Scottish Radiocarbon Database

The Scottish Radiocarbon database project aims to establish a permanent, online resource for radiocarbon dates relating to the archaeological record in Scotland. Radiocarbon dates provide important dating evidence for archaeological sites but too often the association between the scientific analysis and information about the monument (for instance location or classification) is lost. Where possible, individual radiocarbon dates in Scotland have been formally linked back to the relevant archaeological record in the Canmore database.

The original database owed much to a list prepared by Ian Ralston a few decades ago supplemented by information from Patrick Ashmore from dates published in the major journals and some monographs. From 1996 until his retirement in 2006, Patrick Ashmore edited lists of dates for Discovery and Excavation in Scotland. These lists included those dates obtained by Historic Scotland as well as dates obtained by the archaeological companies working in Scotland and some archaeological research projects. Additional dates have been added through lists, also published in Discovery and Excavation in Scotland, compiled by Alison Sheridan, Ian Shepherd and others as well as from the Scottish Universities Environmental Research Centre (SUERC).