Archaeomagnetic dating is the study and interpretation of the signatures of the Earth's magnetic field at past times recorded in archaeological materials.
[1] The method was conceived by Émile Thellier [pt; de] in the 1930s[2] and the increased sensitivity of SQUID magnetometers has greatly promoted its use.
[3] Archaeomagnetic dating requires an undisturbed feature that has a high likelihood of containing a remnant magnetic moment from the last time it had passed through the Curie point.
Once the paleodirections of enough independently dated archaeological features are determined, they can be used to compile a secular variation record for a particular region, known as an SVC.
The results are statistically processed and an eigenvector is generated that shows the three-dimensional magnetic declination that will yield a location for the North Pole at the time of the last thermal event of the feature.