May I cut in, please, and add my tuppence worth? Although I am on this list as someone who works with HER's, my main alternative life is as a prehistorian.
I have always very strictly stuck to the reference to a late Neolithic period, a transitional late Neolithic-early Bronze Age and an early Bronze Age, as agreed upon by Stuart Needham, Colin Burgess, Richard Bradley, Alistair Barclay. The chronological dates and terminology do vary as different people publish new studies or according to context, and it is interesting to see that there is no agreed standard amongst HERs and other resources. That is as it should be, probably, as there are so many important regional differences. Anyway, the answer to Helen's question is embedded in this ramble; your Bronze Age date is earlier than your EBA date, because your BA date encompasses the late Neolithic-early Bronze Age transitional period, which should not properly be thought of as part of the Bronze Age:
late Neolithic (LN) - 2800 to 2300 cal BC
late Neolithic-early Bronze Age (LNEBA) - 2400 to 1700
early Bronze Age (EBA) - 2000 to 1500
whereas radiocarbon date ranges for early prehistoric pottery differ:
Grooved Ware - 2900 to 2200 cal BC
Beaker - 2400 to 1700 cal BC
Food Vessel, Collared Urn, Biconical Urn - 2200 to 1500 cal BC
Hope that helps (hem).
Yes, they do all overlap somewhat but that is because the evidence itself overlaps. This is why I think the object dated should have a queriable field. I never go to an HER wanting to find out about all the early Bronze Age things on the data base. My statistical research would be focusing on objects and I would want to know about absolute and relative chronologies. So, for example, if I want to carry out some research using an HER, it will be on Food Vessels, not early Bronze Age pottery.
Definately a good idea to have a 'profession-wide' discussion about useful terminology and date ranges?
All the Best
Emily Edwards
Honorary Research Associate with the Institute of Archaeology and Antiquity at the University of Birmingham
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