Dating of the hominid (Homo neanderthalensis) remains accumulation from El Sidrón cave (Piloña, Asturias, North Spain): an example of multi-methodological approach to the dating of Upper Pleistocene sites

Abstract

The age of Neanderthal remains and associated sediments from El Sidron cave has been obtained through different dating methods (14CAMS, U/TH, OSL, ESR and AAR) and samples (charcoal debris, bone, tooth dentine, stalagmitic flowstone, carbonate-rich sediments, sedimentary quartz grains, tooth enamel and land snail shells). Detrital Th contamination rendered Th/U dating analyses of flowstone unreliable. Recent 14C contamination produced spurious age-values from charcoal samples as well as from inadequately pretreated tooth samples. Most consistent 14C dates are grouped into two series: one between 35 and 40 ka and the other between 48 and 49 ka. Most ESR and AAR samples yielded concordant ages, ranging between 39 and 45 ka; OSL dating results permitted adequate bracketing of the sedimentary layer that contained the human remains. Our results emphasize the value of multi-dating approaches for the establishment of reliable chronologies of human remains