Decadally Resolved Lateglacial Radiocarbon Evidence from New Zealand Kauri

Abstract

The Last Glacial–Interglacial Transition (LGIT; 15,000–11,000 cal BP) was characterized by complex spatiotemporal patterns of climate change, with numerous studies requiring accurate chronological control to decipher leads from lags in global paleoclimatic, paleoenvironmental, and archaeological records. However, close scrutiny of the few available tree-ring chronologies and radiocarbon-dated sequences composing the IntCal13 14C calibration curve indicates significant weakness in 14C calibration across key periods of the LGIT. Here, we present a decadally resolved atmospheric 14C record derived from New Zealand kauri spanning the Lateglacial from ~13,100–11,365 cal BP. Two floating kauri 14C time series, curve-matched to IntCal13, serve as a 14C backbone through the Younger Dryas. The floating Northern Hemisphere (NH) 14C data sets derived from the YD-B and Central European Lateglacial Master tree-ring series are matched against the new kauri data, forming a robust NH 14C time series to ~14,200 cal BP. Our results show that IntCal13 is questionable from ~12,200–11,900 cal BP and the ~10,400 BP 14C plateau is approximately 5 decades too short. The new kauri record and repositioned NH pine 14C series offer a refinement of the international 14C calibration curves IntCal13 and SHCal13, providing increased confidence in the correlation of global paleorecords.

Human responses and non-responses to climatic variations during the last Glacial-Interglacial transition in the eastern Mediterranean

“…Fig 7b shows summed calibrated distribution. Figures 7a-b also show the impact of adjusting the IntCal13 curve according to improved tree-ring calibration for this period provided by Hogg et al (2016): in this case, there is little evidence for a major difference and so we have continued using IntCal13 for what follows.…”

The Influence of Calibration Curve Construction and Composition on the Accuracy and Precision of Radiocarbon Wiggle-Matching of Tree Rings, Illustrated by Southern Hemisphere Atmospheric Data Sets from AD 1500–1950

“…Santorini (Manning et al 2014), Taupo tephra (Hogg et al 2012), locking in floating tree-ring 14 C sequences for calibration purposes (e.g. Hogg et al 2016) and archaeological applications (e.g. Hogg et al 2017, Palmer et al 2014 and many others).…”

Onset of the Younger Dryas Recorded with 14C at Annual Resolution in French Subfossil Trees

“…The last ring of the youngest tree of the sequence (G5) has been dated in several works to between ca. 12,500 and 12,844 ± 32 cal BP (Hughen et al 2000;Muscheler et al 2008;Hua et al 2009;Bronk Ramsey et al 2012;Hogg et al 2016b;Capano et al 2018).…”

“…Preliminary 14 C dating of the Barb12-17 sequence between ca. 12,836 to 12,594 cal BP (Capano et al 2018) was based on visual matching of wiggles against the kauri sequence from New Zealand (Hogg et al 2016a(Hogg et al , 2016b).…”

“…The 14 C content measured in French subfossil trees is also compared to kauri records from the Southern Hemisphere (Hogg et al 2016a(Hogg et al , 2016b and employed to study the atmospheric 14 C gradient between the Northern and Southern Hemispheres (NH and SH). Indeed, a systematic 14 C difference exists between wood from trees that lived at the exact same time in the NH and SH (SH wood being generally older than NH wood).…”