Almost all statistical tests that archaeologists and historians use are based on the concept of Null Hypothesis Significance Testing or NHST. If someone told you that you should be using some stats in this paper this is probably what they mean for it. The comment is usually accompanied by a ... [Read more...]

One of the first things you want to do when you explore a new dataset is to identify possible gaps. Sample size and the number of variables are relevant but…how many observations do you have for each variable? This distinction is even more relevant for archaeologists because (if we ... [Read more...]

Geographical Information Systems such as QGIS are common in the typical archaeologist’s toolbox. However, the complexities of our datasets mean that we need additional tools to identify patterns in time and space. Imagine that you are working with a set of points in a vector format such as a ... [Read more...]

C14 sampling is the most popular technique that archaeologists use to estimate absolute dates of sites. The method uses an organic sample to measure radiocarbon age that finally needs to be calibrated to calendar years (see the Wikipedia entry for details). I have always been puzzled that C14 samples are ... [Read more...]

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