The discovery of Neolithic artifacts in the Akamas peninsula suggests that the region played a greater role in prehistoric Cyprus than previously thought, the Cyprus Mail reported.
In April 2022, researchers from the University of Cyprus led by Dr. Theodora Moutsiou and Dr. Christian Reepmeyer discovered over a thousand stone objects with Epipaleolithic and early Aceramic Neolithic features.
The excavations also revealed a part of a stone feature which function is still unknown. In the test trench, charcoal samples were uncovered and will be radiocarbon dated in the near future.
The existence of a plethora of stone flakes smaller than one centimeter in size, both on the surface and within the trench, shows that they moved very little from their original deposition place.
Moutsiou and Reepmeyer conducted a surface survey using a grid for systematic collection of lithic artifacts on a plot that had previously been identified as a high-interest area. In the grid’s richest sector, a 1×1 m test trench was excavated. The test trench was designed to determine site stratigraphy and locate items for charcoal dating in situ.
The research was funded by the Cyprus Research Foundation as part of the Cyprus Research Award – Young Researcher, which was given to Moutsiou, and was coordinated by Professor Vasiliki Kassianidou as the academic contact point.
This discovery, in such a remote and secluded part of the island, calls into question the widely held belief that the Akamas peninsula was a culturally marginal area during Cyprus’s early prehistory.
The most recent discoveries add new data and raise new questions for archaeologists in the region to answer in the future.
