¹⁴C record and wiggle-match placement for the Anatolian (Gordion Area) juniper tree-ring chronology ~1729 TO 751 CAL BC, and typical Aegean/Anatolian (growing season related) regional ¹⁴C offset assessment

The East Mediterranean Radiocarbon (inter-)Comparison Project (EMRCP) has measured the ¹⁴C ages of a number of sets of tree rings from the Gordion Area dendrochronology from central Anatolia at the Heidelberg Radiocarbon Laboratory. In several cases, multiple measurements were made over a period from the 1980s to 2009. This paper presents the final data set from this work (128 high-precision measurements), and considers (i) the relationship of these data against the standard Northern Hemisphere ¹⁴C calibration data set (IntCal09), and (ii) the optimum calendar dating of this floating treering record on the basis of the final set of high-precision ¹⁴C data. It finds good agreement between the Anatolian data and IntCal09 in some important intervals (e.g. ~1729 to 1350 cal BC) and observes one period (9th-8th centuries BC) where there appears to be some indication of a regional/growing season signal, and another period (later 14th-13th centuries BC) where IntCal09 may not best reflect the real ¹⁴C record. The scale of the typical growing-season-related regional ¹⁴C offset (ΔR) between the Aegean/Anatolian region and IntCal09 is also assessed (for the mid-2nd millennium BC and mid-2nd millennium AD), and found to be usually minor (at times where there are no major additional forcing factors and/or issues with the IntCal09 data set): of the order of 2-4 ± 2-4 yr.