In December 2012 a group of scholars met in Münster to present their recent studies on the multifaceted history and culture of medieval Cyprus - and most of the papers presented at that conference are published in this volume. Several deal with the (political) history of the island: the reign of Isaakios Komnenos, the effects of the crusade of King Peter I in 1365, the so-called Ottoman-Venetian war. An overview of the three volumes of the Bullarium Cyprium is given. Aspects of economic life in medieval Cyprus are treated in three papers: organisation, management and economic activities of monastic estates in the Middle Byzantine period, medieval cane sugar production on the island, the commerce between the islands of Cyprus, Majorca and Sardinia. Papers on a major ecclesiastical complex dating from the early 7th century, on Cypriot artefacts of the 13th and 14th centuries used in daily life, on luxury metal objects from the Lusignan period, and on some rather disparate elements of 15th-century architecture in Cyprus give insights into the material culture of medieval Cyprus. Furthermore the topics of settlement patterns and insularity are treated in a paper on the successive relocations of the capital of the island of Cyprus from Late Antiquity to the Middle Ages. The book contains papers by Alexander Beihammer, Nicholas Coureas, Peter Edbury, Michael Grünbart, Michalis Olympios, Tassos Papacostas, Maria Parani, K. Scott Parker, Eleni Procopiou, Ulrike Ritzerfeld, Christopher Schabel, Marina Solomidou-Ieronymidou, Myrto Veiko and Joanita Vroom.

The Chalcolithic period in Cyprus has been known since Porphyrios Dikaios’ excavations at Erimi in the 1930s and through the appearance in the antiquities market of illicitly acquired anthropomorphic cruciform figures, often manufactured from picrolite, a soft blue-green stone. The excavations of the settlement and cemetery at Souskiou Laona reported on in this volume paint a very different picture of life on the island during the late 4th and early 3rd millennia BC. Burial practices at other known sites are generally single inhumations in intramural pit graves, only rarely equipped with artifacts. At Souskiou, multiple inhumations were interred in deep rock-cut tombs clustered in extra-mural cemeteries. Although the sites were also subjected to extensive looting, excavations have revealed complex multi-stage burial practices with arrangements of disarticulated and articulated burials accompanied by a rich variety of grave goods. Chief among these are a multitude of cruciform figurines and pendants. This unusual treatment of the dead, which has not been recorded elsewhere in Cyprus, shifts the focus from the individual to the communal, and provides evidence for significant changes involving kinship group links to common ancestors. Excavations at the Laona settlement have furnished evidence suggesting that it functioned as a specialised center for the procurement and manufacture of picrolite during its early phase. The subsequent decline of picrolite production and the earliest known occurrence of new types of ornaments, such as faience beads and copper spiral pendants, attest to important changes involving the transformation of personal and social identities during the first centuries of the 3rd millennium BC, a topic that forms a central theme of this final report on the site.

Covering both the North and the South of Cyprus with equal detail and objectivity, this guide includes features on the island's turbulent history and current politics. It provides accounts of the island's attractions, from the popular beach resorts to the remote hillside villages, and reviews of the best places to eat, drink and sleep for every budget.

Waiting for the End of the World? addresses the archaeological, architectural, historical and geological evidence for natural disasters in the Middle Ages between the 11th and 16th centuries. This volume adopts a fresh interdisciplinary approach to explore the many ways in which environmental hazards affected European populations and, in turn, how medieval communities coped and responded to short- and long-term consequences. Three sections, which focus on geotectonic hazards (Part I), severe storms and hydrological hazards (Part II) and biophysical hazards (Part III), draw together 18 papers of the latest research while additional detail is provided in a catalogue of the 20 most significant disasters to have affected Europe during the period. These include earthquakes, landslides, tsunamis, storms, floods and outbreaks of infectious diseases. Spanning Europe, from the British Isles to Italy and from the Canary Islands to Cyprus, these contributions will be of interest to earth scientists, geographers, historians, sociologists, anthropologists and climatologists, but are also relevant to students and non-specialist readers interested in medieval archaeology and history, as well as those studying human geography and disaster studies. Despite a different set of beliefs relating to the natural world and protection against environmental hazards, the evidence suggests that medieval communities frequently adopted a surprisingly ‘modern’, well-informed and practically minded outlook.