Dietary 14C reservoir effects and the chronology of prehistoric burials at Sakhtysh, central European Russia | Science Advances

We present a robust radiocarbon ( ¹⁴ C) chronology for burials at Sakhtysh, in European Russia, where nearly 180 inhumations of Lyalovo and Volosovo pottery-using hunter-gatherer-fishers represent the largest known populations of both groups. Past dating attempts were restricted by poor understanding of dietary ¹⁴ C reservoir effects (DREs). We developed a DRE correction approach that uses multiple linear regression of differences in ¹⁴ C, δ ¹³ C, and δ ¹⁵ N between bones and teeth of the same individuals to predict DREs of up to approximately 900 years. Our chronological model dates Lyalovo burials to the early fifth millennium BCE, and Volosovo burials to the mid-fourth to early third millennium. It reveals a change in the subsistence economy at approximately 3300 BCE, coinciding with a reorientation of trade networks, and dates the final burial to the early Fatyanovo period, the regional expression of the Yamnaya/Corded Ware expansion. Our approach is applicable when freshwater ¹⁴ C reservoir effects are poorly constrained and grave goods cannot be dated directly.