hans,

Thank your for the edumacation about the oserian.

Fascinating, so if it is an egyptian "retro" styled construction, then they copied an older stylistic example?
HMMM more questions.


BFFT, not going to find much real online info, much of what I've learned came through hours and hours of reading all sorts of stuff.

When i was in college I had an impossible schedual most of the time.
I never had 2 consecutive classes, always had an hr or two between classes, so in between I would go to the old library and read.

I would find a secluded spot in the stacks and just pick books at random and read. I also would camp out in the periodicals room and read journals, like nature or the journal for the international archeology organization cant remember the exact title.

The excavations of the workers camp are on going, and the info gleened is very good.

The camp is divided into different areas, all of the bakers were in one place, the butchers and the fish vendors in another.

From what I remember reading the camp could support several thousand workers at a time.

In other parts of egypt, inscriptions have been found, descibing how the people of the town went off to work at the pyramids, in order to fulfill their duty to the king.

Bfft,

To really learn about whats going on in egyptology is something that cant be done on the internet, it will take pouring over journals and papers, by literally hundreds of different people.

Ive picked up my snippets of info from reading papers , published in archeology journals. And from hanging out in the stacks at the univesity library bewteen classes. if I didnt have anything to do i would pick a section and start reading.


dang gtg

more to come

In Reply to Harte

The C14 dates can be trusted completely as to when the city was constructed.

You are accusing field researchers of not sampling properly when you claim that C14 cannot show when the site was first occupied.

No human activity took place there until around the date specified - plus or minus the margin of error, of course.

How is that exampled in Tiahuanaco, as to the time of construction being proved? For example, I know the pyramids in Peru were the source of much specualtion a few years back, in terms of who constructed them when, until they found fibrous net sacks that were used to carry the some of the smaller stones wedged between the stones themselves -- from the inside of the pyramid it is worth noting. They were then able to do reliable C14 at that point and estimate construction.

I have not seen any evidence -- and would imagine from the state of the site in Tiahuanaco that it would be near impossible to have such definfing evidence -- that would demonstrate that kind of reliable C14 dating in terms of construction. Do you know of any? My impression of the C14 dating was that it was initally counducted around Wendell's 1934 samples after WWII and the advent of the technology.

Wendell's samples, AFAIK, can only definitively point to habitation and his timelines for that were moved back to later dates.

I know there were more extensive digs in the 80's and 90's, but have not seen any data that can truly attest to construction, i.e. tools to quarry with, or records... but... since the inhabiting culture did not posses the capability of writing as well as the wheel... I guess those records will never be forth coming.


edit: poor grammar and clarification of intent


[edit on 2-10-2008 by TheWayISeeIt]

Originally posted by TheWayISeeIt

How is that exampled in Tiahuanaco, as to the time of construction being proved?

I have not seen any evidence -- and would imagine from the state of the site in Tiahuanaco that it would be near impossible to have such definfing evidence -- that would demonstrate that kind of reliable C14 dating in terms of construction. Do you know of any? My impression of the C14 dating was that it was initally counducted around Wendell's 1934 samples after WWII and the advent of the technology.

Typically, carbon 14 dating is used to determine the earliest human habitation and or the approximate ages of any organic materials used in, or preserved by, the construction in question.

The C14 dates provided come from Tihuanaco itself as well as several other sites in the immediate vicinity.

When the oldest date for habitation is found, it can be assumed with a great level of certainty that any construction in the area post-dates the earliest habitation of the area.

Samples from Tihuanaco itself were obtained where organic material could be found that would be pertinant to the dating of the habitation of the area. One way to date the construction would be to take samples from areas directly beneath the lowest layer of stone construction. Whether this was done, I don't know. But if the area was cleared down to bedrock - or even clean soil - before construction began, such samples wouldn't be a good indication of the date of construction anyway. The C14 dates from such locations under those circumstances would yield the age of the organic materials in the soil itself, which wouldn't (necessarily) coincide with the construction date.

If you wish to assume that the construction predates the earliest such time, you are actually assuming that a "great culture" lived there in a previous time yet somehow was able to leave no trace at all of it's existence. This is not only unlikely, it's basically not possible.

Re precisely where each sample was obtained, I don't have that information. Some sample locations were discussed in the paper I linked, though.

Originally posted by TheWayISeeItWendell's samples, AFAIK, can only definitively point to habitation and his timelines for that were moved back to later dates.

I know there were more extensive digs in the 80's and 90's, but have not seen any data that can truly attest to construction, i.e. tools to quarry with, or records... but... since the inhabiting culture did not posses the capability of writing as well as the wheel... I guess those records will never be forth coming.

As you stated, given the condition of the site when it was found - dismantled and robbed of (no doubt) a large number of artifacts, it's unlikely that any construction tools or records will ever be found. Records, especially, since there is no evidence at all that the inhabitants actually had a written language.

As far as the dates of collection of the samples for C14 testing, the paper I linked indicates that the samples that are shown there were collected over several decades (the paper is actually a statistical analysis of these C14 dates and not a report on the dates per se.) The earliest samples appear to be from the 50's and 60's and the most recent I found (scanning the paper) were from 1999.

Harte

BFFT,

I noticed a part of your question regarding C14 dating that Harte didn't get to.

Originally posted by bigfatfurrytexan
Current carbon levels are much higher than they were just, say, 40 years ago. What does this do with our measurements?

How about things like forest fires? Volcano's?

How do we know that the carbon available now in the atmosphere is even close to 1500 years ago, or further back?

Yes, the ratio of carbon in the atmosphere is pretty high nowadays. But this doesn't bother C14 dating at all, for two reasons.

1) The increased carbon in the air is a very recent phenomina, within the last century or so. We can tell from ice cores and some soil samples that this wasn't the case during the time most of these items are being dated. In any case, most fossil fuels have no C14 - the isotope, only hasting a couple dozen millennium, has long since decayed from fossil fuels, with very rare exceptions in some oil feilds near Uranium or populated by bacteria.

2) The bigger reason, however, is that C14 is only absorbed by living organisms. Once they cease living, they cease absorbing it. Dating measures the rate of decay of C14, not the amount of it. Two organisms that died on the same day - one a big ancient tree, chock full of C-14, and the other, a puppy, almost none - will both date to the same time period because the rate of decay of the element is constant as well.

Goebelki Tepe is 12,000 years old fully varified,no carbon 14 confusion about it

I just read an article about dating of pottery.
A group of researchers has found that pottery will absorb lipo-protiens, fats, and these fats can be carbon dated, In a blind study, with random pottery samples, the researchers acurrately judged the age of an object.
An age that was confirmed by historical sources, in 18 of 18 samples.
They have dated egyptian pottery, and confimed known dates.
This technique will be very useful.


One thing that has really stuck in my craw, was an analysis of south american pottery shards(7000 years old), that indicated that the pottery was made in japan.
There is a ratio of isotopes that can be used to indentify where pottery was made.

Originally posted by invisiblewoman
Goebelki Tepe is 12,000 years old fully varified,no carbon 14 confusion about it

Sorry, guys...been tied up with "honey do's".

Gobleki Tepe is an interesting site.

I am going to review some C-14 stuff and will be back with info later on.