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The exploitation of Cyprus's mineral wealth, mainly the copper deposits, and other natural resources, such as the forests, formed the basis of the island's economic prosperity and development from prehistoric times until Late Antiquity. The control of the metal resources of the island would have been a primary and pressing preoccupation of the kings--indeed, the successful management of this multi-stage activity must have defined, in part, the very identity and power structure of Cypriot kingship, as well as the geopolitical (territorial) and economic ambitions of the kings themselves. The following contribution focuses on the exploitation and control of the metal resources of the island by the Cypriot kingdoms in the Iron Age. It takes a regional approach in exploring the evidence for copper production in the Iron Age; it also examines the available information regarding the export of copper in this period. Before presenting the evidence from the Iron Age, a brief introduction to the geology of the island is offered. Then, in order to elucidate the metallurgical evidence during the age of the city kingdoms, a summary is presented of what is currently known about the exploitation of the copper deposits and the production and trade of copper before the first millennium B.C. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focuses on the excavations at Politiko Phorades denoting the prevalence of copper smelting in the late Bronze Age Cyprus. Presence of slag at the excavation site of prevalence Features of the pottery of Phorades; Collection of melting furnaces from the sites.

Predictive models have become an integral part of archaeological research, particularly in the discovery of new archaeological sites. In this paper, we apply predictive modeling to map high potential Pleistocene archaeological locales on the island of Cyprus in the Eastern Mediterranean. The model delineates landscape characteristics that denote areas with high potential to unearth Pleistocene archaeology while at the same time highlighting localities that should be excluded. The predictive model was employed in surface surveys to systematically access high probability locales on Cyprus. A number of newly identified localities suggests that the true density of mobile hunter-gatherer sites on Cyprus is seriously underestimated in current narratives. By adding new data to this modest corpus of early insular sites, we are able to contribute to debates regarding island colonisation and the role of coastal environments in human dispersals to new territories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Seaborne movement underpins frontier research in prehistoric archaeology, including water-crossings in the context of human dispersals, and island colonisation. Yet, it also controls the degree of interaction between locations, which in turn is essential for investigating the properties of maritime networks. The onset of the Holocene (circa 12,000 years ago) is a critical period for understanding the origins of early visitors/inhabitants to the island of Cyprus in the Eastern Mediterranean in connection with the spread of Neolithic cultures in the region. The research undertaken in this work exemplifies the synergies between archaeology, physical sciences and geomatics, towards providing novel insights on the feasibility of drift-induced seaborne movement and the corresponding trip duration between Cyprus and coastal regions on the surrounding mainland. The overarching objective is to support archaeological inquiry regarding the possible origins of these visitors/inhabitants—Anatolia and/or the Levant being two suggested origins. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Picrolite artefacts comprise some of the most distinctive material remains in the prehistory of the island of Cyprus, in the Eastern Mediterranean. Picrolite exploitation dates from at least 12,000 years ago for the manufacture of personal ornaments and items with a symbolic function. It is commonly assumed that picrolite nodules were collected in secondary deposits on an ad hoc basis. This narrative, however, ignores the fact that picrolite carriers can only be found in very specific locations on the island, discrete from each other. Here we report initial outcomes of the application of handheld portable X-ray fluorescence (HHpXRF) and synchrotron-based X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy (SR-μXRF) to the analysis of picrolite raw materials performed at the newly opened PUMA beamline of the SOLEIL Synchrotron Radiation Facility. Our work refines the basic characteristics of the elemental constituents of the picrolite raw material and highlights key micro-structural differences between two distinct source regions on the Troodos Massif in western Cyprus. Picrolite source characterisation is expected to contribute significant new knowledge to the study of rare raw material consumption, prehistoric social organisation, networking and possible long-distance exchange of this idiosyncratic raw material within and beyond the island's geographic boundaries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The origins of copper-based metallurgy on the island of Cyprus, which became the main supplier of the metal in the Late Bronze Age in the Mediterranean and whose name became associated with the metal, is relatively obscure. While metal extraction and metal artefacts became increasingly important in the broader Near East, early metallurgy on Cyprus remains poorly known, and it is often postulated that metals were of limited importance on the island prior to the Philia phase. Here we present a unique context from the Late Chalcolithic (ca. 2800-2400 BC) from the excavations at Chlorakas-Palloures that has considerable ramifications for this debate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]