New radiocarbon dates for the Neolithic settlement at Pool on Sanday, Orkney, are interpreted in ... more New radiocarbon dates for the Neolithic settlement at Pool on Sanday, Orkney, are interpreted in a formal chronological framework. Phases 2.2 and 2.3, during which flat-based Grooved Ware pottery with incised decoration developed, have been modelled as probably dating to between the 31st and 28th centuries calbc. There followed a hiatus of a century or so, before the resumption of occupation in Phase 3, which has a different Grooved Ware style featuring the use of applied decoration. This has been modelled as probably dating from the 26th to the 24th centuries calbc. The implications of these results are discussed for the emergence and development of Grooved Ware, and for the trajectory of settlement and monumentality on Sanday.
Warum waren grose Kollektivitaten von Toten ein weitverbreitetes Merkmal im Westeuropa des spaten... more Warum waren grose Kollektivitaten von Toten ein weitverbreitetes Merkmal im Westeuropa des spaten 4. Jahrtausends cal BC? Anhand des Felskammergrabs von Les Mournouards II in der Marneregion im nordlichen Frankreich, in dem die Uberreste von 79 Menschen in zwei kunstlichen Kammern niedergelegt wurden, wird auf diese und weitere Fragen eingegangen. Mittels Bayes’scher Statistik von 29 neu gewonnenen Radiokarbondaten kann die Erbauung des Grabes ins 34. oder 33. Jahrhundert cal BC datiert werden, wobei seine Belegungszeit vielleicht nur 100 Jahre umfasste. Die Ergebnisse deuten an, dass die beiden Kammern zeitgleich benutzt wurden und dass erkennbare Unterschiede zwischen beiden das Resultat ihrer Nutzung durch unterschiedliche soziale Gruppierungen sein konnen, wie es bereits der Ausgraber Andre Leroi-Gourhan annahm. Die wahrscheinlich kurze Lebensdauer dieses Grabes legt die Annahme nahe, dass Gruppen von Hypogaen grundsatzlich die zeitlich aufeinanderfolgende Nutzung von Grabern du...
Variable kinship patterns in Neolithic Anatolia revealed by ancient genomes Highlights d Genetic ... more Variable kinship patterns in Neolithic Anatolia revealed by ancient genomes Highlights d Genetic kinship estimated from co-buried individuals' genomes in Neolithic Anatolia d Close relatives are common among co-burials in As xıklı and Boncuklu d Many unrelated infants found buried in the same building in Ç atalhö yü k and Barcın d Neolithic societies in Southwest Asia may have held diverse concepts of kinship
The Copper Age cemetery in Varna, Bulgaria, is famous for the earliest known, massive deposition ... more The Copper Age cemetery in Varna, Bulgaria, is famous for the earliest known, massive deposition of exquisite golden artefacts. Radiocarbon dating of the Varna i cemetery, excavated in the period 1972–91, places it in the mid-fifth millennium bc and suggests a duration of c 225 years from c 4550 to c 4325 cal bc. Construction work in the adjacent area (2.5 km to the east of Varna i cemetery) in December 2017 led to the discovery of sixteen new graves, whose characteristics are identical to the burials in the cemetery investigated in the last century. This article discusses the AMS dates of ten newly discovered inhumations. The results match well the existing cemetery chronology, showing that the new graves start slightly later and end earlier than Varna i and have a shorter duration of probably no more than a few decades. It is demonstrated for the first time that some areas of burial on the terrace were in continuous use for one or two generations only, suggesting multi-focal depos...
Since 1993 Historic England (and its predecessor English Heritage) has commissioned 9074 radiocar... more Since 1993 Historic England (and its predecessor English Heritage) has commissioned 9074 radiocarbon (14C) measurements on archaeological samples. Over 80% of these have been interpreted within formal Bayesian statistical models. The multiple strands of reinforcing evidence incorporated in these models provide precise chronologies that make stringent demands on the accuracy of the 14C results included in the analysis. Inter-laboratory replication is consequently a routine part of model construction and validation. We report an analysis of replicate measurements on 1089 archaeological samples. It is clear that laboratory reproducibility accounts for only part of the observed variation. The type of material dated is also critical to the reproducibility of measurements, with some sample types proving particularly problematic.
Archaeological fieldwork preceding housing development revealed a Mesolithic site in a primary co... more Archaeological fieldwork preceding housing development revealed a Mesolithic site in a primary context. A central hearth was evident from a cluster of calcined flint and bone, the latter producing a modelled date for the start of occupation at 8220–7840 calbcand ending at 7960–7530 calbc(95% probability). The principal activity was the knapping of bladelets, the blanks for microlith production. Impact-damaged microliths indicated the re-tooling of hunting weaponry, while microwear analysis of other tools demonstrated hide working and butchery activity at the site. The lithics can be classified as a Honey Hill assemblage type on the basis of distinctive leaf-shaped microlithic points with inverse basal retouch.Such assemblages have a known concentration in central England and are thought to be temporally intermediate between the conventional British Early and Late Mesolithic periods. The lithic assemblage is compared to other Honey Hill type and related Horsham type assemblages from ...
Versend-Gilencsa 0 km 200 N Longhouses are a key feature of Neolithic Linearbandkeramik (LBK) set... more Versend-Gilencsa 0 km 200 N Longhouses are a key feature of Neolithic Linearbandkeramik (LBK) settlements in Central Europe, but debate persists concerning their usage, longevity and social significance. Excavations at Versend-Gilencsa in southwest Hungary (c. 5200 cal BC) revealed clear rows of longhouses. New radiocarbon dates suggest that these houses experienced short lifespans. This paper produces a model for the chronology of Versend, and it considers the implications of the new date estimates for a fuller understanding of the layout and duration of LBK longhouse settlements.
Radiocarbon dating of unaccompanied skeletons discovered during the excavation of an Iron Age, Ro... more Radiocarbon dating of unaccompanied skeletons discovered during the excavation of an Iron Age, Roman and Saxon settlement at Yarnton, Oxfordshire, unexpectedly revealed the presence of a middle Iron Age cemetery (3rd or 4th century cal BC). British Iron Age burials before the 1st century BC are usually found as individuals, often in pits on settlement sites, or are repersented by disarticulated human bone. This paper explores whether cemeteries were a more common part of Iron Age burial practice than hitherto believed, or whether the Yarnton burials were a highly unusual and localized phenomenon? It highlights the merits of obtaining radiocarbon determinations on otherwise undated burials.
The settlement of Racot 18 in the western Polish lowlands is used as a case study in the investig... more The settlement of Racot 18 in the western Polish lowlands is used as a case study in the investigation of continued development and expansion following initial Neolithic beginnings, and in the formal chronological modeling, in a Bayesian framework, of settlement development. The site belongs to the Late Lengyel Culture of the later 5th millennium CAL B.C., and represents the intake of new land following earlier initial colonization. The formally estimated chronology for the settlement suggests individual house biographies spanned from as little as a generation to over a century; distinctive substantial buildings from late in the sequence may have lasted longest. Racot 18 is compared to its formally modeled context of the later 5th millennium CAL B.C.
La taphonomie le rapport entre le materiel date et la couche dont il provient - est toujours fond... more La taphonomie le rapport entre le materiel date et la couche dont il provient - est toujours fondamentale pour l'utilite et l'interpretation des mesures radiocarbone. L'avenement des modeles mathematiques systematiques, qui interpretent des mesures radiocarbone en meme temps que les chronologies relatives de la stratigraphie, a augmente l'importance de ce rapport. La fragilite du charbon de bois pose un probleme particulier. On discute quelques methodes qu'on peut utiliser pour l'evaluation de la justesse de nos interpretations archeologiques sur la taphonomie des materiaux.
Radiocarbon dating has been rarely used for chronological problems relating to the Anglo-Saxon pe... more Radiocarbon dating has been rarely used for chronological problems relating to the Anglo-Saxon period. The "flatness" of the calibration curve and the resultant wide range in calendrical dates provide little advantage over traditional archaeological dating in this period. Recent advances in Bayesian methodology have, however, created the possibility of refining and checking the established chronologies, based on typology of artifacts, against 14C dates. The calibration process, within such a confined age range, however, relies heavily on the structural accuracy of the calibration curve. We have there- fore re-measured, at decadal intervals, a section of the Irish oak chronology for the period AD 495-725. These measurements have been included in IntCal04.
Mount Sandel has long been an iconic site for the Irish Mesolithic, having produced evidence for ... more Mount Sandel has long been an iconic site for the Irish Mesolithic, having produced evidence for a sequence of occupation huts and pits and the earliest radiocarbon dates for the Mesolithic on the island. This paper presents details of a recent programme of redating whereby the application of Bayesian modelling has confirmed the early date for the site but also helped to refine its internal chronology. The major phase of hut building at Mount Sandel took place within a much shorter period of time than had previously been thought, perhaps only a generation or two. The dating of pits of differing sizes suggests that many of them were created during other slightly later visits to the area. The implications of the dating programme for the place of Mount Sandel in the Irish Mesolithic, and for the chronology of the period and its relations with that on the British mainland, are discussed.
ABSTRACT Bayesian statistics provide a powerful tool that can combine different types of informat... more ABSTRACT Bayesian statistics provide a powerful tool that can combine different types of information about a problem. In archaeology over the past decade they have become routinely applied for estimating chronologies, where relative dating information from stratigraphy is available to complement series of scientific dates (Bayliss and Bronk Ramsey 2004). Over the past few years, the first steps have been taken to apply these powerful techniques to the dating of standing buildings. This paper provides an introduction to the principles of Bayesian statistics for those with a limited background in mathematics. The equations needed to implement Bayes's theorem to problems in the real world are scary; the principles are not. By grappling with the principles readers can start to assess the validity of models presented to them.
High-quality data from appropriate archives are needed for the continuing improvement of radiocar... more High-quality data from appropriate archives are needed for the continuing improvement of radiocarbon calibration curves. We discuss here the basic assumptions behind 14C dating that necessitate calibration and the relative strengths and weaknesses of archives from which calibration data are obtained. We also highlight the procedures, problems, and uncertainties involved in determining atmospheric and surface ocean 14C/12C in these archives, including a discussion of the various methods used to derive an independent absolute timescale and uncertainty. The types of data required for the current IntCal database and calibration curve model are tabulated with examples.
New radiocarbon dates for the Neolithic settlement at Pool on Sanday, Orkney, are interpreted in ... more New radiocarbon dates for the Neolithic settlement at Pool on Sanday, Orkney, are interpreted in a formal chronological framework. Phases 2.2 and 2.3, during which flat-based Grooved Ware pottery with incised decoration developed, have been modelled as probably dating to between the 31st and 28th centuries calbc. There followed a hiatus of a century or so, before the resumption of occupation in Phase 3, which has a different Grooved Ware style featuring the use of applied decoration. This has been modelled as probably dating from the 26th to the 24th centuries calbc. The implications of these results are discussed for the emergence and development of Grooved Ware, and for the trajectory of settlement and monumentality on Sanday.
Warum waren grose Kollektivitaten von Toten ein weitverbreitetes Merkmal im Westeuropa des spaten... more Warum waren grose Kollektivitaten von Toten ein weitverbreitetes Merkmal im Westeuropa des spaten 4. Jahrtausends cal BC? Anhand des Felskammergrabs von Les Mournouards II in der Marneregion im nordlichen Frankreich, in dem die Uberreste von 79 Menschen in zwei kunstlichen Kammern niedergelegt wurden, wird auf diese und weitere Fragen eingegangen. Mittels Bayes’scher Statistik von 29 neu gewonnenen Radiokarbondaten kann die Erbauung des Grabes ins 34. oder 33. Jahrhundert cal BC datiert werden, wobei seine Belegungszeit vielleicht nur 100 Jahre umfasste. Die Ergebnisse deuten an, dass die beiden Kammern zeitgleich benutzt wurden und dass erkennbare Unterschiede zwischen beiden das Resultat ihrer Nutzung durch unterschiedliche soziale Gruppierungen sein konnen, wie es bereits der Ausgraber Andre Leroi-Gourhan annahm. Die wahrscheinlich kurze Lebensdauer dieses Grabes legt die Annahme nahe, dass Gruppen von Hypogaen grundsatzlich die zeitlich aufeinanderfolgende Nutzung von Grabern du...
Variable kinship patterns in Neolithic Anatolia revealed by ancient genomes Highlights d Genetic ... more Variable kinship patterns in Neolithic Anatolia revealed by ancient genomes Highlights d Genetic kinship estimated from co-buried individuals' genomes in Neolithic Anatolia d Close relatives are common among co-burials in As xıklı and Boncuklu d Many unrelated infants found buried in the same building in Ç atalhö yü k and Barcın d Neolithic societies in Southwest Asia may have held diverse concepts of kinship
The Copper Age cemetery in Varna, Bulgaria, is famous for the earliest known, massive deposition ... more The Copper Age cemetery in Varna, Bulgaria, is famous for the earliest known, massive deposition of exquisite golden artefacts. Radiocarbon dating of the Varna i cemetery, excavated in the period 1972–91, places it in the mid-fifth millennium bc and suggests a duration of c 225 years from c 4550 to c 4325 cal bc. Construction work in the adjacent area (2.5 km to the east of Varna i cemetery) in December 2017 led to the discovery of sixteen new graves, whose characteristics are identical to the burials in the cemetery investigated in the last century. This article discusses the AMS dates of ten newly discovered inhumations. The results match well the existing cemetery chronology, showing that the new graves start slightly later and end earlier than Varna i and have a shorter duration of probably no more than a few decades. It is demonstrated for the first time that some areas of burial on the terrace were in continuous use for one or two generations only, suggesting multi-focal depos...
Since 1993 Historic England (and its predecessor English Heritage) has commissioned 9074 radiocar... more Since 1993 Historic England (and its predecessor English Heritage) has commissioned 9074 radiocarbon (14C) measurements on archaeological samples. Over 80% of these have been interpreted within formal Bayesian statistical models. The multiple strands of reinforcing evidence incorporated in these models provide precise chronologies that make stringent demands on the accuracy of the 14C results included in the analysis. Inter-laboratory replication is consequently a routine part of model construction and validation. We report an analysis of replicate measurements on 1089 archaeological samples. It is clear that laboratory reproducibility accounts for only part of the observed variation. The type of material dated is also critical to the reproducibility of measurements, with some sample types proving particularly problematic.
Archaeological fieldwork preceding housing development revealed a Mesolithic site in a primary co... more Archaeological fieldwork preceding housing development revealed a Mesolithic site in a primary context. A central hearth was evident from a cluster of calcined flint and bone, the latter producing a modelled date for the start of occupation at 8220–7840 calbcand ending at 7960–7530 calbc(95% probability). The principal activity was the knapping of bladelets, the blanks for microlith production. Impact-damaged microliths indicated the re-tooling of hunting weaponry, while microwear analysis of other tools demonstrated hide working and butchery activity at the site. The lithics can be classified as a Honey Hill assemblage type on the basis of distinctive leaf-shaped microlithic points with inverse basal retouch.Such assemblages have a known concentration in central England and are thought to be temporally intermediate between the conventional British Early and Late Mesolithic periods. The lithic assemblage is compared to other Honey Hill type and related Horsham type assemblages from ...
Versend-Gilencsa 0 km 200 N Longhouses are a key feature of Neolithic Linearbandkeramik (LBK) set... more Versend-Gilencsa 0 km 200 N Longhouses are a key feature of Neolithic Linearbandkeramik (LBK) settlements in Central Europe, but debate persists concerning their usage, longevity and social significance. Excavations at Versend-Gilencsa in southwest Hungary (c. 5200 cal BC) revealed clear rows of longhouses. New radiocarbon dates suggest that these houses experienced short lifespans. This paper produces a model for the chronology of Versend, and it considers the implications of the new date estimates for a fuller understanding of the layout and duration of LBK longhouse settlements.
Radiocarbon dating of unaccompanied skeletons discovered during the excavation of an Iron Age, Ro... more Radiocarbon dating of unaccompanied skeletons discovered during the excavation of an Iron Age, Roman and Saxon settlement at Yarnton, Oxfordshire, unexpectedly revealed the presence of a middle Iron Age cemetery (3rd or 4th century cal BC). British Iron Age burials before the 1st century BC are usually found as individuals, often in pits on settlement sites, or are repersented by disarticulated human bone. This paper explores whether cemeteries were a more common part of Iron Age burial practice than hitherto believed, or whether the Yarnton burials were a highly unusual and localized phenomenon? It highlights the merits of obtaining radiocarbon determinations on otherwise undated burials.
The settlement of Racot 18 in the western Polish lowlands is used as a case study in the investig... more The settlement of Racot 18 in the western Polish lowlands is used as a case study in the investigation of continued development and expansion following initial Neolithic beginnings, and in the formal chronological modeling, in a Bayesian framework, of settlement development. The site belongs to the Late Lengyel Culture of the later 5th millennium CAL B.C., and represents the intake of new land following earlier initial colonization. The formally estimated chronology for the settlement suggests individual house biographies spanned from as little as a generation to over a century; distinctive substantial buildings from late in the sequence may have lasted longest. Racot 18 is compared to its formally modeled context of the later 5th millennium CAL B.C.
La taphonomie le rapport entre le materiel date et la couche dont il provient - est toujours fond... more La taphonomie le rapport entre le materiel date et la couche dont il provient - est toujours fondamentale pour l'utilite et l'interpretation des mesures radiocarbone. L'avenement des modeles mathematiques systematiques, qui interpretent des mesures radiocarbone en meme temps que les chronologies relatives de la stratigraphie, a augmente l'importance de ce rapport. La fragilite du charbon de bois pose un probleme particulier. On discute quelques methodes qu'on peut utiliser pour l'evaluation de la justesse de nos interpretations archeologiques sur la taphonomie des materiaux.
Radiocarbon dating has been rarely used for chronological problems relating to the Anglo-Saxon pe... more Radiocarbon dating has been rarely used for chronological problems relating to the Anglo-Saxon period. The "flatness" of the calibration curve and the resultant wide range in calendrical dates provide little advantage over traditional archaeological dating in this period. Recent advances in Bayesian methodology have, however, created the possibility of refining and checking the established chronologies, based on typology of artifacts, against 14C dates. The calibration process, within such a confined age range, however, relies heavily on the structural accuracy of the calibration curve. We have there- fore re-measured, at decadal intervals, a section of the Irish oak chronology for the period AD 495-725. These measurements have been included in IntCal04.
Mount Sandel has long been an iconic site for the Irish Mesolithic, having produced evidence for ... more Mount Sandel has long been an iconic site for the Irish Mesolithic, having produced evidence for a sequence of occupation huts and pits and the earliest radiocarbon dates for the Mesolithic on the island. This paper presents details of a recent programme of redating whereby the application of Bayesian modelling has confirmed the early date for the site but also helped to refine its internal chronology. The major phase of hut building at Mount Sandel took place within a much shorter period of time than had previously been thought, perhaps only a generation or two. The dating of pits of differing sizes suggests that many of them were created during other slightly later visits to the area. The implications of the dating programme for the place of Mount Sandel in the Irish Mesolithic, and for the chronology of the period and its relations with that on the British mainland, are discussed.
ABSTRACT Bayesian statistics provide a powerful tool that can combine different types of informat... more ABSTRACT Bayesian statistics provide a powerful tool that can combine different types of information about a problem. In archaeology over the past decade they have become routinely applied for estimating chronologies, where relative dating information from stratigraphy is available to complement series of scientific dates (Bayliss and Bronk Ramsey 2004). Over the past few years, the first steps have been taken to apply these powerful techniques to the dating of standing buildings. This paper provides an introduction to the principles of Bayesian statistics for those with a limited background in mathematics. The equations needed to implement Bayes's theorem to problems in the real world are scary; the principles are not. By grappling with the principles readers can start to assess the validity of models presented to them.
High-quality data from appropriate archives are needed for the continuing improvement of radiocar... more High-quality data from appropriate archives are needed for the continuing improvement of radiocarbon calibration curves. We discuss here the basic assumptions behind 14C dating that necessitate calibration and the relative strengths and weaknesses of archives from which calibration data are obtained. We also highlight the procedures, problems, and uncertainties involved in determining atmospheric and surface ocean 14C/12C in these archives, including a discussion of the various methods used to derive an independent absolute timescale and uncertainty. The types of data required for the current IntCal database and calibration curve model are tabulated with examples.
Uploads
Papers by Alex Bayliss