1. Species-specific reservoir effect estimates: A case study of archaeological marine samples from the Bering Strait
- Author
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Alison Jt Harris, Maria V. Dobrovolskaya, Kirill Dneprovsky, Jack P. R. Dury, Johannes van der Plicht, Arkady B. Savinetsky, Gunilla Eriksson, Kerstin Lidén, Peter Jordan, Arctic and Antarctic studies, and Isotope Research
- Subjects
010506 paleontology ,Archeology ,ΔR ,Bering Strait ,01 natural sciences ,Marine species ,law.invention ,Reservoir effect ,law ,0601 history and archaeology ,14. Life underwater ,Radiocarbon dating ,reservoir age ,Ekven ,0105 earth and related environmental sciences ,Earth-Surface Processes ,Global and Planetary Change ,060102 archaeology ,Ecology ,marine reservoir effects ,Old Bering Sea Culture ,Paleontology ,06 humanities and the arts ,Oceanography ,radiocarbon ,Geology - Abstract
Due to the marine reservoir effect, radiocarbon dates of marine samples require a correction. Marine reservoir effects, however, may vary among different marine species within a given body of water. Factors such as diet, feeding depth and migratory behaviour all affect the 14C date of a marine organism. Moreover, there is often significant variation within single marine species. Whilst the careful consideration of the Δ R values of a single marine species in a given location is important, so too is the full range of Δ R values within an ecosystem. This paper illustrates this point, using a sample pairing method to estimate the reservoir effects in 17 marine samples, of eight different species, from the archaeological site of Ekven (Eastern Chukotka, Siberia). An OxCal model is used to assess the strength of these estimates. The marine reservoir effects of samples passing the model range from Δ R (Marine20) = 136 ± 41–Δ R = 460 ± 40. Marine reservoir effect estimates of these samples and other published samples are used to explore variability in the wider Bering Strait region. The archaeological implications of this variability are also discussed. The calibrating of 14C dates from human bone collagen, for example, could be improved by applying a dietary relevant marine reservoir effect correction. For humans from the site of Ekven, a Δ R (Marine20) correction of 289 ± 124 years or reservoir age correction of 842 ± 123 years is suggested.
- Published
- 2021