Seeking the Cypriot Merchant. Personal objects as indicators of identity?
Abstract
The subject of trade in the Eastern Mediterranean littoral during the Late Bronze Age and the role of Cyprus in these exchange networks, have received significant scholarly attention over the past decades. However, the identification of the physical presence of the Cypriot merchants outside Cyprus has yet to be discussed in detail, primarily due to the methodological problems and limitations of such a research questions. This paper suggests it is possible to acquire a sense of the whereabouts of these merchants outside Cyprus, especially in the Aegean and the Levant, by attempting to identify personal belongings which can be used as identity indicators. For this purpose, selected material culture from Cyprus, which was found outside the island, is discussed together with contemporary textual evidence, where available. A contextual examination of clay bull-shaped vessels, female figurines (Type A and B), and large pithoi can provide useful insights as they may be considered personal objects of Cypriots. This combined study of material culture and textual evidence showed that it is possible to identify certain areas, both coastal and inland, where Cypriot merchants could have resided, leaving behind them traces of their presence.
Keywords
Full Text:
PDFReferences
Alexandrou, C. 2016. Following the Life-Cycle of Base-Ring Female Figurines in Late Bronze Age Cyprus, Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Dublin, Trinity College.
Antonaccio, C 2009. “(Re)defining ethnicity: Culture, material culture, and identity”. In Material Culture and Social Identities in the Ancient World, edited by Sh. Hales and T. Hodos, Cambridge University Press, 32-53.
Artzy, M. 1998. “Routes, Trade, Boats and Nomads of the Sea”. In Mediterranean Peoples in Transition: Thirteenth to Early Tenth Centuries BCE. In Honor of Professor Trude Dothan, edited by S. Gitin, A. Mazar, and E. Stern, Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 439-448.
Bachhuber, Ch. 2006. “Aegean Interest on the Uluburun Ship”, AJA 110.3: 345-363.
Bell, C. 2006. The Evolution of Long Distance Trading Relationships across the LBA/Iron Age Transition on the Northern Levantine Coast: Crisis, continuity and change. A study based on imported ceramics, bronze and its constituent metals, BAR-IS 1574, Oxford: Archaeopress.
Bevan, A. 2007. Stone Vessels and Values in the Bronze Age Mediterranean, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Bushnell, L. 2013. The socio-economic implications of the distribution of juglets in the eastern Mediterranean during the Middle and Late Bronze Age, Doctoral thesis, University College London.
Cline, Ε.Η. 2009. Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea. International trade and the Late Bronze Age Aegean, BAR-IS 591, Oxford: Archaeopress.
Crewe, L. 2012. “Beyond Copper: Commodities and Values in Middle Bronze Cypro-Levantine Exchanges”, OJA 31.3: 225-243.
Davies, de G., N. and R.O. Faulkner, 1947. “A Syrian Trading Venture to Egypt”, The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, 33: 40-46.
Fischer, P.M. and T. Bürge, 2018. “The New Swedish Cyprus Expedition 2017: Excavations at Hala Sultan Tekke (The Söderberg Expedition). Preliminary results, with contributions by M. Ausiayevich, B. Placiente Robedizo, V. Barrera Alarcón, L. Recht, and D. Kofel”, Opuscula. Annual of the Swedish Institutes at Athens and Rome (OpAthRom) 11: 29-79.
Fischer, P.M. and T. Bürge, 2019, “The New Swedish Cyprus Expedition 2018: Excavations at Hala Sultan Tekke (The Söderberg Expedition). Preliminary results, with contributions by J. Tracz and D. Kofel”, Opuscula. Annual of the Swedish Institutes at Athens and Rome (OpAthRom) 12: 287-326.
Frankel, D. and J.M. Webb. 1998. “Three Faces of Identity: Ethnicity, Community, and Status in the Cypriot Bronze Age”, MeditArch 11: 1-12.
Goren, Y., S. Bunimovitz, I. Finkelstein and N. Na’aman. 2003. “The Location of Alashiya: New Evidence from Petrographic Investigation of Alashiyan Tablets from El-Amarna and Ugarit”, AJA 107.2: 233-255.
Himmelhoch, L. 1993. “The Use of the Ethnics a-ra-si-jo and ku-pi-ri-jo in Linear B Texts”, Minos 25-26 (1990-1991): 91-104.
Hirschfeld, N. 1992. “Cypriot Marks on Mycenaean Pottery”. In Mykenaïka. Actes du IXe Colloque international sur les textes mycéniens et égéens, edited by J.-P. Olivier, Centre de l' Antiquité Grecque et Romaine de la Fondation Hellénique des Recherches Scientifiques et École française d'Athènes. BCH Suppl. 25. Diffusion de Boccard, Paris.,315-319.
Hirschfeld, N. 1996. “Cypriots in the Mycenaean Aegean”. In Atti e memorie del secondo Congresso internazionale di micenologia, Roma-Napoli, 14-20 ottobre 1991. Volume 1: Filologia. Incunabula Graeca 98, edited by E. De Miro, L. Godart and A. Sacconi, eds. Rome: Gruppo editoriale internazionale. p. 289-297.
Hirschfeld, N. 2005. Die zyprische Keramik aus dem Schiffswrack von Uluburun. In Das Schiff von Uluburun, edited by Ü. Yalçin, C. Pulak and R. Slotta, Welthandel vor 3000 Jahren, 103-108. Bochum: Deutsches Bergbaumuseum.
Kassianidou, V. 2017. “Η παραγωγή και το εμπόριο του κυπριακού χαλκού κατά την Εποχή του Χαλκού: Νέα δεδομένα”. In Αρχαία Κύπρος, 111-134.
Kassianidou, V. 2018. “Apliki Karamallos on Cyprus: the 13th century BCE miners’ settlement in context”. In Mining for Ancient Copper. Essays in Memory of Beno Rothenberg, edited by E. Ben Yosef, Eisenbrauns. 345-356
Knapp, A.B. 1983. “An Alashiyan Merchant at Ugarit”, Tel Aviv 10.1: 38-45.
Knapp, A.B. (ed.) 1996. Near Eastern and Aegean Texts from the Third to the First Millennia BC. Sources for the History of Cyprus Volume II. Altamont, NY: Greece and Cyprus Research Center.
Knapp, A.B. 2008. Prehistoric and Protohistoric Cyprus: Identity, Insularity, and Connectivity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Knapp, A.B. 2009. “Representations: Female figurines and social identity on Protohistoric Cyprus”, Medelhavsmuseet. Focus on the Mediterranean 5: 137-144.
Knapp, A.B. 2014a. “Seafaring and seafarers: the case for Late Bronze Age Cyprus”. In Structure, Measurement and Meaning: Studies on Prehistoric Cyprus in Honour of David Frankel, edited by J.M. Webb, SIMA 143, Uppsala: Åströms förlag, 79-93.
Knapp, A.B. 2014b. “Mediterranean Archaeology and Ethnicity”. In A Companion to Ethnicity in the Ancient Mediterranean, edited by J. McInerney, Blackwell Companions to the Ancient World. Chichester, West Sussex: Wiley Blackwell, 34-49.
Knapp, A.B. 2018. Seafaring and Seafarers in the Bronze Age Eastern Mediterranean, Leiden: Sidestone Press.
Knox, D.-K. 2012. Making sense of figurines in Bronze Age Cyprus. A Comprehensive Analysis of Cypriot Ceramic Figurative Material from EC I – LC IIIA (c.2300BC – c.1100BC), unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Manchester.
London, G. 2020. Wine Jars and Jar Makers of Cyprus: The Ethnoarchaeology of Pitharia (SIMA PB 188), Nicosia.
MacDonald, C. 1986. “Problems of the Twelfth Century BC in the Dodecanese”, BSA 81: 125-151.
Maguire, L.C. 2009. Tell El-Dab’a XXI. The Cypriot Pottery and its Circulation in the Levant, Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften Denkschriften der Gesamtakademie 51. Untersuchungen der Zweigstelle Kairo des Österreichischen Archäologischen Institutes 33, Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.
Maran, J. 2004. “The spreading of objects and ideas in the Late Bronze Age Eastern Mediterranean. Two case examples from the Argolid of the 13th and 12th centuries B.C.E., BASOR 336: 11-30.
Marschall, S. 2019. “‘Memory objects’: Material objects and memories of home in the context of intra-African mobility”, Journal of Material Culture 1-17.
Mee, C. 1982. Rhodes in the Bronze Age. Aris & Phillips, Warminster.
Monroe, Ch.M. 2009. Scales of Fate: Trade, Tradition, and Transformation in the Eastern Mediterranean ca. 1350-1175 BCE, AOAT 357, Münster: Ugarit-Verlag.
Moran, W.L. 1992. The Amarna Letters, Johns Hopkins University Press.
Nys, K. 2001. “Base-ring Bull-shaped Vases in Context”. In The Chronology of Base-ring Ware and Bichrome Wheel-made Ware. Proceedings of a Colloquium held in the Royal Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities, Stockholm, May 18-19 2000, edited by P. Åström, Stockholm: Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademien. Konferenser 54, 95-122.
Öniz, H. 2019. “A new Bronze Age shipwreck with ingots in the west of Antalya—preliminary results”, Palestine Exploration Quarterly, 151:1, 3-14.
Papadimitriou, N. 2012. “Regional or 'international' networks? A comparative examination of Aegean and Cypriot imported pottery in the Eastern Mediterranean”. In Talanta 44, Recent Research and Perspectives on the Late Bronze Age Eastern Mediterranean, edited by A. Papadopoulos, 92-136.
Papadimitriou, N. 2017. “Κυπριακό και αιγαιακό εµπόριο κατά την 2η χιλιετία π.Χ.: Μια συγκριτική εξέταση”. In Αρχαία Κύπρος. Πρόσφατες εξελίξεις στην αρχαιολογία της ανατολικής Μεσογείου, edited by N. Papadimitriou and M. Tolis, Αθήνα: Μουσείο Κυκλαδικής Τέχνης, 159-188.
Papadopoulos, A. 2017 “Report for the Study and publication of Cypriot and Aegean material stored at the PEF (Phase 2: 2015)”, Palestine Exploration Quarterly 149.1: 91-95.
Papasavvas, G. 2017. “Κυπριακή μεταλλοτεχνία της Ύστερης Εποχής του Χαλκού στο Μεσογειακό Κόσμο”. In Αρχαία Κύπρος, 135-158.
Petruso, K.M. 1992. Keos, Results of Excavations Conducted by the University of Cincinnati under the Auspices of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens VIII. Ayia Irini: The Balance Weights. An Analysis of Weight Measurement in Prehistoric Crete and the Cycladic Islands. Philipp von Zabern, Mainz on Rhine.
Pilides, D. 2019. “Egkomi British Excavations: The Cypriot pottery”. In The Tombs of Egkomi. British Museum Excavations), edited by D. Pilides, Nicosia: Department of Antiquities, 53-103.
Pulak, C. 2008. “The Uluburun Shipwreck and Late Bronze Age Trade”. In Beyond Babylon: Art, Trade, and Diplomacy in the Second Millennium B.C., edited by J. Aruz, K. Benzel and J.M. Evans, New York and New Haven: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Yale University Press, 288-385.
Rahmstorf, L. 2014. “A 'wall bracket' from Kandia in the Argolid: notes on the local character and function of an 'east Mediterranean' artefact of the Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age”. In Αθύρματα: Critical Essays on the Archaeology of the Eastern Mediterranean in Honour of E. Susan Sherratt, edited by Y. Galanakis, T. Wilkinson, and J. Bennet. Oxford: Archaeopress, 187-195.
Sacconi, A. 2009. “Ku-pi-ri-jo and Mycenaean trade”. In Δώρον: τιμητικός τομός για τον καθηγητή Σπύρο Ιακωβίδη, edited by D.
Daniilidou. Σειρά Μονογραφιών 6, Αθήνα: Ακαδημία Αθηνών, Κέντρον Ερεύνης της Αρχαιότητος, 611-617.
Sauvage, C. 2012. Routes maritimes et systèmes d'échanges internationaux au Bronze récent en Méditerranée orientale, Travaux de la Maison de l’Orient et de la Méditerranée 61, Lyon: Maison de l’Orient et de la Méditerranée - Jean Pouilloux.
Schofield, L. and R.B. Parkinson, 1994. “Of Helmets and Heretics: A Possible Egyptian Representation of Mycenaean Warriors on a Papyrus from el-Amarna, BSA 89: 157-170.
Shai, I., Ch. McKinny, M. Spigelman, D. Ben Shlomo, A. Karasik, D. Namdar & J. Uziel, 2019. “Two Cypriot Pithoi from Late Bronze Age Tel Burna”, Tel Aviv, 46.1: 65-82.
Sherratt, S. 2003. “The Mediterranean Economy: ‘Globalization’ at the End of the Second Millennium B.C.E.”. In Symbiosis, Symbolism, and the Power of the Past: Canaan, Ancient Israel, and Their Neighbors from the Late Bronze Age through Roman Palaestina. Proceedings of the Centennial Symposium, W. F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research and American Schools of Oriental Research, Jerusalem, May 29-31, 2000, edited by W.G. Dever and S. Gitin, Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 37-62.
Tomlinson, J.E., J.B. Rutter and S.M.A. Hoffmann. 2010. “Mycenaean and Cypriot Late Bronze Age Ceramic Imports to Kommos: An Investigation by Neutron Activation Analysis”, Hesperia 79.2: 191-231.
Tufnell, O. 1958. Lachish (Tell el Duweir). Vol. IV: The Bronze Age, Oxford University Press.
Vetters, M. 2011. “A Clay Ball with a Cypro-Minoan Inscription from Tiryns”, AA 2011. 2: 1-49
Voskos, I. and A.B. Knapp. 2008. “Cyprus at the End of the Late Bronze Age: Crisis and Colonization or Continuity and Hybridization?”, AJA 112.4: 659-684.
Wengrow, D. 1996. “Egyptian taskmasters and heavy burdens: Highland Exploitation and the collared‐rim pithos of the Bronze/Iron Age Levant”, OJA 15.3: 307-326.
“Merchant”, Merriam-Webster online dictionary
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/merchant
Date of last access: 5 September 2020.
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.26247/aura5.8
Refbacks
- There are currently no refbacks.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
ISSN: 2623-3428 (digital), 2623-3436 (print)
© 2018-2020 National and Kapodistrian University of Athen, Department of History and Archaeology.