Late Bronze Age trade between Sardinia and Cyprus.
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During winter 2019, thanks to an interdisciplinary collaboration, five more or less complete bowls of Sardinian origin were detected among recently excavated material from the necropolis of Hala Sultan Tekke, Cyprus. The bowls have the typical shape and the technological and petrographic characteristics of Nuragic so-called burnished gray ware. They represent the first examples of this kind of pottery ever reported from Cyprus. Other Nuragic ceramics are known from Sicily, Crete, and Cyprus, but, so far, fine drinking ware had not been found outside the island. Over the years, the investigations at the site of Hala Sultan Tekke have provided many interesting features and finds. Hala was an urban settlement of considerable size and wealth, with a strategic position close to the sea, and a natural harbor, which had roughly the contour of today’s local salt lake. The excavations at the site revealed, among other things, striking evidence of varied craft production, including metalworking of consistent scale, In addition to the settlement, an extra-urban necropolis has also been detected. The discovery of Nuragic tableware from Hala Sultan Tekke arrives as a welcome addition to a long-lived debate on the character of the specific connections between Sardinia and Cyprus. Despite diverging positions, the new finds provide strong evidence for the idea of a distinctive and intensive relationship between Cyprus and Sardinia. It also reinforces earlier suggestions that considered Nuragic Sardinian communities to have been seafaring participants in the long distance metal trade in the Mediterranean.