Fast & Furious?

In the archaeological record of Early and Middle Bronze Age Cyprus, evidence has been detected of rapid destruction events, which have been identified as principal triggering factors of definitive abandonment processes in some of the main settlements investigated on the island. The present paper aims to review the destruction sequences of these Bronze Age Cypriot contexts and to scrutinize the available stratigraphic data in order to possibly attempt a characterisation of the abandonment dynamics at these settlements and possibly define if these processes were gradual, as part of a long-term project, or rapid and unplanned. While we could not trace precise motivations behind the abandonment of these contexts, data resulting from this analysis indicate that the majority of the settlements examined were abandoned in a planned and gradual process and that rapid single abandonment events occur only under relatively unique conditions.