Middle and Late Bronze Age Metal Tools from the Aegean, Eastern ...

y region may reflect social and craft-related preferences, it is just as likely that differing
levels of accessibility to copper resources dictated the consumption patterns.
Within the entire study area, tools are almost three times more prominent in the
LBA than in the previous period (Fig. 3.1a, b). The far-reaching rise in LBA tools
throughout the study region likely corresponds to an expanded, international metal
industry on Cyprus, though this is not to say that the objects were produced on the island.
The distribution of LBA implements reflects greater accessibility of raw copper
throughout the Mediterranean. International exploitation of copper resources and the
greater availability of the metal partially explain the dramatic shift in tool consumption
during the second millennium. The evolution, expansion and even palatial organization of
craft industries also contributed to the increased number of tools in circulation.
While the other regions witnessed a dramatic rise in LBA tools, the Cypriot
quantities decreased by 12.5% from the MBA to the LBA. This is an odd pattern, but it
broadly demonstrates that the copper industry on the island was exploited by local
inhabitants for their own needs in the MBA (with some evidence for export).
Subsequently in the LBA, the international export of Cypriot metal became more
important than the island’s local consumption demands. The discrepancy in the volume
of metal consumed on Cyprus versus the Aegean in the LBA is emphasized by the
distribution of Cypriot copper oxhide ingots. A surprisingly low number of ingots have
been found on the eastern island, yet they are well distributed throughout the Aegean and
central Mediterranean. 144
Contrasting the decline in Cypriot tools from the MBA to the
LBA, the Greek mainland witnessed a twelve-fold increase in tools from the MH to LH
period. This change is remarkable, for LH implements represent the largest collection of
144 Gale 1991; Kassianidou 2009; Lo Schiavo et al. 2009.
66