Cypriot Figure History

Cypriot female figurines are clearly associated with fertility and childbirth, and this figure with her flattened thighs is squatting in a birthing position. The detailed head of the woman with added facial features and hair atop an elongated neck contrasts with her highly schematized body with its large pendent breasts. The double-roped bands on the arms may represent some form of jewelry. 

Female figurines are found throughout the Mediterranean in the third millennium B.C. Over one hundred cruciform figures made in southwestern Cyprus in the period 3000 - 2500 B.C. are known, but almost all are considerably smaller in scale than this example. Only one other figure of this large size is known; these two may have served as cult images representing a fertility goddess. 

The figure's left arm, with its clearly visible attachment holes, was repaired in antiquity. This repair attests to the figure's value and importance to the ancient Cypriots.

Transitional period between the Stone Age and the Bronze Age. Most Chalcolithic settlements are found in Western Cyprus, where a fertility cult developed. Copper is being discovered and exploited on a small scale.

The Chalcolithic period is best described as the in-between or transitional period, between the Stone & Bronze Ages. Despite the fact that the Chalcolithic period was at least 1500 years pre Bronze Age, this was still the period that bronze was first discovered, and exploited on a very small minimal scale.

8.) http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0107447.html#axzz0yc7lxSEL

Cyprus was the site of early Phoenician and Greek colonies. For centuries its rule passed through many hands. It fell to the Turks in 1571, and a large Turkish colony settled on the island.
In World War I, at the outbreak of hostilities with Turkey, Britain annexed the island. It was declared a Crown colony in 1925. The Greek population, which regarded Greece as its mother country, sought self-determination and union (enosis) with Greece. In... [continues]

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