Souskiou: settlement and cemeteries in the Chalcolithic

The explanations distinguish finds, interpretations and open questions. Sources appear at the end of the page.

Two excavation areas

The final volume, "Figurine Makers of Prehistoric Cyprus: Settlement and Cemeteries at Souskiou", edited by Edgar Peltenburg, Diane Bolger and Lindy Crewe, was published in 2019 by Oxbow Books. Its document page on ancientcyprus.com lists two excavation projects: the Department of Antiquities of Cyprus excavations of the Chalcolithic cemetery at Souskiou-Vathyrkakas in 1991-1997, directed by Demos Christou and Evi Baxevani, and the Edinburgh excavations of the settlement and cemetery at Souskiou-Laona in 1992-2011, directed by Edgar J. Peltenburg, Lindy Crewe and Sorina Spanou. Source 1.

The cemetery and the settlement

According to the same page, in 1951 Tryphonas A. Koulermou and George Pastos identified the settlement while trying to locate the habitations of those buried at Vathyrkakas Cemetery 1; in 1972 Maier noted the discovery of the Laona cemetery and reported 14 visible and empty tombs. Louise Steel's survey "Archaeology in Cyprus 1997-2002" (2003), as summarised on its document page on the same website, records that at Souskiou-Laona 115 Chalcolithic tombs had been excavated by 2003, mostly closely spaced and frequently reused, with picrolite objects, pottery, beads and chipped stone tools among the finds. In the survey's list of excavations the Laona cemetery is marked "Middle Chalcolithic". Sources 1, 2.

Picrolite cruciform figurines

According to the Department of Antiquities, Cyprus page on the Paphos museum, a workshop for picrolite cruciform figurines is documented at the site. The title of the 2019 volume speaks of "figurine makers of prehistoric Cyprus", and the document page points to works on the cruciform figures of Chalcolithic Cyprus; but the pages read do not describe the workshop itself, its place within the site or its date. Sources 3, 1.

Dating

The sources read give no years, only the labels "Chalcolithic" and "Middle Chalcolithic". The article is therefore placed in the site's Chalcolithic, which the Department of Antiquities' chronological table dates to 3900-2500 BCE and the Met's timeline to about 3900-2500 BCE. Where within that range the Middle Chalcolithic falls, the sources read do not say, so the article gives it no numbers. Sources 1, 2, 4, 5.

What can be asked

The question of what the place of burial tells about the community starts here from a modest fact: at Souskiou cemeteries were excavated alongside a settlement, and in 1951 the habitations of those buried in one cemetery were searched for. The wording implies that the cemetery lay away from the houses, but the pages read do not say when burial outside the houses began or whether people were also buried within the settlement. Closely spaced, frequently reused tombs raise questions about families or groups returning to the same place, but an answer needs the tomb data of the final volume. Sources 1, 2.

Scope of reading: on 24 October 2026 the two document pages on ancientcyprus.com and the Met's timeline for 8000-2000 BCE were read. The Department of Antiquities pages cited here could not be opened for checking on 24 October 2026; the details from them follow notes taken from those pages at an earlier stage and were not re-checked. The volume itself, Steel's article and the excavation reports were not read, so this page gives no tomb plans, numbers of individuals or radiocarbon dates.