Stewart J Fallon
Biographic Data
| ID | 4129293 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Stewart J Fallon |
| GIVEN NAMES | Stewart J |
| FAMILY NAME | Fallon |
| SIGNATURE | FALLON S J |
| AFFILIATIONS | Australian National University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-8064-5903 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 27 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 249 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 27 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2009 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
Rapid minimally invasive subsurface archaeological site prospection on Roti Island, Indonesia
Methodological tests using Amazonian soil samples for 14 C-AMS dating
Although radiocarbon-accelerator mass spectrometry ( 14 C-AMS) is an important tool for the establishment of soil chronology, its application is challenging due to the complex nature of soil samples. In the present study, chemical extraction methodologies were tested to obtain the most representative age of Amazonian soil deposition by 14 C-AMS. We performed acid hydrolysis with different numbers of extractions, as well as treatments combining ac…
The Size Inherited Age Effect on Radiocarbon Dates of Alluvial Deposits: Redating Charcoal Fragments in a Sand-Bed Stream, Macdonald River, Nsw, Australia
Radiocarbon dates on charred plant remains are often used to define the chronology of archives such as lake cores and fluvial sequences. However, charcoal is often older than its depositional context because old-wood can be burnt and a range of transport and storage stages exist between the woodland and stream or lake bed (“inherited age”). In 1978, Blong and Gillespie dated four size fractions of charcoal found floating or saltating in the Macdo…
Inherited age of floating charcoal fragments in a sand-bed stream, Macdonald River, NSW, Australia: Implications for radiocarbon dating of sediments
Radiocarbon dates on multiple individual charcoal fragments floating together down the Macdonald River, New South Wales, Australia, have calibrated ages spanning >1700 years. Partial explanations of this range of inherited ages can be attributed to the inbuilt age of living biomass, charcoalisation conditions, hillslope transport and storage and/or valley floor (fluvial) transport and storage, but the contribution of each of these components can …
Assessing the 14 C Marine Reservoir Effect in Archaeological Contexts: Data From the Cabeçuda Shell Mound in Southern Brazil
Prehistoric shell mounds can be useful for the quantification of the radiocarbon marine reservoir effect (MRE) and, at the same time, knowledge about the MRE allows for the establishment of robust chronologies for these sites. This creates a loop in which the archaeological setting has a dual role: it is part of both the method and the application. Therefore, it is paramount to address these sites from both archaeological and environmental perspe…
Sample Preparation Methods Used at the Australian National University Radiocarbon Facility
The Single Stage AMS radiocarbon facility at the Australian National University has operated for the past 14 years. This paper presents the pretreatment methods used for the major sample types dated and reflects on whether quality assurance protocols can adequately detect altered materials. The majority of fossil samples dated by the facility are from tropical and arid environments where diagenesis of both organic samples and carbonates is often …
Do Weak or Strong Acids Remove Carbonate Contamination From Ancient Tooth Enamel More Effectively? The Effect of Acid Pretreatment on Radiocarbon and Δ 13 C Analyses
In hot environments, collagen, which is normally targeted when radiocarbon ( 14 C) dating bone, rapidly degrades. With little other skeletal material suitable for 14 C dating, it can be impossible to obtain dates directly on skeletal materials. A small amount of carbonate occurs in hydroxyapatite, the mineral phase of bone and tooth enamel, and has been used as an alternative to collagen. Unfortunately, the mineral phase is often heavily contamin…
Surface Ocean Radiocarbon From a Porites Coral Record in the Great Barrier Reef: 1945–2017
We present a high-resolution seawater radiocarbon (Δ 14 C) record from a Porites coral collected from Masthead Island in the southern Great Barrier Reef (GBR) covering the years 1945–2017. The Δ 14 C values from 1945–1953 (pre-bomb era) averaged –49‰. As a result of bomb-produced 14 C in the atmosphere, Δ 14 C values started to rise rapidly from 1959, levelled off at ∼131‰ in the late 1970s and gradually decreased to ∼40.3‰ by 2017 due to the dec…
Historical droughts in Southeast Australia recorded in a New South Wales stalagmite
The Murray Darling Basin contains 40% of Australia’s farms and is subject to multi-year droughts that put severe pressure on southeast Australia’s freshwater resources. Yet the long-term frequency, timing and potential severity of these droughts is unknown, as there are few high-resolution paleoclimate records from the basin that extend past the instrumental era. In this study, we investigate the potential of stalagmites from Careys Cave, Wee Jas…
Late Holocene coastal land-use, site formation and site survival: Insights from five middens at Cape Leveque and Lombadina, Dampier Peninsula, Kimberley, Australia
This paper introduces primary data on site contents, chronology and stratigraphy for four subsurface middens, which formed through the late Holocene on the Dampier Peninsula. Data from one surface midden collection are also presented. In this monsoonal coastal locality, variations in dune stability and sand flux are critical to archaeological site formation and preservation. Site specific factors determining sand sequestration into topsoils inter…
Who's been using my burial mound? Radiocarbon dating and isotopic tracing of human diet and mobility at the collective burial site, Le Tumulus des Sables, southwest France
Evaluating the Radiocarbon Reservoir Effect in Lake Kutubu, Papua New Guinea
We examined the radiocarbon ( 14 C) reservoir effect in Lake Kutubu using tephrochronology and terrestrial plant material to deliver a precise age-depth profile and sedimentation rates for this lake. Based on the presence of two tephra horizons (Tibito and Olgaboli), we found a reservoir age offset in sediments of between 1490 and 2280 14 C yr using the sediment ages derived from the lead-210 ( 210 Pb) dating method. The live submerged biological…
Significance and timing of the mid-17th-century eruption of Long Island, Papua New Guinea
Tibito Tephra was first recorded in the central highlands of Papua New Guinea (PNG) in 1971. By the late 1970s, the tephra had been mapped across tens of thousands of square kilometres, traced to its source on Long Island in the Bismarck Sea, and linked to pyroclastic density currents in the Matapun Beds on the island. With a tephra fall volume >10 km 3 , this eruption was clearly one of the 10 largest globally in the past 600 years. Although alm…
Updated Methods to Age the Australian Lungfish: Reply to Kemp (2015)
Kemp’s comments in this issue (Kemp 2015) have raised several issues regarding dating Australian lungfish (Neoceratodus forsteri) using bomb radiocarbon in their scales (James et al. 2010). The James et al. (2010) publication represented a pilot study in which the feasibility of using bomb 14C in lungfish scales could provide an age for an individual fish. Kemp’s first issue relates to nomenclature regarding the different parts of the scale. This…
New 14C dates for Spring Creek and Mowbray Swamp megafauna: XAD‐2 processing
Bones from extinct Australian marsupials found at Spring Creek, Victoria, and in the Mowbray Swamp, Tasmania, have yielded scattered and anomalously young radiocarbon ages measured on collagen, gelatin or ultrafiltered gelatin. We resampled previously dated material from those two sites and from Mt Cripps, Tasmania, as well as a control sample from Zaglik, Russia, to compare chronologies based on XAD‐2 purified total amino acid fractions and coll…
New evidence of late survival of beaver in Britain
We describe new radiocarbon-dated evidence for the late survival of beavers from an upland site in northern England. A wood specimen with beaver gnaw marks was recovered from the bank of the Scaup Burn in Kielder Forest in Northumberland. The marks were analysed, the tree species were identified and the sample was radiocarbon dated to between 1269 and 1396. Other wood remains in the same context suggest a most likely dating between 1330 and 1390.…
The chronology of the earliest Upper Palaeolithic in northern Iberia: New insights from L'Arbreda, Labeko Koba and La Viña
Radiocarbon dates for coastal midden sites at Long Point in the Coorong, South Australia
This paper presents 29 radiocarbon dates from eight surface concentrations of shell and 10 test-pits across four shell middens at Long Point in the Coorong, South Australia. Results indicate that occupation of these sites was confined to the late Holocene period, post-2500 cal. BP. With the exception of one midden, which appears not to have been used after 500–300 cal. BP, all other sites suggest continued use until the recent past. This pattern …
Radiocarbon analysis of halophilic microbial lipids from an Australian salt lake
Assigning accurate dates to hypersaline sediments opens important terrestrial records of local and regional paleoecologies and paleoclimatology. However, as of yet no conventional method of dating hypersaline systems has been widely adopted. Biomarker, mineralogical, and radiocarbon analyses of sediments and organic extracts from a shallow (13 cm) core from a hypersaline playa, Lake Tyrrell, southeastern Australia, produce a coherent age-depth cu…
Radiocarbon Dates from Jar and Coffin Burials of the Cardamom Mountains Reveal a Unique Mortuary Ritual in Cambodia's Late- to Post-Angkor Period (15th–17th Centuries AD)
We present the first radiocarbon dates from previously unrecorded, secondary burials in the Cardamom Mountains, Cambodia. The mortuary ritual incorporates nautical tradeware ceramic jars and log coffins fashioned from locally harvested trees as burial containers, which were set out on exposed rock ledges at 10 sites in the eastern Cardamom Massif. The suite of 28 14 C ages from 4 of these sites (Khnorng Sroal, Phnom Pel, Damnak Samdech, and Khnan…
New radiocarbon ages for the Lower Murray River, South Australia
This paper presents the initial radiocarbon ages from the Lower Murray Archaeological Project developed in conjunction with the Ngarrindjeri Heritage Committee in South Australia. As part of this community based research program, a total of 59 shell (V. ambiguus) and charcoal samples were selected for radiocarbon dating. Radiocarbon ages varied significantly between sites within the region and ranged from 150–490 calBP at Pomberuk (Hume Reserve M…
Uranium-series age estimates for rock art in southwest China
The next chapter in radiocarbon dating at the Australian National University: Status report on the single stage AMS
A Minimum Age For Early Depictions Of Southeast Asian Praus in the Rock Art of Arnhem Land, Northern Territory
In 2008, we began two related research projects that focus on recent Australian rock art, made after the arrival of Asians and Europeans, in part of northwest Arnhem Land’s Wellington Range. This area has extensive and diverse rock art, including many examples of paintings that reflect contact between local Aboriginal people and visitors to their shores. At some sites figures made of beeswax are found superimposed under and over paintings, thus p…
Pre-Bomb Marine Reservoir Variability in the Kimberley Region, Western Australia
New ΔR values are presented for 10 known-age shells from the Kimberley region of northwest Australia. Previous estimates of ΔR for the Kimberley region are based on only 6 individual shell specimens with dates of live collection known only to within 50 yr (Bowman 1985a). Here, we describe the results of our recent attempts to constrain ΔR variability for this region by dating a suite of known-age pre-AD 1950 shell samples from the Australian Muse…
The chronology of the earliest Upper Palaeolithic in northern Iberia: New insights from L'Arbreda, Labeko Koba and La Viña
A Minimum Age For Early Depictions Of Southeast Asian Praus in the Rock Art of Arnhem Land, Northern Territory
In 2008, we began two related research projects that focus on recent Australian rock art, made after the arrival of Asians and Europeans, in part of northwest Arnhem Land’s Wellington Range. This area has extensive and diverse rock art, including many examples of paintings that reflect contact between local Aboriginal people and visitors to their shores. At some sites figures made of beeswax are found superimposed under and over paintings, thus p…
Radiocarbon Dates from Jar and Coffin Burials of the Cardamom Mountains Reveal a Unique Mortuary Ritual in Cambodia's Late- to Post-Angkor Period (15th–17th Centuries AD)
We present the first radiocarbon dates from previously unrecorded, secondary burials in the Cardamom Mountains, Cambodia. The mortuary ritual incorporates nautical tradeware ceramic jars and log coffins fashioned from locally harvested trees as burial containers, which were set out on exposed rock ledges at 10 sites in the eastern Cardamom Massif. The suite of 28 14 C ages from 4 of these sites (Khnorng Sroal, Phnom Pel, Damnak Samdech, and Khnan…
Uranium-series age estimates for rock art in southwest China
New radiocarbon ages for the Lower Murray River, South Australia
This paper presents the initial radiocarbon ages from the Lower Murray Archaeological Project developed in conjunction with the Ngarrindjeri Heritage Committee in South Australia. As part of this community based research program, a total of 59 shell (V. ambiguus) and charcoal samples were selected for radiocarbon dating. Radiocarbon ages varied significantly between sites within the region and ranged from 150–490 calBP at Pomberuk (Hume Reserve M…
Sample Preparation Methods Used at the Australian National University Radiocarbon Facility
The Single Stage AMS radiocarbon facility at the Australian National University has operated for the past 14 years. This paper presents the pretreatment methods used for the major sample types dated and reflects on whether quality assurance protocols can adequately detect altered materials. The majority of fossil samples dated by the facility are from tropical and arid environments where diagenesis of both organic samples and carbonates is often …
Surface Ocean Radiocarbon From a Porites Coral Record in the Great Barrier Reef: 1945–2017
We present a high-resolution seawater radiocarbon (Δ 14 C) record from a Porites coral collected from Masthead Island in the southern Great Barrier Reef (GBR) covering the years 1945–2017. The Δ 14 C values from 1945–1953 (pre-bomb era) averaged –49‰. As a result of bomb-produced 14 C in the atmosphere, Δ 14 C values started to rise rapidly from 1959, levelled off at ∼131‰ in the late 1970s and gradually decreased to ∼40.3‰ by 2017 due to the dec…
Evaluating the Radiocarbon Reservoir Effect in Lake Kutubu, Papua New Guinea
We examined the radiocarbon ( 14 C) reservoir effect in Lake Kutubu using tephrochronology and terrestrial plant material to deliver a precise age-depth profile and sedimentation rates for this lake. Based on the presence of two tephra horizons (Tibito and Olgaboli), we found a reservoir age offset in sediments of between 1490 and 2280 14 C yr using the sediment ages derived from the lead-210 ( 210 Pb) dating method. The live submerged biological…
New 14C dates for Spring Creek and Mowbray Swamp megafauna: XAD‐2 processing
Bones from extinct Australian marsupials found at Spring Creek, Victoria, and in the Mowbray Swamp, Tasmania, have yielded scattered and anomalously young radiocarbon ages measured on collagen, gelatin or ultrafiltered gelatin. We resampled previously dated material from those two sites and from Mt Cripps, Tasmania, as well as a control sample from Zaglik, Russia, to compare chronologies based on XAD‐2 purified total amino acid fractions and coll…
Pre-Bomb Marine Reservoir Variability in the Kimberley Region, Western Australia
New ΔR values are presented for 10 known-age shells from the Kimberley region of northwest Australia. Previous estimates of ΔR for the Kimberley region are based on only 6 individual shell specimens with dates of live collection known only to within 50 yr (Bowman 1985a). Here, we describe the results of our recent attempts to constrain ΔR variability for this region by dating a suite of known-age pre-AD 1950 shell samples from the Australian Muse…
Late Holocene coastal land-use, site formation and site survival: Insights from five middens at Cape Leveque and Lombadina, Dampier Peninsula, Kimberley, Australia
This paper introduces primary data on site contents, chronology and stratigraphy for four subsurface middens, which formed through the late Holocene on the Dampier Peninsula. Data from one surface midden collection are also presented. In this monsoonal coastal locality, variations in dune stability and sand flux are critical to archaeological site formation and preservation. Site specific factors determining sand sequestration into topsoils inter…
Gledswood Shelter 1: Initial Radiocarbon Dates from a Pleistocene Aged Rockshelter Site in Northwest Queensland
In 2002, a research programme was initiated in collaboration with the Woolgar Valley Aboriginal Corporation to investigate the long-term chronology and nature of regional occupation of the northwest savannah corridor, beyond local refugia. Subsequent surveys identified more than 100 sites among the sandstone escarpments in the foothills of the Gregory Ranges (Wallis et al. 2004). However, owing to the specific site formation processes operating l…
Do Weak or Strong Acids Remove Carbonate Contamination From Ancient Tooth Enamel More Effectively? The Effect of Acid Pretreatment on Radiocarbon and Δ 13 C Analyses
In hot environments, collagen, which is normally targeted when radiocarbon ( 14 C) dating bone, rapidly degrades. With little other skeletal material suitable for 14 C dating, it can be impossible to obtain dates directly on skeletal materials. A small amount of carbonate occurs in hydroxyapatite, the mineral phase of bone and tooth enamel, and has been used as an alternative to collagen. Unfortunately, the mineral phase is often heavily contamin…
Significance and timing of the mid-17th-century eruption of Long Island, Papua New Guinea
Tibito Tephra was first recorded in the central highlands of Papua New Guinea (PNG) in 1971. By the late 1970s, the tephra had been mapped across tens of thousands of square kilometres, traced to its source on Long Island in the Bismarck Sea, and linked to pyroclastic density currents in the Matapun Beds on the island. With a tephra fall volume >10 km 3 , this eruption was clearly one of the 10 largest globally in the past 600 years. Although alm…
The Size Inherited Age Effect on Radiocarbon Dates of Alluvial Deposits: Redating Charcoal Fragments in a Sand-Bed Stream, Macdonald River, Nsw, Australia
Radiocarbon dates on charred plant remains are often used to define the chronology of archives such as lake cores and fluvial sequences. However, charcoal is often older than its depositional context because old-wood can be burnt and a range of transport and storage stages exist between the woodland and stream or lake bed (“inherited age”). In 1978, Blong and Gillespie dated four size fractions of charcoal found floating or saltating in the Macdo…
Inherited age of floating charcoal fragments in a sand-bed stream, Macdonald River, NSW, Australia: Implications for radiocarbon dating of sediments
Radiocarbon dates on multiple individual charcoal fragments floating together down the Macdonald River, New South Wales, Australia, have calibrated ages spanning >1700 years. Partial explanations of this range of inherited ages can be attributed to the inbuilt age of living biomass, charcoalisation conditions, hillslope transport and storage and/or valley floor (fluvial) transport and storage, but the contribution of each of these components can …
Assessing the 14 C Marine Reservoir Effect in Archaeological Contexts: Data From the Cabeçuda Shell Mound in Southern Brazil
Prehistoric shell mounds can be useful for the quantification of the radiocarbon marine reservoir effect (MRE) and, at the same time, knowledge about the MRE allows for the establishment of robust chronologies for these sites. This creates a loop in which the archaeological setting has a dual role: it is part of both the method and the application. Therefore, it is paramount to address these sites from both archaeological and environmental perspe…
Historical droughts in Southeast Australia recorded in a New South Wales stalagmite
The Murray Darling Basin contains 40% of Australia’s farms and is subject to multi-year droughts that put severe pressure on southeast Australia’s freshwater resources. Yet the long-term frequency, timing and potential severity of these droughts is unknown, as there are few high-resolution paleoclimate records from the basin that extend past the instrumental era. In this study, we investigate the potential of stalagmites from Careys Cave, Wee Jas…
Who's been using my burial mound? Radiocarbon dating and isotopic tracing of human diet and mobility at the collective burial site, Le Tumulus des Sables, southwest France
Updated Methods to Age the Australian Lungfish: Reply to Kemp (2015)
Kemp’s comments in this issue (Kemp 2015) have raised several issues regarding dating Australian lungfish (Neoceratodus forsteri) using bomb radiocarbon in their scales (James et al. 2010). The James et al. (2010) publication represented a pilot study in which the feasibility of using bomb 14C in lungfish scales could provide an age for an individual fish. Kemp’s first issue relates to nomenclature regarding the different parts of the scale. This…
New evidence of late survival of beaver in Britain
We describe new radiocarbon-dated evidence for the late survival of beavers from an upland site in northern England. A wood specimen with beaver gnaw marks was recovered from the bank of the Scaup Burn in Kielder Forest in Northumberland. The marks were analysed, the tree species were identified and the sample was radiocarbon dated to between 1269 and 1396. Other wood remains in the same context suggest a most likely dating between 1330 and 1390.…
Assessing the Potential for Radiocarbon Dating the Scales of Australian Lungfish ( Neoceratodus Forsteri )
We present a novel application for radiocarbon dating by aging 4 scales from a single large adult lungfish ( Neoceratodus forsteri ) from the Burnett River, in Queensland, Australia. The relict fish species lack a solid crystalline otolith, which precludes the use of the otolith annuli as a reliable age indicator. Previous attempts to age lungfish using a number of techniques have had only limited success. We report on ages obtained from the dens…
Gledswood Shelter 1: Initial Radiocarbon Dates from a Pleistocene Aged Rockshelter Site in Northwest Queensland
In 2002, a research programme was initiated in collaboration with the Woolgar Valley Aboriginal Corporation to investigate the long-term chronology and nature of regional occupation of the northwest savannah corridor, beyond local refugia. Subsequent surveys identified more than 100 sites among the sandstone escarpments in the foothills of the Gregory Ranges (Wallis et al. 2004). However, owing to the specific site formation processes operating l…
The next chapter in radiocarbon dating at the Australian National University: Status report on the single stage AMS
A Minimum Age For Early Depictions Of Southeast Asian Praus in the Rock Art of Arnhem Land, Northern Territory
In 2008, we began two related research projects that focus on recent Australian rock art, made after the arrival of Asians and Europeans, in part of northwest Arnhem Land’s Wellington Range. This area has extensive and diverse rock art, including many examples of paintings that reflect contact between local Aboriginal people and visitors to their shores. At some sites figures made of beeswax are found superimposed under and over paintings, thus p…
Pre-Bomb Marine Reservoir Variability in the Kimberley Region, Western Australia
New ΔR values are presented for 10 known-age shells from the Kimberley region of northwest Australia. Previous estimates of ΔR for the Kimberley region are based on only 6 individual shell specimens with dates of live collection known only to within 50 yr (Bowman 1985a). Here, we describe the results of our recent attempts to constrain ΔR variability for this region by dating a suite of known-age pre-AD 1950 shell samples from the Australian Muse…
Assessing the Potential for Radiocarbon Dating the Scales of Australian Lungfish ( Neoceratodus Forsteri )
We present a novel application for radiocarbon dating by aging 4 scales from a single large adult lungfish ( Neoceratodus forsteri ) from the Burnett River, in Queensland, Australia. The relict fish species lack a solid crystalline otolith, which precludes the use of the otolith annuli as a reliable age indicator. Previous attempts to age lungfish using a number of techniques have had only limited success. We report on ages obtained from the dens…
Uranium-series age estimates for rock art in southwest China
Radiocarbon analysis of halophilic microbial lipids from an Australian salt lake
Assigning accurate dates to hypersaline sediments opens important terrestrial records of local and regional paleoecologies and paleoclimatology. However, as of yet no conventional method of dating hypersaline systems has been widely adopted. Biomarker, mineralogical, and radiocarbon analyses of sediments and organic extracts from a shallow (13 cm) core from a hypersaline playa, Lake Tyrrell, southeastern Australia, produce a coherent age-depth cu…
Radiocarbon Dates from Jar and Coffin Burials of the Cardamom Mountains Reveal a Unique Mortuary Ritual in Cambodia's Late- to Post-Angkor Period (15th–17th Centuries AD)
We present the first radiocarbon dates from previously unrecorded, secondary burials in the Cardamom Mountains, Cambodia. The mortuary ritual incorporates nautical tradeware ceramic jars and log coffins fashioned from locally harvested trees as burial containers, which were set out on exposed rock ledges at 10 sites in the eastern Cardamom Massif. The suite of 28 14 C ages from 4 of these sites (Khnorng Sroal, Phnom Pel, Damnak Samdech, and Khnan…
New radiocarbon ages for the Lower Murray River, South Australia
This paper presents the initial radiocarbon ages from the Lower Murray Archaeological Project developed in conjunction with the Ngarrindjeri Heritage Committee in South Australia. As part of this community based research program, a total of 59 shell (V. ambiguus) and charcoal samples were selected for radiocarbon dating. Radiocarbon ages varied significantly between sites within the region and ranged from 150–490 calBP at Pomberuk (Hume Reserve M…
Radiocarbon dates for coastal midden sites at Long Point in the Coorong, South Australia
This paper presents 29 radiocarbon dates from eight surface concentrations of shell and 10 test-pits across four shell middens at Long Point in the Coorong, South Australia. Results indicate that occupation of these sites was confined to the late Holocene period, post-2500 cal. BP. With the exception of one midden, which appears not to have been used after 500–300 cal. BP, all other sites suggest continued use until the recent past. This pattern …
New evidence of late survival of beaver in Britain
We describe new radiocarbon-dated evidence for the late survival of beavers from an upland site in northern England. A wood specimen with beaver gnaw marks was recovered from the bank of the Scaup Burn in Kielder Forest in Northumberland. The marks were analysed, the tree species were identified and the sample was radiocarbon dated to between 1269 and 1396. Other wood remains in the same context suggest a most likely dating between 1330 and 1390.…
The chronology of the earliest Upper Palaeolithic in northern Iberia: New insights from L'Arbreda, Labeko Koba and La Viña
Updated Methods to Age the Australian Lungfish: Reply to Kemp (2015)
Kemp’s comments in this issue (Kemp 2015) have raised several issues regarding dating Australian lungfish (Neoceratodus forsteri) using bomb radiocarbon in their scales (James et al. 2010). The James et al. (2010) publication represented a pilot study in which the feasibility of using bomb 14C in lungfish scales could provide an age for an individual fish. Kemp’s first issue relates to nomenclature regarding the different parts of the scale. This…
New 14C dates for Spring Creek and Mowbray Swamp megafauna: XAD‐2 processing
Bones from extinct Australian marsupials found at Spring Creek, Victoria, and in the Mowbray Swamp, Tasmania, have yielded scattered and anomalously young radiocarbon ages measured on collagen, gelatin or ultrafiltered gelatin. We resampled previously dated material from those two sites and from Mt Cripps, Tasmania, as well as a control sample from Zaglik, Russia, to compare chronologies based on XAD‐2 purified total amino acid fractions and coll…
Significance and timing of the mid-17th-century eruption of Long Island, Papua New Guinea
Tibito Tephra was first recorded in the central highlands of Papua New Guinea (PNG) in 1971. By the late 1970s, the tephra had been mapped across tens of thousands of square kilometres, traced to its source on Long Island in the Bismarck Sea, and linked to pyroclastic density currents in the Matapun Beds on the island. With a tephra fall volume >10 km 3 , this eruption was clearly one of the 10 largest globally in the past 600 years. Although alm…
Who's been using my burial mound? Radiocarbon dating and isotopic tracing of human diet and mobility at the collective burial site, Le Tumulus des Sables, southwest France
Evaluating the Radiocarbon Reservoir Effect in Lake Kutubu, Papua New Guinea
We examined the radiocarbon ( 14 C) reservoir effect in Lake Kutubu using tephrochronology and terrestrial plant material to deliver a precise age-depth profile and sedimentation rates for this lake. Based on the presence of two tephra horizons (Tibito and Olgaboli), we found a reservoir age offset in sediments of between 1490 and 2280 14 C yr using the sediment ages derived from the lead-210 ( 210 Pb) dating method. The live submerged biological…
Historical droughts in Southeast Australia recorded in a New South Wales stalagmite
The Murray Darling Basin contains 40% of Australia’s farms and is subject to multi-year droughts that put severe pressure on southeast Australia’s freshwater resources. Yet the long-term frequency, timing and potential severity of these droughts is unknown, as there are few high-resolution paleoclimate records from the basin that extend past the instrumental era. In this study, we investigate the potential of stalagmites from Careys Cave, Wee Jas…
Late Holocene coastal land-use, site formation and site survival: Insights from five middens at Cape Leveque and Lombadina, Dampier Peninsula, Kimberley, Australia
This paper introduces primary data on site contents, chronology and stratigraphy for four subsurface middens, which formed through the late Holocene on the Dampier Peninsula. Data from one surface midden collection are also presented. In this monsoonal coastal locality, variations in dune stability and sand flux are critical to archaeological site formation and preservation. Site specific factors determining sand sequestration into topsoils inter…
Do Weak or Strong Acids Remove Carbonate Contamination From Ancient Tooth Enamel More Effectively? The Effect of Acid Pretreatment on Radiocarbon and Δ 13 C Analyses
In hot environments, collagen, which is normally targeted when radiocarbon ( 14 C) dating bone, rapidly degrades. With little other skeletal material suitable for 14 C dating, it can be impossible to obtain dates directly on skeletal materials. A small amount of carbonate occurs in hydroxyapatite, the mineral phase of bone and tooth enamel, and has been used as an alternative to collagen. Unfortunately, the mineral phase is often heavily contamin…
Surface Ocean Radiocarbon From a Porites Coral Record in the Great Barrier Reef: 1945–2017
We present a high-resolution seawater radiocarbon (Δ 14 C) record from a Porites coral collected from Masthead Island in the southern Great Barrier Reef (GBR) covering the years 1945–2017. The Δ 14 C values from 1945–1953 (pre-bomb era) averaged –49‰. As a result of bomb-produced 14 C in the atmosphere, Δ 14 C values started to rise rapidly from 1959, levelled off at ∼131‰ in the late 1970s and gradually decreased to ∼40.3‰ by 2017 due to the dec…
Inherited age of floating charcoal fragments in a sand-bed stream, Macdonald River, NSW, Australia: Implications for radiocarbon dating of sediments
Radiocarbon dates on multiple individual charcoal fragments floating together down the Macdonald River, New South Wales, Australia, have calibrated ages spanning >1700 years. Partial explanations of this range of inherited ages can be attributed to the inbuilt age of living biomass, charcoalisation conditions, hillslope transport and storage and/or valley floor (fluvial) transport and storage, but the contribution of each of these components can …
Assessing the 14 C Marine Reservoir Effect in Archaeological Contexts: Data From the Cabeçuda Shell Mound in Southern Brazil
Prehistoric shell mounds can be useful for the quantification of the radiocarbon marine reservoir effect (MRE) and, at the same time, knowledge about the MRE allows for the establishment of robust chronologies for these sites. This creates a loop in which the archaeological setting has a dual role: it is part of both the method and the application. Therefore, it is paramount to address these sites from both archaeological and environmental perspe…
Sample Preparation Methods Used at the Australian National University Radiocarbon Facility
The Single Stage AMS radiocarbon facility at the Australian National University has operated for the past 14 years. This paper presents the pretreatment methods used for the major sample types dated and reflects on whether quality assurance protocols can adequately detect altered materials. The majority of fossil samples dated by the facility are from tropical and arid environments where diagenesis of both organic samples and carbonates is often …
The Size Inherited Age Effect on Radiocarbon Dates of Alluvial Deposits: Redating Charcoal Fragments in a Sand-Bed Stream, Macdonald River, Nsw, Australia
Radiocarbon dates on charred plant remains are often used to define the chronology of archives such as lake cores and fluvial sequences. However, charcoal is often older than its depositional context because old-wood can be burnt and a range of transport and storage stages exist between the woodland and stream or lake bed (“inherited age”). In 1978, Blong and Gillespie dated four size fractions of charcoal found floating or saltating in the Macdo…
Geography (23 works) · Radiocarbon dating (23 works) · Geology (22 works) · Archaeology (21 works) · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies (16 works) · Paleontology (12 works) · Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology (12 works) · Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies (9 works) · Geology and Paleoclimatology Research (8 works) · Physical geography (7 works)