Kevin Fisher, University of British Columbia
“The Urban Revolution on Aphrodite’s Isle: Searching for Cyprus’s Late Bronze Age Cities”

Abstract: The Late Bronze Age (ca. 1650–1100 BCE) was a revolutionary period on the island of Cyprus as it transformed from a relatively isolated, village-based, and largely egalitarian society, to one characterized by a complex social hierarchy and extensive international relations. It also saw the emergence on the island of the historically-attested Kingdom of Alashiya, the major source of copper in the eastern Mediterranean. The Kalavasos and Maroni Built Environments (KAMBE) Project is investigating the relationship between these profound changes and the “urban revolution” that saw the appearance of the island’s first cities. The project uses remote sensing, excavation, and cutting-edge digital technologies to reveal and model the urban fabric of the sites of Kalavasos-Ayios Dhimitrios and Maroni-Vournes/Tsaroukkas in south-central Cyprus. This work provides important insights into the role of urban place-making in the emergence of new patterns of social interaction and the exercise of power. Dr. Fisher’s presentation features the results of new field work at Kalavasos-Ayios Dhimitrios, a possible source of the famous Amarna letters written from the King of Alashiya to the Pharaoh Akhenaten in the 14th century BCE.

Kevin Fisher

Kevin Fisher is an anthropological archaeologist interested in the relationship between people and their built environments, urbanism and the social dynamics of ancient cities, and the application of digital technologies for recording, analyzing and visualizing archaeological phenomena. He received a PhD in Anthropology from the University of Toronto (2007). Since 2013 he has been an Assistant Professor of Eastern Mediterranean Archaeology in the Department of Classical, Near Eastern, and Religious Studies at the University of British Columbia. His research focuses mainly on the early complex societies of the eastern Mediterranean and Near East, especially Cyprus, although he’s worked on projects in Greece, Jordan, Peru, Guatemala, the US and Canada. He’s currently a co-director of the Kalavasos and Maroni Built Environments (KAMBE) Project, an investigation of the relationship between urban landscapes, interaction and social change in Late Bronze Age Cyprus (c. 1700-1100 BCE).

For more about Kevin Fisher: http://cnrs.ubc.ca/people/kevin-fisher/

For Further Reading: http://kambe.cnrs.ubc.ca/