Paleoethnobotany Study

In 2013, anthropology graduate student Jessica Herlich contacted staff at the WILLI herbarium at William & Mary for assistance in collecting reference plant materials for a study of plant phytolith and starch grain analysis. Herlich’s advisor, Dr. Shanti Morell-Hart, was then a Visiting Assistant Professor in Anthropology and is now an Assistant Professor at McMaster University. WILLI curator Beth Chambers worked with Herlich to gather materials from both herbarium vouchers and in situ plants, which Herlich used to identify plant taxa as part of her archaeobotanical analysis.

In 2015, Herlich and Morell-Hart published a paper, “Visualization and Collaborative Practice in Paleoethnobotany,” in the SAA Archaeological Record, documenting their study. The paper emphasized how collaborative methods enhanced the impact of their research and included a description of the herbarium staff’s contributions.