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Two hiatuses in human bone radiocarbon dates in Britain (17 000 to 5000 cal BP)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 March 2015

Stella M. Blockley
Stella M. Blockley*
Affiliation:
Department of Archaeological Sciences, University of Bradford, West Yorkshire, BD7 1DP, UK. (Email: s.m.blockley@bradford.ac.uk)
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Abstract

Undertaking a comprehensive review of radiocarbon dates for the 12 000 years preceding the Neolithic in Britain, the author defines two periods when human remains become hard to find. One of these (already noted by Chamberlain) lies between 7-6000 BP; the other, a new addition, runs from 13 850 to 11 000 BP. What could have caused these ‘hiatuses’? Comparison of dated human remains and dated activities associated with humans, with the climatic record from ice cores, shows that the most likely explanation was a change in burial practice, even if this was itself one of a chain of behavioural changes initiated by the rise in sea level.

Keywords

BritainUpper PalaeolithicMesolithicradiocarbon datesclimate changemortuary behaviour

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Type
Research
Information
Antiquity , Volume 79 , Issue 305 , September 2005 , pp. 505 - 513
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 2005

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