ANT200H5 Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Lithic Flake, Absolute Dating
Document Summary
Each method has its limits and inaccuracies: regarding materials it can date. Multiple dated samples can determine old world artifacts. Relative vs absolute dating *may be short answer q. Relative: free, fast, but unscaled, can be performed in the field, on the spot, generally only used regionally, free of time restrictions. Absolute: expensive, slow, but scaled, cannot be performed in the field except for calendric, can be applied globally except for tree-ring. Objects cannot do cross regional comparison when the framework is different e. g. seriation is not available in another location: except tree rings since it cannot be compared to trees of other places. One approach is not better than the other they provide complementary information since they provide independent means of assessing age. Whenever possible apply together to get more information since absolute is limited to types of material and that which cannot use absolute may use relative.
