The National Museum of Denmark and the Department of Geography at the University of Copenhagen have collaborated on a project investigating burial mounds near early Medieval churches. The aim was to identify a possible continuity in cult sites across the shift to Christianity in the late Viking Age. Charcoal samples from 18 mounds were radiocarbon dated but the results showed they were far older than expected. Control dating undertaken on burial mounds of known age confirmed that charcoal in the mound fill can at least be up to 3000 years older than the mound itself. As charcoal can survive in the surface soil layer for millennia, in spite of ploughing, bioturbation and frost, it may also dominate the charcoal pool of the grass or heather turfs used in the mound construction. Therefore, the article concludes, charcoal cannot be used to securely date archaeological features built with turfs and it is important to be aware of the possible presence of very old charcoal when selecting material for dating archaeological features, even those which otherwise would be judged unaffected by material from earlier archaeological periods.

中文翻译：

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在丹麦约会古代墓葬 – 揭示有问题的古代木炭

丹麦国家博物馆和哥本哈根大学地理系合作开展了一项调查中世纪早期教堂附近墓葬的项目。目的是确定在维京时代晚期向基督教转变的过程中，邪教场所可能存在的连续性。来自 18 个土墩的木炭样本进行了放射性碳测年，但结果显示它们比预期的要古老得多。对已知年龄的墓葬进行的控制测年证实，土墩填充物中的木炭至少比土墩本身古老 3000 年。由于木炭可以在表层土壤中存活数千年，尽管经过耕作、生物扰动和霜冻，它也可能在土墩建筑中使用的草或石南草草皮的木炭池中占主导地位。因此，文章得出结论，