Minimum Date Evidence
Definition
Artefacts (coins, currency notes, dated packaging, mobile phones) recovered from a burial whose manufacture date establishes that burial cannot have occurred before that date. Less precise than chronometric methods but often more resistant to challenge.
- Related concept
- Terminus post quem
- Example artefacts
- Coins, currency notes, dated packaging, mobile phones
- Establishes
- Burial cannot predate the artefact's manufacture date
- Precision
- Lower than chronometric methods, often more challenge-resistant
Common questions
Why is minimum date evidence considered more resistant to legal challenge than chronometric dating?+
A manufacture date on a coin or a mobile phone model is typically a documented, independently verifiable fact rather than a statistical estimate with an error range, so it is harder to attack on methodological grounds, even though it only bounds one end of the interval.
Can minimum date evidence establish how recently a burial occurred?+
No, it only sets a bound on the earliest possible date. An artefact could have entered the grave fill long after its manufacture, so it does not by itself indicate how much later the burial took place; that requires additional stratigraphic or chronometric evidence.
What undermines the reliability of minimum date evidence?+
Intrusive contamination is the main risk: an object from disturbed overlying soil, root action, or later digging can end up misassociated with the burial fill. Careful stratigraphic recording of exactly where the artefact was recovered is needed to defend the association.
Related terms
- Accumulated Degree Days (ADD)
- The sum of daily mean temperatures above a threshold (usually 0 °C) over a period of interest. Used as a measure of...
- Burial Interval
- The elapsed time between placement of the body in the ground and the time of recovery. Distinct from the post-mortem interval (time...
- PFIDAC
- Post-mortem Forensic Index of Decomposition and Alteration in Context: a UK-developed scoring protocol that standardises the description of decomposition stages in buried...
- Pollen Stratigraphy
- The analysis of pollen assemblages at different depth horizons within the grave fill to establish a seasonal or annual chronology. A pollen...
- Soil Temperature Logging
- Placement of calibrated temperature dataloggers at the grave depth during excavation, allowing the actual thermal history of the burial environment to be...