Libby worked with colleagues, including anthropologist Robert Braidwood of UChicago’s Oriental Institute (now known as the ), to develop the carbon-14 method. Samples taken from artifacts in the museum collections were used to test the accuracy of radiocarbon dating, since archaeologists already knew their ages by tree-ring dating and other evidence. The many materials Libby tested while developing the method included a rope sandal found in an Oregon cave, the dung of an extinct ground sloth, linen wrappings from the Dead Sea Scrolls, and part of a funeral ship deck placed in the tomb of Sesostris III of Egypt., Learn about carbon dating or radiocarbon dating in science. Discover its history, how it works, its uses, and its limitations., Carbon-14 dating, explained Radiocarbon dating, or carbon-14 dating, is a scientific method that can accurately determine the age of organic materials as old as approximately 60,000 years. First developed in the late 1940s at the University of Chicago by Willard Libby, the technique is based on the decay of the carbon-14 isotope..