Textile Database from Gullskoen, Norway (2019-2023)

Collection of archaeological textiles from the site of Gullskoen Norway, belonging to the Bryggen Museum in Bergen This material is part of a project looking at early Norwegian Towns, (the Borgund Kaupang Project) and material from Bryggen is being used comparatively. The Norwegian government has has not authorized this material to be public until the completion of the project in 2025 and the data must first figure on the Norwegian National antiquities database. This scientific investigation will employ a mixed methodology to document and analyze textile collections from rural and urban, North Atlantic and European contexts. Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS), dye and material analyses, strontium isotope analyses, and X-Ray Fluorescence will be employed to further characterize North Atlantic collections and compare them to previously collected data assemblages. Strontium isotope analyses and portable X-ray fluorescence (pXRF) data of archaeological samples and modern wool will be carried out in order to map isotopic signatures geographically and provide insight into the movements of textiles and the compounds used in their production across long distances, such as to North America, northern Europe and Eurasia. Bringing together analyses ranging in scale from trans-continental trade to assessments of individual women's handiwork and to their products' elemental and isotopic signatures, this project has transformative potential to provide an engendered, interdisciplinary perspective on trade, women, and the emergence of early globalized economies in the North.