Topic
Craft Production
How objects were made and by whom: workshops, specialist craftspeople, raw materials and the organisation of production in Cypriot communities.
39 entries in 5 sections
Pottery
21 entriesSection overview
Combed WareThe red-slipped pottery of the Cypriot Ceramic Neolithic whose slip was scraped with a comb-like tool while wet to expose pale bands, c. 4500–3900 BCE.Neolithic
Red-on-White WareRed-on-White is the hand-built painted pottery of Chalcolithic Cyprus, with red geometric patterns on a pale marl or slipped ground.NeolithicChalcolithic
Red Polished Philia WareThe hand-made, red-slipped and polished pottery of the Philia facies, strikingly uniform across Cyprus at the opening of the Bronze Age.Early Bronze Age- Red Polished WareRed Polished is the hand-made, red-slipped and burnished pottery that dominated Cyprus in the Early and Middle Bronze Age.Early Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze Age
Drab Polished WareDrab Polished is a hard-fired Bronze Age ware of western and south-western Cyprus, often with a blue-grey core, and a technological forerunner of Base Ring.Early Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze Age
White Painted WareThe hand-made, pale-slipped Bronze Age pottery of Cyprus painted with dark matt geometric motifs, flourishing in the Middle Bronze Age as WP I to VI.Early Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze Age
Base Ring WareThe thin-walled, hand-made Late Bronze Age pottery of Cyprus with dark lustrous surfaces imitating metal, widely exported as jugs and juglets.Late Bronze Age
White Slip WareThe hand-made Late Bronze Age tableware with a thick white slip and dark painted decoration, mostly hemispherical bowls, widely exported from Cyprus.Late Bronze Age
Plain White WareThe undecorated, pale-surfaced pottery of Middle and Late Bronze Age Cyprus, made by hand and later wheel-shaped, the first Cypriot ware formed with the wheel.Middle Bronze AgeLate Bronze Age
White Painted Wheelmade WareThe locally made, wheel-thrown, matt-painted pottery of Aegean inspiration that became the standard Cypriot tableware in Late Cypriot IIC and IIIA.Late Bronze Age
Proto-White Painted WareThe wheel-thrown, matt-painted pottery of Late Cypriot IIIB, c. 1125–1050 BCE, which merged earlier Aegean-style wares and led into Iron Age White Painted I.Late Bronze AgeCypro-Geometric
Bichrome WareBichrome is Cypriot pottery painted in black and red on a light surface, first a Late Bronze Age export ware and later a long-lived Iron Age class.Late Bronze AgeCypro-GeometricCypro-Archaic
Bichrome Red WareBichrome Red is the Cypriot Iron Age wheel-made ware with black and added white paint on a red slip, the sister ware of Black-on-Red.Cypro-ArchaicCypro-Classical
Baskets and Basket-Handled VesselsNot a standard Cypriot vessel class, "basket" names the arched basket handle, vessels that carry it, the kalathos and a few openwork bowls.Late Bronze AgeCypro-GeometricCypro-Archaic
CirclesConcentric circles, disks, spirals and pendent semicircles, the leading geometric motif of Cypriot Iron Age painted pottery and of Gjerstad's Western style.Cypro-GeometricCypro-Archaic- From Bronze to Iron: Cypriot Pottery c. 1300–950 BCEThe change in Cypriot fine pottery between c. 1300 and 950 BCE, from handmade Base Ring and White Slip to wheelmade White Painted and Bichrome.Late Bronze AgeCypro-Geometric
Jugs (Oinochoe)The Iron Age Cypriot pouring jug or oinochoe, a painted wheelmade vessel for liquids made in regional workshops and widely exported around the Mediterranean.Cypro-GeometricCypro-ArchaicCypro-Classical- Pottery ShapesSectionThe classification of Cypriot pottery by vessel form rather than ware, grouped into ten shape families from bowls and jugs to composite vessels.Early Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze AgeLate Bronze AgeCypro-GeometricCypro-Archaic
The Pottery of Ancient CyprusSectionThe pottery made and used in Cyprus from the Ceramic Neolithic onward, the island's most abundant artifact class and the basis of its chronology.NeolithicChalcolithicEarly Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze AgeLate Bronze AgeCypro-GeometricCypro-ArchaicCypro-ClassicalHellenisticRoman
Types of WareSectionThe families of Cypriot pottery, grouped by clay, surface finish and decoration, from Neolithic Combed ware to Iron Age Black-on-Red.NeolithicChalcolithicEarly Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze AgeLate Bronze AgeCypro-GeometricCypro-ArchaicCypro-Classical
Zig-ZagsA continuous line changing direction at sharp angles, incised or painted on Cypriot pottery from Early Bronze Age Red Polished to Cypro-Archaic handles.Early Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze AgeLate Bronze AgeCypro-GeometricCypro-Archaic
Statues
7 entriesSection overview
Archaic Limestone StatuesThe limestone votive statues and statuettes dedicated in Cypriot sanctuaries of the Cypro-Archaic period, many in Egyptianizing dress.Cypro-Archaic
Base Ring Figurines (Astarte Type)Handmade Base Ring ware terracotta figurines of nude women from Late Bronze Age Cyprus, found in tombs and houses and often linked to Astarte.Late Bronze Age
Cruciform FigurinesSmall stylised human figures with outstretched arms and bent legs, carved mostly in picrolite in Chalcolithic Cyprus and often worn as pendants.Chalcolithic- Neolithic and Picrolite FigurinesThe small, mostly stone and rarely sexed human figures of Neolithic Cyprus, and the early use of picrolite that precedes the Chalcolithic cruciforms.NeolithicChalcolithic
Painted Stone: Colour on Cypriot Limestone SculptureThe painting of Cypriot limestone sculpture with red, black, yellow, green and blue, of which usually only traces now survive.Cypro-ArchaicCypro-Classical
Plank FiguresFlat, rectangular, stylised human figures, mostly in incised Red Polished clay, made in Cyprus from Early Cypriot IIIA to Middle Cypriot II.Early Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze Age
Snowman FigurinesHand-modelled terracotta votaries and musicians of Iron Age Cyprus, built up from a columnar lump of clay with a pinched beak nose and pellet features.Cypro-GeometricCypro-ArchaicCypro-Classical
Jewelry
1 entrySection overview
Tools and Technologies
5 entriesSection overview
Copper Metallurgy in Ancient CyprusThe mining, smelting and casting of the Troodos sulphide ores, from hammered Chalcolithic native copper to Late Bronze Age oxhide ingots and Archaic slag heaps.ChalcolithicEarly Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze AgeLate Bronze AgeCypro-GeometricCypro-Archaic
Glass in Ancient CyprusGlass vessels found on Cyprus from the Late Bronze Age to the Roman period, mostly from tombs, with local workshops argued but never excavated.Late Bronze AgeCypro-ClassicalHellenisticRoman- Pottery Kilns and Firing in Ancient CyprusHow Cypriot potters fired their wares, mostly in open fires and pits until the Late Bronze Age, when the first kilns and the potter's wheel appear.ChalcolithicEarly Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze AgeLate Bronze Age
Spindle Whorls and Textile Tools in Ancient CyprusThe tools of spinning, weaving and dyeing in ancient Cyprus, from Neolithic bone needles to the terracotta whorls and loom weights of the Bronze Age.NeolithicChalcolithicEarly Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze AgeLate Bronze Age
Tools and Technologies of Ancient CyprusSectionThe crafts and technologies of ancient Cyprus, from Neolithic stone and bone toolkits through copper metallurgy and the potter's wheel to early iron.NeolithicChalcolithicEarly Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze AgeLate Bronze AgeCypro-Geometric
Daily Life
5 entriesSection overview
Village Life in Early Bronze Age CyprusEveryday life in the unwalled farming villages of Philia and Early Cypriot Cyprus, known best from the excavated settlements of Marki-Alonia and Sotira-Kaminoudhia.Early Bronze Age
Village Life in Middle Bronze Age CyprusEveryday life in Middle Cypriot villages, where households farmed, herded and made their own pots, copper tools and thread in courtyard compounds.Middle Bronze Age
Village Life in Late Bronze Age CyprusRural life in Late Cypriot Cyprus outside the towns, pieced together from a few excavated farming, mining, storage and pottery-making sites.Late Bronze Age
Furniture in Ancient CyprusHow Cypriots sat, slept and stored goods from the Neolithic to the Archaic kingdoms, known almost entirely from built benches, clay models, seals and royal tombs.NeolithicChalcolithicEarly Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze AgeLate Bronze AgeCypro-Archaic
Subsistence, Craft, and Community in Prehistoric and Archaic CyprusSectionHow ordinary Cypriots farmed, herded, cooked, built houses and made pots, tools and cloth from the Neolithic to the Cypro-Archaic period.NeolithicChalcolithicEarly Bronze AgeMiddle Bronze AgeLate Bronze AgeCypro-Archaic