ABSTRACT
This chapter highlights the opportunity to develop alternative dating methods. It discusses two chemical methods, based on Fourier transform infrared and Raman vibrational spectroscopy, and deals with a mechanical dating method. It is easy to say that as the radiocarbon dating method is not applicable to a certain historical sample, an alternative one must be used; what is less easy is using and, even more, devising an alternative dating method that could provide us with a scientifically reliable result. The chapter describes a multiparametric dating method that is not chemical but mechanical. It aims to study the mechanical behavior of the single fibers coming from both modern and ancient flax fabrics in order to search for possible dependencies with time, to be used for the construction of dating diagrams.
