Radiocarbon dates from eastern Africa in the CARD2.0 format

Radiocarbon dating is one of the most widely available and applied techniques to develop Late Quaternary chronologies of many ecosystems and is, thus, utilized in Quaternary studies, archaeology, hydrology, geomorphology, palaeoanthropology, palaeoclimatology, palaeoecology, palaeontology, and isotope analyses. A literature review of published radiocarbon dates from eastern Africa was undertaken to store these data in the open-access Canadian Archaeological Radiocarbon Database. The format of the database permits expansion of the dataset in the future and permits local, regional and global scale analyses of radiocarbon dates. This paper expands on some of these potential research areas and promote archiving of African data. A literature search of published radiocarbon dates from palaeoenvironmental studies, including palaeoclimatological, palaeoecological, environmental archaeology and palaeontological sources. Dates from study sites required published coordinates and details pertaining to common radiocarbon dating reporting, such as laboratory code identifiers, radiocarbon ages and errors. Used the data input template (version 1.3; 29 September, 2015) of the CARD 2.0 database. The vast majority of dates were entered in the database manually from tables in published literature or data sources. The data upload template has minimum requirements, including the identifier code supplied by the laboratory, the material dated, geographic coordinates, and the radiocarbon age with associated 1σ dating error. Publications that did not present radiocarbon laboratory identification codes were assigned as ‘LUNK-000’ that can be updated in the future (n = 6). In cases where the δ13C values were not recorded alongside radiocarbon dates (n = 392), the values were estimated as: -27‰ for peat, bulk sediment, picked organic samples, and dung; -25‰ for wood and charcoal; -10‰ for bone apatite; and 0‰ for marine shells and foraminifera. These values can also be updated if needed.