Interpretation of radiocarbon data: absolute chronology of the lola culture of the Caspian region

He main focus of this paper is the verification and the interpretation of ra-diocarbon data. In order to apply the 14C dates for chronological inference, isotope effectsshould be properly understood. Human and animal bone collagen from several SteppeBronze Age cultures, like the Lola culture, shows large variations in δ 1 and δ 15Ν values.More positive values of δ 1 and δ 15Ν are caused by change in diet and higher aridity ofclimate. Human bones show reservoir effects caused by aquatic diet components. Newstable isotope and radiocarbon data are available for the Lola culture of the Eurasiansteppe. The stable isotope values for Lola human and animal bones vary significantly; thediet of the people of this culture does not correspond to the steppe population diet. Thismeans that either the isotope ecology of the Caspian and Lower Don steppe areas changedduring the period of aridization, or some individuals came to this part of the steppe fromthe regions where food components show different isotope signals, including marine foodcomponents. Reservoir effect can be quantified by paired dating of human bones and as-sociated terrestrial samples. Some Lola culture paired dates do not reveal reservoir effect.Some human bones from the dated pairs do show a reservoir effect, which varies between114 and 185 yr. Reservoir corrections have revised the chronology of the Lola culture,which falls within the interval between 2200-2000 cal. BC, based on the available 14Cdata.