time Magazine Archive
Germans had been excavating before we came, and we found in the town many cases of antiquities, ready packed for transport to Europe.
From The Leicestershires beyond Baghdad by Thompson, Edward John
It was at Beaumont-Hamel, under the Hawthorne Redoubt, that exactly at 7.30 a. m., the hour of attack, the British exploded a mine which they had been excavating for seven months.
From The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 8) Battle of Jutland Bank; Russian Offensive; Kut-El-Amara; East Africa; Verdun; The Great Somme Drive; United States and Belligerents; Summary of Two Years' War by Churchill, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
