Alassa: the Department of Antiquities dam rescue excavations

At Alassa, in the Kouris valley, the Department of Antiquities uncovered a Late Cypriot settlement with courtyard houses and metalworking debris at Pano Mandilaris, and from 1991 monumental ashlar buildings at Paliotaverna, one of them, Building II, covering 1,410 m2^1,2,3. The work was directed by Sophocles Hadjisavvas, archaeologist of the Department of Antiquities, between 1984 and 2000^1,4. It followed a 1983 survey of the upper Kouris valley, a prelude to construction of a major dam, which produced new evidence for Late Bronze Age settlement in the area^5,6.

The first season, 1984

The first season, in 1984, worked in two sectors¹. The first was a fifth-century Roman villa near the village, fully excavated, with a bath suite of two hot rooms with hypocausts, a peristyle atrium with mosaic pavement and fountain, a mosaic room to the north, and a pool with a four-step stair to the south¹. The second was a small area of the Late Cypriot settlement at Alassa-Pano Mandilaris, where houses were built around a courtyard containing dressed stones used as post bases. Slag beside bellows, copper-sulphate ore and basins showed metalworking, and the finds included a fragmentary bellows pot and a miniature copper ingot, 6.6 cm wide, similar to Enkomi examples¹. Terracotta bull figurines near a pit and an altar-like feature were taken in the Chronique as evidence for a sanctuary nearby, and a Late Cypriot III chamber tomb with four burials was also excavated¹. The Chronique compared the settlement with Bamboula at Episkopi and suggested that the two, with others not yet located, might belong to a chain of towns from the copper region to the coast¹.

Tombs at Pano Mandilaris and in the dam area

In 1986 the Period II house floors excavated in 1985 were removed to reach lower levels, and the two construction phases were defined⁷. Three Late Cypriot II tholos tombs were excavated; the Chronique reports that all had been looted during tree planting in the field⁷. They had irregular pit dromoi, circular stomia and benches, and held White Slip and Base Ring pottery and bronze bracelets; the third also held three Red Lustrous Wheelmade vases and Mycenaean IIIB sherds. Two lay in an enclosure whose curved wall was built over Tombs 7 and 8⁷.

Hadjisavvas reports continuous occupation from LC IB to LC IIIA, with no traces of violent destruction, abandonment or reoccupation. Tomb 5, with Base Ring I, White Slip I and Red Lustrous Wheelmade, is the earliest, and Tomb 3 was the richest, with 93 grave goods including gold jewellery and a hematite cylinder seal⁸. He also reported two Base Ring bull figurines on the floor of Locus 003⁸.

In 1987 the Department excavated many tombs in the Alassa and Kandou area during Kouris dam works, mostly Cypro-Archaic I-II⁶. Tomb 16 at Pano Mandilaris held a fragmentary Urartian-type bronze helmet, 19.8 cm high; Tomb 11 at Kambos a Phoenician Red Slip jug and a local imitation; Tomb 12 at Kambos an unusual bronze fibula. Roman Tomb 15 at Kandou-Kokkinospilios produced pottery, glass and lamps, and Tomb 17 two red-glazed lamps; the lamps include figured examples showing an erotic scene, a leaping stag and a siren⁶. Some of these tombs were registered in the Limassol regional museum in 1987; others were still in Nicosia being cleaned and restored⁶.

Paliotaverna

From 1991 excavation continued at Alassa-Paliotaverna, revealing two monumental ashlar buildings separated by a street; cleaning at Pano Mandilaris that year found a small hoard of bronze weapons in room B². Both buildings are LC IIC and were used into LC IIIA. Building II has a pi-shaped plan around a court and a north-wing storeroom with at least 16 pithoi, and was destroyed by fire^2,3,4. Three large ashlar buildings are counted there, 250 m northwest of Pano Mandilaris⁴. In 1993 part of a building up the slope to the north, separated from Building II by a narrow street, was revealed and at first taken for a third building; it was later found to be connected to the south wing of Building II^3,5. Hadjisavvas interprets an installation in Building III as a wine press and dates the north wing of Building II and the conversion of Building III to the start of LC IIIA⁹.

The 1997 season was devoted to uncovering Building II completely: drains were removed, the inner court excavated, and pits for sunken pithoi dug inside and outside, with many stamped pithos sherds recovered¹⁰. Finds in the building were scanty and mainly pithos sherds, many with roller seal impressions of chariots, bull and human processions and combats; more than 150 sealed pithos fragments are known from Alassa, and a bathtub lay in a small room of the south wing^3,4,10.

Dating and interpretation

Keswani reports that Hadjisavvas dates habitation floors at both localities to LC IIIA, with the foundation of Building II in LC IIC and earlier activity beneath floors and in tombs at Pano Mandilaris⁴. Herscher reports his suggestion of a regional administration tied to copper production, with a chain of local centres along river valleys linking the mining districts to coastal export settlements⁵. Jung dates the destruction of Paliotaverna Phase 1 to LC IIC, probably late¹¹.