Bernhard Weninger

Extension of the (super 14) C calibration curve to ca. 40,000 cal BC by synchronizing Greenland (super 18) O/ (super 16) O ice core records and North Atlantic Foraminifera profiles; a comparison with U/ Th coral data.

For a better understanding of pre-Holocene cultural history, archaeologists are in need of an absolute time scale that can be confirmed and duplicated by different dating methods. Proxy data available from archaeological sites do not, in themselves, allow much reflection on absolute age. Even when founded on supporting radiocarbon data, Paleolithic chronologies that are beyond the actual limits of (super 14) C calibration still remain relative ones, and thus are often quite tentative. Lacking the possibility of calibration for the Paleolithic, archaeologists often attempt to correlate their data with different time scales from different archives that are thought to be absolute or calendric. The main result of this paper is that the GISP2 and U/Th chronologies duplicate each other over their entire range of data overlap, while other time scales (i.e., GRIP, most varve sites) differ significantly. The context-derived (super 14) C calibration curve provides a large potential to correlate the various climate archives as recorded in ice cores and deep ocean drillings with terrestrial sequences.

A light in the dark: archaeological wiggle matching and the absolute chronology of the close of the Aegean Late Bronze Age

The conventional chronology of the Aegean Late Bronze Age was challenged by P.J. James and his co-workers in Centuries of darkness (1991). The present paper is an exhaustive and critical re-examination of radiocarbon dates from a number of key sites in the region using the technique of probabilistic computer archaeological wiggle matching which concludes that the conventional arhcaeological chronology still holds good (whatever the flaws in its original construction) on the basis of the independent radiocarbon evidence.

Quantum theory of radiocarbon calibration

Abstract The calibration of radiocarbon measurements is based on a number of mathematical assumptions that are rarely considered by users of the various available calibration programs. As 14C ages take on mathematical properties best known from quantum physics, a quantum theoretical approach provides a useful basis to evaluate the reliability of processes of calibration and Bayesian modelling of radiocarbon datasets. We undertake such an evaluation here through a consideration of the mathematics of calibration, the normalization process, and through an archaeological case study. We demonstrate that the normalization function deemed necessary for 14C histogram shape-correction is identical to the default prior widely used in Bayesian calibration. We highlight flaws in default Bayesian calibration algorithms which may affect archaeological studies that are overly reliant on high calibration precision, especially when based on relatively small (N<100) sample sizes. The observed differences between algorithms have consequences for radiocarbon models that claim sub-generational (~25–30 calendar years) precision.

Radiocarbon Dating the Middle to Upper Palaeolithic Transition: The Demise of the Last Neanderthals and the First Appearance of Anatomically Modern Humans in Europe

Only a precise chronological/stratigraphical framework can enable an understanding of the dynamics of change underlying the replacement of Neanderthals by Anatomically Modern Humans and the emergence of what are recognized as Upper Palaeolithic technologies and behaviour. This paper therefore examines the European radiocarbon-based chronometric record for the period between ca. 40.0 and 30.0 ka 14C BP with reference to the stratigraphic evidence. The following testable hypotheses are proposed:

Absolute age range of the Late Cypriot IIC period on Cyprus

Extensive radiocarbon data are examined, including results from short-lived samples contemporary with use-contexts. An absolute date range for the main Late Cypriot IIC period on Cyprus, from c. 1340–1315 BC to c. 1200 BC, is proposed.

The Aegean in the Early 7th Millennium BC: Maritime Networks and Colonization

The process of Near Eastern neolithization and its westward expansion from the core zone in the Levant and upper Mesopotamia has been broadly discussed in recent decades, and many models have been developed to describe the spread of early farming in terms of its timing, structure, geography and sociocultural impact. Until now, based on recent intensive investigations in northwestern and western Anatolia, the discussion has mainly centred on the importance of Anatolian inland routes for the westward spread of neolithization. This contribution focuses on the potential impact of east Mediterranean and Aegean maritime networks on the spread of the Neolithic lifestyle to the western edge of the Anatolian subcontinent in the earliest phases of sedentism. Employing the longue durée model and the concept of ‘social memory’, we will discuss the arrival of new groups via established maritime routes. The existence of maritime networks prior to the spread of farming is already indicated by the high mobility of Epipalaeolithic/Mesolithic groups exploring the Aegean and east Mediterranean seas, and reaching, for example, the Cyclades and Cyprus. Successful navigation by these early mobile groups across the open sea is attested by the distribution of Melian obsidian. The potential existence of an additional Pre-Pottery Neolithic (PPN) obsidian network that operated between Cappadocia/Cilicia and Cyprus further hints at the importance of maritime coastal trade. Since both the coastal and the high seas networks were apparently already well established in this early period, we may further assume appropriate knowledge of geographic routes, navigational technology and other aspects of successful seafaring. This Mesolithic/PPN maritime know-how package appears to have been used by later groups, in the early 7th millennium calBC, exploring the centre of the Anatolian Aegean coast, and in time establishing some of the first permanent settlements in that region. In the present paper, we link this background of newcomers to the western edge of Anatolia with new excavation results from Çukuriçi Höyük, which we have analysed in terms of subsistence strategies, materiality, technology and symbolism. Additionally, further detailed studies of nutrition and obsidian procurement shed light on the distinct maritime affinity of the early settlers in our case study, something that, in our view, can hardly be attributed to inland farming societies. We propose a maritime colonization in the 7th millennium via routes from the eastern Mediterranean to the eastern Aegean, based on previously developed sea networks. The pronounced maritime affinity of these farming and herding societies allows us to identify traces of earlier PPN concepts still embedded in the social-cultural memories of the newcomers and incorporated in a new local and regional Neolithic identity.