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

accurately account for the internal developments on the island: “It seems quite certain
that the great change that then affected the industry [between the EC-MC and LC
periods] was not the result of an internal technical revolution, but was due to the impact
on the island of foreign metal-workers, their techniques and their products.” 147
Catling’s
claim is not supported by the current evidence, which shows that the island’s craft
industries, for the most part, seem to have acted upon indigenous preferences and
demands for tools. Judging by the broad regional and temporal tool tendencies, Cyprus
displays a unique dataset, reflecting very different social, economic, and political factors
in comparison to other areas (Figs. 3.1 and 3.3).
Classification of the entire corpus of tools into functional categories is shown in
Figure 3.4, and an analysis of the regional, chronological and contextual patterns of these
groupings constitute the majority of this chapter. Carpentry and masonry tools are the
most ubiquitous objects, followed, in quantity, by utilitarian objects, small craft tools,
agricultural tools, metallurgical implements (including stone molds), and ritual or
prestige items. The division of the dataset into functional categories indicates the
preference for tool types as well as the choices that were made in utilizing copper.
Agricultural and metallurgical tools are found in relatively low quantities. Many
implements for farming and metalworking are large, meaning that greater amounts of raw
metal was required to produce them; therefore it seems probable that their production and
use was confined to elite installations, which could afford them. Manufacturing smaller
tools, such as those intended for minor craft and utilitarian needs, did not require as much
material. The comparatively low number of metal agricultural tools suggests that they
were valuable with restricted distributions, most often found at large palatial or urban
147 Catling 1964, 78.
70