The sea level cosmic ray dose is about 30 mrad a^-1 and buried artifacts receive less than this. This contribution is normally a sufficiently small contribution to the total environmental dose that a substantial uncertainty in the value can be tolerated. However, in some circumstances, e.g., very high altitude or Pacific coral island sites, the cosmic ray dose becomes a more significant fraction of the total dose. The paper presents a review of cosmic ray intensities as a function of altitude, latitude and depth in a form useful to workers in thermoluminescent dating. A basic figure of 18.5 plus or minus 1.1 mrad a^-1 for latitudes above 35°, at sea level, at a burial depth of 100 grams cm^-2, is recommended. -- AATA