Building the radiocarbon chronology for the archaeological site Ufa-II: is this the elusive "bashkort" of medieval sources?

Abstract

A suite of accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) radiocarbon dates for the Ufa-II archaeological site in Bashkortostan, Russia, is obtained for the first time. Dating was done on charcoal samples from a sequence of cultural deposits collected during the 2011 digging season. An age-depth chronology is established using the Bayesian deposition General Outlier P_Sequence model. The oldest age for the site at the horizon immediately over the sterile ground was cal AD 137-237 (68% probability), corresponding to the beginning of site occupation. The youngest C-14 date found was late 6th to early 7th century cal AD for the extensive planked boardwalks unearthed at the site. The C-14 dates are in good agreement with archaeological determinations based on discovered artifacts. © 2013, University of Arizona.