Island Archaeology and Island History: Cyprus

Abstract

This chapter considers, first, various archaeological ‘constructions’ that have guided as well as constrained the study of Cypriot archaeology. Until the 1980s, for example, most archaeologists working on the island, including native Cypriotes, were trained as specialists in Aegean, Levantine, or Anatolian archaeology, only secondarily in the archaeology of Cyprus. In contrast, and from a decidedly internal perspective, this chapter focuses on the material record of Prehistoric Bronze Age (PreBA) Cyprus (ca. 2700–1700/1650 BC), a time marked by major shifts in traditional materials and lifeways. Crucial social changes are considered through detailed examination of spatial organization and cultural sequences at several archaeological sites (landscapes), production and trade (copper, imports, the ‘secondary products revolution’), material culture (architecture, pottery) and mortuary practices, representations (‘genre scenes’, figurines), individuals (figurines, burials, jewellery), migration, and hybridization (architecture, pottery, cooking and weaving items, metal goods, jewellery). By about 1700 BC, the intensification of metallurgical and agricultural production precipitated the emergence of new island identities and a new social order, structurally very different from that which had characterized earlier periods, but one still solidly Cypriot in origin, outlook and makeup.