This chapter outlines the main steps in the process of archaeological wood analysis for taxonomic assessment. Preparation of specimens and sampling for anatomical characterization, followed by microscopy and anatomical data collection, then the identification process leading to a taxonomic assignment. Difficulties and problems unique to working with wood in fragmentary, degraded, and/or distorted conditions are examined, including how to deal with these and a variety of related issues. Several new frontiers in wood identification and analysis such as automated systems, DNA methods, high-resolution microscopy, and more are also described. The overall aim is to provide readers and students of the subject with an improved understanding of the potential along with the limitations involved in assigning woods taxonomically, both modern and ancient. A thorough comprehension of wood anatomy and its relationship to biological systematics and taxonomy is essential, necessary both to accuracy of assignment and to valid reporting. This in turn ensures that archaeological results are suitable for incorporation into broader archaeological and paleoecological frameworks, thus made more accessible and widely relevant across historical and scientific disciplines.

This chapter begins by overviewing the history of discoveries and related circumstances involving archaeological wood, with emphasis on developments since the mid-18th-century emergence of archaeology as a scientific discipline. The prominent role of environmental contexts that afford exceptional organic preservation is explicit, with material from perpetually moist, or conversely, quite arid settings having been dominant themes from the beginning. The relevance and variety of archaeological contexts, site formation processes, and the dominant forms of wood preservation (carbonized, waterlogged, desiccated, mineralized), as well as the different classes or categories of wooden remains and objects that may be found archaeologically are explained in detail. Choices, procedures, and issues related to excavation, field sampling, field recovery, and immediate handling of archaeological wood are also described.

This chapter details and explains wood anatomy, including the fundamental distinctions between hardwoods, or flowering plants, and softwoods, mainly the conifers. The principal cell types and defining characteristics of secondary xylem are described, with emphasis on the details and traits most relevant to wood identification and work with archaeological wood. The second half of the chapter reviews well-documented variability in anatomical expression that may result from a wide range of internal and external stimuli, including delving further into functional and ecological variation (i.e., juvenile wood, reaction wood, such as were initially described in Chapter 3). The deliberate and secondary effects of human activities influencing wood development and woodland resources generally are also examined.

This chapter examines some of the analytical procedures and practicalities of work with archaeological wood, aside from wood identification (Chapter 5). The categories and variety of primary data commonly used and reported in archaeological wood analysis are reviewed, including concerns inherent to work with ancient material. Anatomical observations and morphometric data collection at the larger, macroscopic scale are elaborated, including observations and procedures concerning sample selection for radiocarbon dating purposes. Some of the coverage relates directly to the broader research involving growth-ring variation, that is, dendroclimatology and related fields, some of which is described in earlier chapters. The general analytical approaches that are nowadays commonly used to report and compare among archaeological wood assemblages are overviewed, as are issues involving temporal and spatial resolution, including discrepancies, results that deviate from expectations. The chapter concludes with a view toward the future, directing attention to the relevance of archaeological wood in the modern world, not the least being as a record of past climate dynamics and global change.

This chapter emphasizes the role of wood as an information source in view of modern archaeological and paleobiological research and practice. Tree-ring-based applications and other uses of archaeological wood data sets are overviewed. The fundamental nature of wood as a vital plant tissue system, valuable natural resource, and forest product are additional themes, drawing especially from plant biology and wood science (what is wood?). As an exceptionally versatile and almost infinitely adaptable biological material, wood has long served human needs for illumination, cooking foods, heating dwellings, firing ceramics, and a host of other subsistence and technological purposes. It has been manufactured into countless utilitarian and non-utilitarian objects and has formed the basic structural and finishing elements for dwellings and other construction of nearly all forms and types, on land as well as to navigate the planet’s waters. The forms and variety of preservation states in which wood occurs archaeologically are overviewed in this opening chapter, along with initial discussion of the inherent complexities and some of the difficulties involved in work with ancient material. This chapter also provides suggestions and guidance on education and training for work with archaeological wood, emphasizing the importance of understanding wood from both humanistic and plant biological standpoints to enhance archaeological interpretation.