Unnumbered pageScan 2 of 4
Handwritten: Enkomi
Mr Claude F.A. SCHAEFFER, Directeur de Recherches at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Conservateur des Musées de France, informed the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres (session of 28 March), of the results of archaeological research carried out under his direction in September and October last at ENKOMI in the island of Cyprus. The excavations uncovered the remains of an important maritime town of the Bronze Age that preceded Salamis Greek and the present port of Famagusta. It drew its wealth mainly from the export of Cypriot copper to Asia and Egypt.
Dating back to the time of the Egyptian Middle Kingdom (20th - 18th c.), the town, still anonymous, discovered by Mr Schaeffer was abandoned as early as 1700 BC during a period of crisis characterised by extreme poverty among the decimated natives probably by an epidemic. During this period so still obscure in the history of the Ancient Orient, a general perturbation shook the whole of Western Asia, and caused major population movements. It took place then the invasion of the Hyksos into the Delta where their stay lasted about two centuries, contrary to a recent theory of Mr R.Weill, who wished to reduce the Second Intermediate Period in Egypt to about 30 years.
After a hiatus lasting more than a century, the town of Enkomi was rebuilt around 1500; it retained its role as the principal port of the island until the 13th c. BC.
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