Abstract
Cindery Tuff is a subalkaline, rhyolitic air-fall deposit that was probably produced by a mixed-magma eruption. It is a distinctive, datable, regional isochronous marker bed within the Pliocene sediments of the Middle Awash district, and is stratigraphically situated between two new fossil hominid discoveries. Based on 40Ar/39Ar analyses of plagioclase, rhyolitic glass and basaltic glass, as well as fission-track analyses of zircons, we estimate its age to be 3.8–4.0 Myr. This implies that associated hominid skull fragments are at least 3.9 Myr old.
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Hall, C., Walter, R., Westgate, J. et al. Geochronology, stratigraphy and geochemistry of Cindery Tuff in Pliocene hominid-bearing sediments of the Middle Awash, Ethiopia. Nature 308, 26–31 (1984). https://doi.org/10.1038/308026a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/308026a0
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