Tracking a non‐dipole geomagnetic anomaly using new archaeointensity results from north‐east China

Abstract

A collection of ceramics and samples, collected from north‐east China with ages ranging from 1000 to 7000 years, have been investigated using a modified version of the Shaw palaeointensity techniques (Shaw 1974; Rolph & Shaw 1985) in which only partial NRMs and TRMs (PNRMs and PTRMs) with blocking temperatures (Tb) above 300 d̀C are used after pre‐selection of samples by mineral magnetic analysis. A secular variation curve obtained from this study is quite consistent with previous results from other areas of China (Wei et al. 1987; Tang et al. 1991), as well as with the global model of McElhinny & Senanayake (1982). Comparison of the Chinese results with contemporaneous results from Greece (Aitken et al. 1989) has allowed us to track the movement of a large non‐dipole anomaly as it drifts westwards. Copyright © 1993, Wiley Blackwell. All rights reserved