Glossary Archaeological method and dating
Radiocarbon dating
Also called: carbon-14 dating
A scientific method that dates once-living material such as charcoal, seeds and bone by measuring the decay of the carbon-14 it contains.
Living things take in carbon, including a small, steady proportion of radioactive carbon-14. After death the carbon-14 decays at a known rate, so the amount left in a sample shows roughly how long ago the plant or animal died. The method works on material up to about 50,000 years old, and every result carries a statistical margin of error. Raw laboratory ages must be calibrated before they can be read as calendar years.
Radiocarbon transformed the study of prehistoric Cyprus, which has no written records. The first dates, around 1960, pushed the aceramic village of Khirokitia back to about 5675 bc in uncalibrated years, and later series pushed the first villages back further still (The Chronology of Ancient Cyprus). Calibrated dates now place the start of LC IIIA in the first decades of the twelfth century BCE, independently of any pottery sequence.
Related terms
- Calibrated date
A radiocarbon result converted into calendar years using a calibration curve, usually written cal BC, cal BCE or cal BP.
- Absolute chronology
A chronology expressed in calendar years (BCE, CE or years before present), fixed by scientific dating or by links to written history.
- Thermoluminescence dating
A method that dates fired clay by measuring the light it releases when heated, widely used to test whether a pot or terracotta is ancient.
Where it appears
- Climate and Landscape in Ancient Cyprus
- Combed Ware
- Copper Metallurgy in Ancient Cyprus
- Late Bronze Age Cyprus
- Red Polished Zoomorphic Vessels and Animal Figurines
- Red-on-White Ware
- Village Life in Early Bronze Age Cyprus
- Early Bronze Age Cyprus
- Middle Bronze Age Cyprus
- Proto-White Painted Ware
- Stone Plank Figures
- The Chronology of Ancient Cyprus
and 11 more compendium pages