Radiocarbon dating and the Naqada relative chronology

The Naqada relative chronology provides the main cultural framework for the Predynastic period of ancient Egypt. It was devised in the late nineteenth century by Flinders Petrie to improve understanding of the prehistoric origins of the Egyptian state. Petrie's approach became widely known and formed the basis for the development of seriation. In this study, we test the reliability of the Naqada relative chronology as a dating tool against all the relevant radiocarbon information. The results show that the main blocks of the relative sequence do form a true chronology, but also indicate that the system is much less reliable at the level of individual phases. We discuss the nature of the discrepancies and the broader influence of the relative chronology on current understanding of Early Egypt.