Inventory of Textile Artifacts from Archaeological Sites Located on US Forest Service

The William S. Webb Museum of Anthropology proposes to conduct an inventory of the textile artifacts from archaeological sites located on US Forest Service land in Kentucky. These materials are currently stored at the Webb Museum at the University of Kentucky. The goals of this project will be to: " Identify archaeological sites on property owned by the US Forest Service in Kentucky with collections of textile artifacts " Inventory those collections and rectify discrepancies in the catalog " Catalog any textile materials from these sites which have not been previously cataloged " Provide basic identification of the textile structure and object type " Enter catalog information into a searchable database " Use the information generated from the inventory to assess the curatorial needs of the collection and define future research directions " Time permitting, photograph each object as it is identified The total project is expected to take 2 weeks. The estimated time to complete the inventory is one week. Data entry of the catalog information will take approximately 2 days. Once the inventory is completed and the database is created, the remaining time will be devoted to assessing the storage needs of the collection and outlining future research. The final product of this project will be a white paper outlining the needs and potential of this collection. Textiles are an overlooked class of material culture. Their potential to inform on the subtle nuances of prehistoric cultural has barely been explored. This project is the first step in that exploration.