CHALCOLITHIC AGE IN CYPRUS : ART

Art:

1- Pottery Making: We already made a reference to the produce and use of handmade pottery in the later Neolithic period (4600-4500- 4000/3900) in Cyprus. The potteries made in the North of the island were painted in red on a white ground, sometimes using a brush with multiple heads; in the south, patterns were made by combing the slip (a specially prepared clay solution used for coating vessels) by means of a tool with multiple teeth.

Chalcolithic pottery shows the emergence of new forms. The predominant decoration is now red painted on a white ground, with a variety of linear and floral ornaments.

2- Figurines: The human form appeared in the art of the earliest inhabitants of Cyprus and remained as dominant theme throughout the antiquity. With a few exceptions the figures of the Chalcolithic Period like the Neolithic ones were quite small, no more than 19 centimeters in height. As we already said the Neolithic figures are rather elementary representations of the human form: these are figures with the arms and legs reduced to mere stumps. The latest example of this type including one from Lemba which is 36 cm. tall, are contemporary with another variety called cruciform figures typical of the Chalcolithic Era (4000/3900-2500 BC.). Shaped like a cross, almost invariably made of soft stone (bluish green picrolite or serpentine), this type has now been shown to have developed within Cyprus from the stump-like form. The cruciform category includes some figures of terra-cotta. An interesting repertoire in that material shows the ingenuity of the Chalcolithic artist. These figures are either sexless or with small breasts in relief. The arms are the most characteristic feature of this category of figures. They are stretched out sideways stiffly and are full-length. They are always represented in a sitting position on a high seat with their knees bended. There is nothing like them in prehistoric culture. Their symbolic significance, however, is totally different, and not immediately apparent. Once again it is also connected with the theme of survival and their mission is to act as fertility cults. Many of them were pierced which reminds us that they were worn as pendants. Some were found as miniatures on necklaces. They were probably worn exclusively to encourage, by sympathetic magic, a new birth.

Some of these figures are depicted with their outstretched arms transformed into another horizontal figure, which most probably symbolize the mother with a baby in her arms. But when the size of the horizontal figure is compared with the main figure, it makes us laugh with its incredibly large size almost equal to her. Also, the legs are bended as if in a sitting position like the main figure.

 

There are a few unique figures, which are in different postures. One of this is a figurine depicting double body, one on top of the other one. This rare example in the Allard Pierson Museum in Amsterdam shows one figure perched on the top of the head of another. Both have the typical, sharply bent legs and the stiffly outstretched arms with blunt ends. Both have polished picrolite surfaces with no incised details. This is most probably representing mother with her child sitting on her head.

 

 

The second unique example is triple body, joined at the feet. The remarkable and unique object shows tree Cruciform figures, connected to one another by the feet and spread out equidistantly at angles of 120 degrees. One of them has a distinct head while the second one does not. The third figure is broken. There are different suggestions for the symbolic meaning of this object. It may be a symbol of kinship of three tribes or a symbol of sex depicting a husband with two wives or a symbol of fertility, with a demand for a family with three children.

 

 

Two unusual Chalcolithic terracottas are unique with their postures as well. These are depicting woman squeezing their breasts. These are also called lactation figures since one of them is seen as if collecting the milk in a bowl. This may be thought that she is doing this just to offer her milk for some symbolic ceremony. There are suggestions that the way she is squeezing her breast is in fact is a posture of mourning and she may be doing this just to offer her milk to her deceased husband or baby.

 

 

The terra-cotta figure which is in the Pierides Foundation Museum since 1978 was discovered in Souskio in Cyprus. It represents a male figure seated on a low, four-legged stool. The head and body parts are modeled hollow, but the legs and arms are solid. The clay for thick parts, such as the legs and arms, is gray at the core and brownish at the surface.

 

This male figure given in the above picture is nude. He is seated on a low stool, which is flat, rectangular to rounded legs. His knees are bended and his elbows resting on them. The artists have added extraordinary detail, such as the hair and the neck muscles shown in distinct relief. It must mean that it was of particular importance to show this male at a moment of great physical strain and body tension. Through the perforation at the top of the man if one pours liquid it flows through the conspicuous penis. The statuette could be considered not only as the first and unique example of its kind in the whole Chalcolithic Cyprus but also as having possibly immediate connections with certain religious ceremonies taking place in the southwestern Cyprus in honor of the fertility of female or male deity. It is easy to imagine the figure being carried around from field to field to perform its seminal libation and magically fertilize the crops. However, similar figures dated to the end of the Neolithic period were found in Thessaly and Romania.

It is the largest terra-cotta figure known from the Chalcolithic, having a height 36 cm., and is unlike anything found in Cyprus. But recent discoveries of fragments of fairly large-scale terracottas at Lemba, near western coast of the island suggest that this object like the other ones were locally made.

The iconography seems to belong to an old Balkan tradition, known since the Vinca period as suggested by Gimbutash. However, the position of the figurine in the Pierides foundation Museum, with the hands holding the head and the elbows on the knees, is nearer to the iconography of the so-called "sorrowful god", a well known figurine discovered in Romania. This figure is dated to the end of Neolithic culture while the Cypriot one is Chalcolithic. Therefore this dating makes the parallelism between them weak and strengthens the Cypriot Chalcolithic identity. Another similar link can be seen by another curious Chalcolithic figure from Cyprus.

It is an animal-shaped vessel with a human face - a kind of primitive "centaur" - possibly coming from Souskia. This item is on display in St. Barnabas Museum. Unfortunately it is displayed wrongly together with the Middle Bronze age objects.

Male representations are rare in Cyprus during the Chalcolithic period, even if a stone phallus comes from Souskiou.

3-Jewellery: The early community wore necklaces of locally available dentalium shells and beads of carnelian that came from the east. In the Chalcolithic period picrolite (a soft soap like stone) was used to make pendants. These were often in the form of human figures shaped like a cross similar to many of the larger figurines in the same material. Groups of dentalium shells were still used for necklaces. An important innovation around 2500 BC. was the use of seals of stone apparently to stamp pottery or personal items.

 

 

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