Fig. 2

Detrital charcoal radiocarbon ages and great earthquakes. a Relationships between detrital charcoal AMS ¹⁴C dates and actual deposition ages. (1) Short time-lag (decades), as in Sir Khola charcoals. (2) Longer lag, due to long-lived wood species, long residence time, and reworking. Horizontal black arrows show plausible total time-lags, including inbuilt ages, transport, and eventual reworking. b Historical earthquake macroseismic intensities in Kathmandu (black bars) and western Nepal (gray bar). c ¹⁴C ages of the last surface ruptures at Koilabas, Mahara Khola, Sir Khola, and Hokse (Mugnier et al., 2011; Lavé et al., 2005; Sapkota et al., 2013; Bollinger et al., 2014; Upreti et al., 2000). Continuous, dashed, and short dashed lines refer to detrital charcoal deposited post-last, pre-last, and pre-penultimate identified events, respectively. Ages in gray are uncalibrated ages mentioned in the text. Calculated probability density spectra for earthquakes (gray) assume no inbuilt age and transport. Horizontal black arrows show plausible time-lag taken into account as detailed in a