Excavations in Cyprus in 1894

Abstract

Early in 1894 the Committee of the Cyprus Exploration Fund offered the small balance which remained from the excavations of 1891, to the British School of Archaeology in Athens, for use in Cyprus if possible. As a student of the School was then watching the excavations which were being carried on at Amathus on behalf of the British Museum, this sum was applied to defray part of the cost of several small excavations, the principal object of which was to test certain theories current in Cypriote archaeology; though some new ground was broken incidentally.Five sites were examined in all; none of them exhaustively, but all with distinct and definite result.I.—Agia Paraskevi (Nicosia District): Bronze Age Necropolis.The celebrated Bronze Age Necropolis which occupies the edge of the plateau S.W. of Nicosia seemed the most suitable site for making practical acquaintance with the Bronze Age of Cyprus, and for verifying previous observations, with a view to the re-organisation of the Cyprus Museum which took place in the course of the summer.Fourteen tombs were opened along the northern edge of the plateau, half a mile north of the Church of Agia Paraskevi, to the west of the Larnaka road, and between it and the stone quarries in the direction of the village of Agii Omologitádes. The tombs in the surface of this part of the plateau were found nearly exhausted by Dr. Ohnefalsch-Richter's excavations in 1883–4: but enough evidence was collected to illustrate the general character of the site. Tomb 12, as explained below, was an intruder of Hellenistic or Graeco-Roman date. Similar tombs have been opened on the low hills west of the road to Strobilo village.