This Week in Cypriot Archaeology: 30 March–5 April 2026

The Department of Antiquities announced the return from the United States of a Cypro-Archaic jug that its officers had found for sale online. In Nicosia, the Department's director answered criticism over the delays to the new archaeological museum, and a curator set out how its galleries will tell the island's story. The Department also published its programme for the International Day for Monuments and Sites.

Map of Cyprus

This week's stories

• Museums
• Events
• Ground above 200, 500, 1,000 m

N

50 km

Sites on this map

1. 1Nicosia
2. 2Khirokitia
3. 3Kiti-Panayia Angeloktistos (approx.)
4. 4Kolossi (approx.)
5. 5Kourion-Sanctuary of Apollo Hylates

Heritage crime

A small jug of White Painted V ware, which the Department dates to the Cypro-Archaic II period (600–480 BCE), reached the Cypriot Embassy in Washington on 27 March, the Department announced on 31 March. Archaeological officers who watch the internet for illegal trafficking of Cypriot antiquities had spotted it in an online auction. After the Department contacted Kleinfelter's Auction Inc., the lot was withdrawn, and the Department thanked the auction house and the possessor for the voluntary return.

Iron Age White Painted is wheel-made pottery painted in matt black or brown on a pale ground. Two similar returns had been announced earlier in March: on 10 March the Department reported 18 antiquities handed over in Washington on 23 February after another online sale, and on 17 March a Black-on-Red jug handed over in London on 7 March, also after an online sale was stopped.

Museums

Speaking on 3 April at the first public event in the restored Famagusta Gate in Nicosia, Dr Giorgos Georgiou, Director of the Department, said that the contractor building the new museum has asked for extensions of about a year and a half, which move the handover of the building from June 2026 to December 2027. Construction is the business of the Public Works Department. His own department can start fitting out the galleries, about 6,000 objects, and moving some 250,000 antiquities out of the stores of the Cyprus Museum only once the keys are handed over.

At the same gate, at an event organised by the Friends of Nicosia, Curator of Antiquities Eftychia Zachariou presented the plan for the displays. The galleries sit in three raised volumes, Place, Sea and World, over a public square: the land and prehistory, the island as a hub of ships and trade, and its dealings with its neighbours. In her account the old colonial picture of Cyprus as a passive receiver of outside influence gives way to many Cypriot identities, with themes such as copper, the sea, the island's separate regional states and its several languages. 3D models of objects, and reconstructions of sanctuaries, baths, houses and tombs, are being made with the Cyprus Institute. She gave 2028 as the expected opening and said the old building on Museum Street, now a listed monument, will stay a museum for the later periods. Six months later, on 30 September, MPs heard that the new building would not be delivered before 2028 (our brief).

Events

On 31 March the Department published its programme for 18 April, the International Day for Monuments and Sites, which UNESCO established in 1983 on the proposal of ICOMOS. This year's theme is living heritage and the response to emergencies. Entry to the Department's open sites and monuments is free on Saturday 18 April.

The series opened in the week itself, on 4 April at the Famagusta Gate, with a study day on the Venetian and Ottoman fortifications of Nicosia; the speakers were Antonis Hadjikyriacou of Panteion University, Angel Nicolaou-Konnari of the University of Cyprus and Stathis Birtachas of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, with Dr Georgiou in the chair. On 18 April at 7pm, the church of Panagia Angeloktisti at Kiti hosts Memories from Stone, an evening of photographs, a short film and music with the Metropolis of Kition, on three churches of the Virgin: Kanakaria at Lythrangomi and Kyra at Livadia, both in the occupied north, and Angeloktisti itself.

On 19 April the municipality of Kourion and the Limassol old car club run a charity drive for autism in old and new cars past Kolossi castle, the sanctuary of Apollo Hylates and the monastery of St Nicholas of the Cats. On 25 April a morning walk on the trail at Khirokitia is guided with the excavator Odile Le Brun, and on 15 May schoolchildren from the village make stone tools at the site with Dr Theodora Moutsiou.