Recent archaeological investigations in Cyprus have considerably changed our perception of the arrival of early farmers on the island. Evidence from the emblematic small rock shelter of Akrotiri-Aetokremnos (10.500 BC) and a number of less well-documented Epipalaeolithic sites on the island provide a glimpse of the hunter-gatherer way of life in Cyprus while the case of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic village of Ag. Tychonas-Klimonas (9.100-8.600 BC) shows, albeit tentatively, that early cultivated species (emmer wheat) was introduced to Cyprus from the mainland. At the same time hunting (small wild boar) and gathering of plants (pistachio) continued to support a foraging niche, entertaining the presence of a rather obscure archaeologically transition period to farming on the island. The conditions under which foraging on Cyprus became unstable and therefore open to a long transformation process towards farming or how the early farming niche of the mainland was transferred to the island, will be examined on the context of the new available archaeological evidence from the mainland. Moreover, the paper will probe the limits of concepts such as ‘insularity’, ‘sea foraging’ and ‘maritime way of life’ and their role in shaping the early archaeological record and therefore the prevailing narratives. This will include the archaeological evidence from the newly excavated Aceramic Khirokitia culture site of Ag. Ioannis/Vretsia-Upper Roudias (mid-7^th^ mill BC) in upland Troodos, which comments on issues of ‘insularity’ and ‘regionality’ in early Cyprus. The degree of interaction or absence of it between the foraging and farming way of life on the island, which often reveal territorial preferences, networks of contacts, exchanges and procurement strategies etc, will be presented and discussed.

Dr. Nikos Efstratiou

Born in Australia, Nikos Efstratiou studied archaeology (B.A) at the University of Thessaloniki, Greece and prehistory at the Institute of Archaeology, University of London, UK (M.A, Ph.D). He has directed interdisciplinary archaeological and ethnoarchaeological field projects (excavations, surveys) in various parts of Greece (Northern Sporades Aegean Islands, Thrace, Western Macedonia, Crete, Lemnos) and abroad (Spain, Cyprus, Sultanate of Oman). He is currently teaching courses of Prehistoric Archaeology and Ethnoarchaeology at the Department of Archaeology.

Contact:
Dr. Nikos Efstratiou
Professor of Prehistoric Archaeology
Department of Archaeology
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki 54 124
Greece
efstrati@hist.auth.gr

• Neolithic
• Moving Stones