Wet Organic Archaeological Materials Working Group
Triennial Programme 2017-2020
Working Group Activities and Projects 2017-2020
Specific themes for investigation/research
- The ethics and practicalities of treating waterlogged materials, especially large structures or large assemblages.
- In situ preservation of waterlogged organics.
- New treatment techniques and continued review of older techniques, such as Kauramin, PEG, Sugars, Alum etc. In particular, we welcome studies that address the long-term performance and stability of treatments, especially those that reassess the condition of the materials treated as part of the International Comparative Wood Study and currently stored in Trondheim.
- The treatment of composite materials.
- The treatment of non-wood organics.
- The display and storage of waterlogged (and previously waterlogged) organics.
- The role of sulphur and other contaminants in the deterioration of wood and other organics and ways to mitigate these effects.
- The documentation and characterization techniques for recording and assessing waterlogged organics.
Projects
Meetings:
• 2019 Interim Meeting to be held in Portsmouth, England.
Communications:
• Communications via two annual newsletters (summer and winter) and periodic shorter updates as warranted.
General:
- Planning the 2019 Interim Meeting to be held in Portsmouth, England.
- Publication of the 2016 Florence post-prints
- Preparation and publication of the 2019 Portsmouth Interim Meeting post-prints.
- Prepariation of the Wet Organic Archaeological Materials Working Group postprints for publication on-line. This includes obtaining copyright permissions from authors and institutions, formatting already scanned proceedings and scanning any remaining post-prints.