Zodiacal dating vs radiocarbon dating
Bison carved on a Sperm Whale tooth found in a Spanish Cave (from Corchon-Rodriguez et al., 2008)
It uses the fact that carbon-14 has a half-life of 5730 years, while carbon-13 and carbon-12 are much more stable. Because the carbon content of all living things is practically in equilibrium with carbon in the atmosphere (e.g. in CO2), which has a specific isotopic composition, the isotopic composition of all living things slowly changes once they die.
While animals and plants 'breath' or 'ingest' they are continually renewing the carbon in their bodies. But when they die, this process stops and the carbon-14 content of their bodies slowly decays. The imbalance in these carbon isotopes can be measured accurately, even in very small samples.
However, the isotopic carbon proportions in the atmosphere are not fixed absolutely. They depend on various processes, including the flux of cosmic rays on Earth. Therefore, a radiocarbon calibration curve has to be used to convert a 'raw' radiocarbon age to a 'real' or calibrated age. These calibration curves are created by comparing the radiocarbon ages of samples with the known ages of sediments in which they are found, which can be measured independently by counting lake sediment layers, tree rings, and other formations with annual layers. Wiggle-matching is used to build a radiocarbon chronology from very many samples. The latest radiocarbon calibration curve is IntCal13.
Our new zodiacal dating method has been validated many times, as described in this blog. In a statistical sense, it is proven. It should, therefore, be a useful predictive tool.
Just yesterday, Jamie Woodward, a Professor Physical Geography at the University of Manchester, tweeted about the above Bison symbol carved on a whale tooth. He quoted its age at around 13,400 years, i.e. about 11,400 BC, based on radiocarbon dating.
Now, I knew, based on the zodiacal method of dating, that this date was very likely wrong. Upon checking the original research paper, I found that the date he quoted was an uncalibrated age. Using the latest calibration curve (IntCal13) the tooth's age is actually 13,800 to 14,700 BC (2 sigma). This agrees perfectly with the zodiacal method, for which the Bison represents Capricornus on the summer solstice at this time. Therefore, the date of this tooth should be from 15,000 BC to 13,000 BC.
The conclusion? Be careful with quoting radiocarbon dates. The zodiacal method can tell the difference between uncalibrated and calibrated dates. Moreover, the zodiacal method is now a practical and completely independent dating method for ancient artefacts. It can be used together with radiocarbon dating to create a more accurate date for organic artefacts displaying zodiacal symbols.
Some questions that I made some time ago. Using archaeoastronomy I can date depending on the movement of the sun (Equinox, solstices, etc). But can I date thinking that our ancestors united the stars in the same way so that they geometrically form the same current constellations? Because the bison is capricorn and not other stars joined?
ReplyDeleteThe oldest records indicate that our current constellations will begin to draw approximately 4000 BC.
Thank you
You are quite right that we can't be sure they used the exact same set of stars with lines as we do. However, the 12 zodiacal constellations we use now have been fairly stable for 40,000 years - this is because the 'proper motion' of the zodiacal stars is quite slow. Some of the other constellations, however, are much less stable.
ReplyDeleteWhat our analysis shows is that in the region of the sky where we currently 'see' Capricornus, they saw a similar constellation. And it's the same for all the other zodiacal constellations.