ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to provide an overview of the basic principles that govern some key physical and chemical methods relevant in dating humanity’s past. It complements monographs and articles that review the ever increasing and improving chronometric methods available to researchers (e.g. Faure 1986; Aitken 1990; Geyh and Schleicher 1990; Aitken et al. 1992; Wagner 1995; Wintle 1996). Although early archaeological and geological research recognized the importance of stratigraphy in establishing relative chronology, absolute chronology has remained a daunting task for reconstructing cultural evolution in time and space. The intensity of the debate between the ‘multiregional evolution’ and the ‘out of Africa’ hypotheses (Figure 2.1) have warranted not only new technological tools to finger-print DNA, but also higher precision in numerical dating techniques (see Aitken et al. 1992).
