Absolute dating in anthropology refers to scientific methods used to determine the actual age of artifacts, fossils, or archaeological sites in years, rather than just placing them in relative order. It provides a chronological framework for human evolution and cultural development.

🕰 What Is Absolute Dating?

• Definition: A set of techniques that assign a calendar age or numerical estimate to materials.
• Contrast with Relative Dating: Relative dating (e.g., stratigraphy) only tells whether something is older or younger compared to another item, while absolute dating gives a specific time range.

🔑 Major Methods in Anthropology

• Radiocarbon Dating (C-14)
  • Measures decay of carbon-14 in organic materials (wood, bone, shell).
  • Effective up to ~50,000 years.
• Potassium-Argon (K-Ar) Dating
  • Used for volcanic rocks and ash layers.
  • Effective for sites older than 100,000 years.
• Uranium-Series Dating
  • Applied to calcium carbonate materials (cave deposits, corals).
  • Useful for dating hominin fossils in caves.
• Thermoluminescence (TL)
  • Measures trapped electrons in ceramics, burnt stone, or sediments.
  • Dates last heating event.
• Optically Stimulated Luminescence (OSL)
  • Determines when quartz or feldspar grains were last exposed to sunlight.
• Dendrochronology (Tree-Ring Dating)
  • Provides precise annual dates for wooden artifacts or structures.

🌍 Anthropological Applications

• Human Evolution: Dating fossils of Homo erectus, Homo neanderthalensis, and early Homo sapiens.
• Archaeology: Establishing timelines for prehistoric cultures (e.g., Neolithic farming, Bronze Age metallurgy).
• Cultural Anthropology: Helps contextualize material culture—when tools, ornaments, or ritual objects were made and used.
• Environmental Reconstruction: Dating sediments and ecological changes to understand human adaptation.

In short: Absolute dating gives anthropology its chronological backbone, turning artifacts and fossils into time-stamped evidence of human history.