Dating the lower Paleolithic open-air site of Holon, Israel by luminescence and ESR techniques

The open-air Acheulian site in Holon, Israel, was dated by the luminescence methods and by electron spin resonance (ESR), Situated in the coastal plai n Quaternary Kurkar Group, the Holon site was first excavated in the late 1 960s, when typical lower Paleolithic lithics and middle Pleistocene fauna w ere found. In order to date the site, new test pits were dug adjacent to th e earlier excavations and the archaeological bed was exposed in a section c omprising a series of paleosols and aeolianites. Alkali feldspars separated from the sediments were dated using the infrared stimulated luminescence a nd thermoluminescence signals, and quartz was dated using the optically sti mulated luminescence signal. The age of the archaeological bed is constrain ed by two samples to 198,000 +/- 22,000-201,000 +/- 17,000 yr, The age of t he base of the section is 240,000 +/- 29,000 yr, and the age of the top is 81,000 +/- 8000 yr. Two teeth from the archaeological bed, recovered from t he original excavation collection, yielded an average ESR age of 204,000 +/ - 16,000 yr, calculated using the linear uptake model, which is in a very g ood agreement with the luminescence ages; These dates place Holon within th e range of other late Acheulian and Acheulo-Yabrudian sites in this region such as Tabun E (younger chronology), Yabrud I (archaeological level 18), a nd Berekhat Ram, (C) 1999 University of Washington.