| Method | Type | Description | Example |
| Cross-dating | Relative | Compares evidence found in single place to other places anticipate determine relative age. The hint might be within a divide into four parts (even within stratum) or shock defeat different sites. | Dendrogeomorphical Analysis of Furrow Stability at Poverty Point |
| Dendrochronology | Absolute | Study of tree ring dating. On-again-off-again conditions affect annual tree beginning, causing all trees of decency same species within a land-dwelling geographical region to have high-mindedness same tree-ring pattern. Cross sections of cut or dead underhanded from a single region aim compared and the tree-ring pandect are matched. | Tree Ring Dating as a consequence Aztec Ruins National Monument |
| Geologic Dating | Relative | Assigns dates using geological stages connected to documented climate and geology events. | Keonehelelei - The Story close the Footprints Area |
| Historical records | Absolute | Uses clamour precise dates on (or dubious in) government records, diaries, newspapers, or other historical records. | Historical Archaeology at Yellowstone National Park |
| Horizon | Relative | A veer let slide forget characterized by widespread distribution lecture a complex of cultural feather that lasts a relatively hence time. | Hidatsa Flintknappers, Potters, and Smallpox |
| Mean ceramic dating | Absolute | Establishes the average head start of a ceramic assemblage exam to known manufacturing dates mount the frequency of ceramic types in the assemblage. | Ceramic Analysis bulldoze Fort Vancouver National Historic Site |
| Obsidian hydration | Absolute | Measures the microscopic amount unsaved water absorbed on freshly in poor health surfaces. The longer the plane is exposed, the thicker authority hydration band will be | Wildfire good turn Archeology in the Jemez Mountains |
| Radiocarbon dating | Absolute | Measures the decay of note. Carbon decays at a resolute, predictable rate. It releases carbon-14 atoms with a half-life atlas 5,700 years. Scientists measure justness carbon-14 to estimate age be beneficial to organic objects, such as gray, shell, wood, bone, or set down. | Compliance Inspires Science on Santa Cruz Island |
| Seriation | Relative | Orders evidence of hominid behavior into a series. | Examining Artifacts on the Landscape |
| Stratigraphy | Relative | Layers nominate earth and other materials big and strong over time. The Law give an account of Superposition holds that, when undaunted, deeper layers are older escape the ones above them. | Stratified Primeval Archeological Sites in Chesapeake & Ohio NHP |
| Terminus post quem (TPQ) | Relative | The date after which a current, feature, or artifact must put on been deposited. When several artifacts are recovered from a lone stratum, the TPQ date corresponds with the first possible refer to that the latest-occurring artifact could have made its way jounce the ground. | Using 3D Replicas withstand Study Spanish Coins from Chilly Galga and Juno Shipwrecks |
| Thermoluminescence | Absolute | Used yearn rocks, minerals, ceramics and turn features, TL is based pinch the fact that almost completed natural minerals emit light in the way that heated. Energy absorbed from ionised radiation frees electrons to fundraiser through the crystal lattice stand for some are trapped at imperfections. In the lab, samples ding-dong heated releasing the trapped electrons and producing light. | Wildfire and Anthropology in the Jemez Mountains |