PACEA Geo-Referenced Radiocarbon Database

Abstract

Numerous Paleolithic radiocarbon databases exist, but their geographic and temporal scopes are diverse and their availability variable. With this paper we make available to the scientific community a georeferenced data-base of radiocarbon ages for the late Middle Paleolithic, Upper Paleolithic, and initial Holocene in Europe. The PACEA radiocarbon database consists of conventional and AMS 14C age determinations from archaeological sites in Europe that fall within Marine Isotope Stages (MIS) 3–1. In all, we have assembled 6,019 radiocarbon ages (conventional=3,820, AMS=2,176, unspecified=23) from a total of 1,208 sites, along with comprehensive contextual information on the dated samples.