References
- Bodies of evidence:
from the Channel 4 TV programme - Radiocarbon dating:
the Dating Game interactive from NOVA
Piltdown man
One way to work out the age of some fossils today is by using radiocarbon dating. Click on the picture to find out how scientists would use radiocarbon dating to age the Piltdown Man remains today.
2. Dating the bones | Results
Piltdown Man cranial fragments
©The Natural History Museum
Radiocarbon dating is just one of the methods used to date fossils today. If Piltdown Man really had been the 'missing link', the human fossils would have been too old to be aged by radiocarbon dating. It was only after Piltdown had been suggested as a hoax that scientists turned to this method.
In 1989, Museum palaeontologist Chris Stringer used radiocarbon dating to obtain the most accurate date of the human remains so far. The results confirmed earlier studies that had revealed the human bones to be less than 1,000 years old.
'The radiocarbon dating showed that Piltdown Man had existed at least 100,000 years after modern humans evolved.' Chris Stringer, Museum palaeontologist.
