Glossary Archaeological method and dating
Terminus post quem
Also called: TPQ
Latin for 'limit after which': the earliest possible date for a deposit, set by the latest datable object found in it.
A layer or tomb cannot have been closed before the newest thing in it was made. If a deposit contains a coin of a known year or a scarab naming a pharaoh, the deposit is no earlier than that date, though it may be much later. The terminus post quem is therefore a lower limit, and archaeologists look for the latest securely datable item to set it.
The Uluburun shipwreck off southern Turkey, with its cargo of copper ingots and Cypriot pottery, is a standard example. A gold scarab of Nefertiti gives a date after which the ship sank, and tree-ring dates and Aegean pottery then place the sinking at the very end of the fourteenth century BCE (Seafaring and Ships).
Related terms
- Terminus ante quem
Latin for 'limit before which': the latest possible date for an object or deposit, set by a dated event that sealed or followed it.
- Synchronism
A link showing that two cultures' sequences overlap in time, such as a dated Egyptian object in a Cypriot tomb or a Cypriot pot in a dated foreign layer.
- Archaeological context
The exact place and circumstances in which an object was found, including its layer and associated finds, which give it most of its value as evidence.