The Radiocarbon Dates and What They Established

The dating of the Anzick burial has been addressed by multiple radiocarbon analyses over the decades since the discovery, and the results have converged on an age that places the burial squarely within the Clovis period.

Radiocarbon dating works by measuring the remaining concentration of the radioactive carbon isotope carbon-14 in organic material.

Carbon-14 is produced in the upper atmosphere by cosmic ray bombardment and is incorporated into living organisms through the food chain.

When an organism dies, the incorporation of new carbon-14 stops, and the carbon-14 already present begins to decay at a known rate.