SignificanceWe report coincident changes in the consumption of energy by human populations over the last 10,000 y—synchrony—and document patterns consistent with the contemporary process of globalization operating in the past. Our results suggest that the process of globalization may display great antiquity among our species, and this knowledge provides an entry point for integrating insights from archaeological research into discussions on the long-term consequences of globalization for building sustainable societies. Our results demonstrate the potential for archaeological radiocarbon records to serve as a basis for millennial-scale comparisons of human energy dynamics and provide a baseline for further cross-cultural research on the long-term growth and decline trajectories of human societies.

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From 2014 to 2020, we compiled radiocarbon ages from the lower 48 states, creating a database of more than 100,000 archaeological, geological, and paleontological ages that will be freely available to researchers through the Canadian Archaeological Radiocarbon Database. Here, we discuss the process used to compile ages, general characteristics of the database, and lessons learned from this exercise in “big data” compilation.

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