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Enhancing Radiocarbon Chronologies of Colonization: Chronometric Hygiene Revisited

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 January 2019

Magdalena M E Schmid Open the ORCID record for Magdalena M E Schmid [Opens in a new window] ,
Rachel Wood ,
Anthony J Newton ,
Orri Vésteinsson  and
Andrew J Dugmore
Magdalena M E Schmid*
Affiliation:
School of GeoSciences, University of Edinburgh, EH8 9XPEdinburgh, UK Department of Archaeology, University of Iceland, Sæmundargata 2, Reykjavík 101, Iceland Centre for Archaeological Sciences, School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW2522, Australia Australian Research Council (ARC) Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW2522, Australia
Rachel Wood
Affiliation:
Research School of Earth Sciences, Australia National University, Canberra, 0200 ACT, Australia
Anthony J Newton
Affiliation:
School of GeoSciences, University of Edinburgh, EH8 9XPEdinburgh, UK
Orri Vésteinsson
Affiliation:
Department of Archaeology, University of Iceland, Sæmundargata 2, Reykjavík 101, Iceland
Andrew J Dugmore
Affiliation:
School of GeoSciences, University of Edinburgh, EH8 9XPEdinburgh, UK Department of Anthropology, Washington State University, Pullman, WA99164-0001, USA The Graduate Center, City University of New York, 365 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY10016-4309, USA
*
*Corresponding author. Email: mme6@hi.is.
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Abstract

Accurately dating when people first colonized new areas is vital for understanding the pace of past cultural and environmental changes, including questions of mobility, human impacts and human responses to climate change. Establishing effective chronologies of these events requires the synthesis of multiple radiocarbon (14C) dates. Various “chronometric hygiene” protocols have been used to refine 14C dating of island colonization, but they can discard up to 95% of available 14C dates leaving very small datasets for further analysis. Despite their foundation in sound theory, without independent tests we cannot know if these protocols are apt, too strict or too lax. In Iceland, an ice core-dated tephrochronology of the archaeology of first settlement enables us to evaluate the accuracy of 14C chronologies. This approach demonstrated that the inclusion of a wider range of 14C samples in Bayesian models improves the precision, but does not affect the model outcome. Therefore, based on our assessments, we advocate a new protocol that works with a much wider range of samples and where outlying 14C dates are systematically disqualified using Bayesian Outlier Models. We show that this approach can produce robust termini ante quos for colonization events and may be usefully applied elsewhere.

Keywords

Bayesian Outlier ModelsEast PolynesiaIcelandmarine/freshwater reservoir effectwood charcoal with inbuilt age
Type
Research Article
Information
Radiocarbon , Volume 61 , Issue 2 , April 2019 , pp. 629 - 647
Copyright
© 2019 by the Arizona Board of Regents on behalf of the University of Arizona 

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