A long-term mountain station series of tropospheric 14C data for the period 1959 to 1984 is presented. This series is considered representative of the higher altitude14C level over central Europe. Even tree-ring 14C levels from a rural ground level site in southern Germany are consistently lower (by Δ14Cdepression = −15‰ if compared with the mountain station summer average in atmospheric CO2). The rural tree-ring series is considered to represent the additional continental Suess effect at ground level without local contamination. This Suess effect decreases gradually with the distance from the ground (ie, source) level. We therefore estimate the additional continental Suess effect in the vegetation period to be Δ14Cdepression = −5‰ for the mountain station and −20‰) for a rural ground level site, respectively. Based on this assumption, yearly mean tropospheric 14C levels corrected for fossil fuel contamination and representative of the Northern Hemisphere are provided for use in global carbon cycle models.

14C calibration curves derived from South German oak tree-ring series are presented. They cover the interval between 4400 and 7200 BC complementing existing data sets and extending them to older periods. The atmospheric 14C level before 6200 BC no longer follows the long-term sinusoidal trend fitted to the bristlecone data. This observation is supported by a tentative match of the Main 9 series.

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