Archaeological Dating Table of Contents | Part 1: Stratigraphy and Seriation | Part 2: Chronological Markers and Dendrochronology | Part 3: The Radiocarbon RevolutionAbsolute dating, the ability to attach a specific chronological date to an object or collection of objects, was a breakthrough for archaeologists. Until the 20th century, with its multiple developments, only relative dates could be determined with any confidence. Since the turn of the century, several methods to measure elapsed time have been discovered.
Chronological Markers
The first and simplest method of absolute dating is using objects with dates inscribed on them, such as coins, or objects associated with historical events or documents. For example, since each Roman emperor had his own face stamped on coins during his realm, and dates for emperor's realms are known from historical records, the date a coin was minted may be discerned by identifying the emperor depicted. Many of the first efforts of archaeology grew out of historical documents--for example, Schliemann looked for Homer's Troy, and Layard went after the Biblical Ninevah--and within the context of a particular site, an object clearly associated with the site and stamped with a date or other identifying clue was perfectly useful.
But there are certainly drawbacks. Outside of the context of a single site or society, a coin's date is useless. And, outside of certain periods in our past, there simply were no chronologically dated objects, or the necessary depth and detail of history that would assist in chronologically dating civilizations. Without those, the archaeologists were in the dark as to the age of various societies. Until the invention of dendrochronology.
Dendrochronology
The use of tree ring data to determine chronological dates, dendrochronology, was first developed in the American southwest by astronomer Andrew Ellicott Douglass. In 1901, Douglass began investigating tree ring growth as an indicator of solar cycles. Douglass believed that solar flares affected climate, and hence the amount of growth a tree might gain in a given year. His research culminated in proving that tree ring width varies with annual rainfall. Not only that, it varies regionally, such that all trees within a specific species and region will show the same relative growth during wet years and dry years. Each tree then, contains a record of rainfall for the length of its life, expressed in density, trace element content, stable isotope composition, and intra-annual growth ring width.
Using local pine trees, Douglass built a 450 year record of the tree ring variability. Clark Wissler, an anthropologist researching Native American groups in the Southwest, recognized the potential for such dating, and brought Douglass subfossil wood from puebloan ruins.
Unfortunately, the wood from the pueblos did not fit into Douglass's record, and over the next 12 years, they searched in vain for a connecting ring pattern, building a second prehistoric sequence of 585 years. In 1929, they found a charred log near Show Low, Arizona, that connected the two patterns. It was now possible to assign a calendar date to archaeological sites in the American southwest for over 1000 years.
Determining calendar rates using dendrochronology is a matter of matching known patterns of light and dark rings to those recorded by Douglass and his successors. Dendrochronology has been extended in the American southwest to 322 BC, by adding increasingly older archaeological samples to the record. There are dendrochronological records for Europe and the Aegean, and the International Tree Ring Database has contributions from 21 different countries.
The main drawback to dendrochronology is its reliance on the existence of relatively long-lived vegetation with annual growth rings. Secondly, annual rainfall is a regional climatic event, and so tree ring dates for the southwest are of no use in other regions of the world.
See the glossary entry for Dendrochronology for more information and a bibliography.
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