NICOSIA, Aug. 23 (Xinhua) -- Archaeologists working at an archaeological site known as Prastio-Mesorotsos in a west Cyprus river valley have uncovered the interior space of a presumed Chalcolithic building which showed the way of living of people who lived about 7,000 years ago, the Department of Antiquities said on Friday.
Announcing the completion of the 2019 University of Edinburgh archaeological investigations, the department said that features within this space include a well-preserved plaster hearth and a well-built plaster floor of an Early- or Middle-Chalcolithic house.
The statement said the site is situated around a rocky outcrop that acts as one of the most important topographical features in the valley of Diarizos.
It seems to have been at a crossroad between the lowlands and the uplands and between the west of Cyprus and the rest of the island to the east. Its location and the proximity of abundant natural resources led to the site's extraordinary longevity, showing evidence for continuous occupation for about 12,000 years, that is from the Pre-pottery Neolithic (about 10,000 - 8,800 BC) until the modern day.
Features within the interior space of a presumed Chalcolithic building, according to the statement, include a well-preserved plaster hearth and a well-built plaster floor of an Early- or Middle-Chalcolithic house. This seems to have remained undisturbed for centuries, as it was covered by collapsed roof material.
At this time, inhabitants continued to live in circular structures for several architectural phases and did not seem to alter their lifestyles greatly between the Late Chalcolithic and the Early Cypriot periods.
The archaeological team also uncovered the remains of a round domestic structure with a pit hearth, likely dating to this transitional period.
Archaeologists concluded that although the Early Cypriot inhabitants were rather slow to change their lifestyles and were probably reluctant to do so, change did occur eventually, and the settlement, its architecture and probably the inhabitants' lifestyles were significantly reconfigured in the Middle Cypriot period (MC), starting at about 2,000 BC.
