.' THE ONTOGENESIS OF CYPRIOT JOHN LUND The aim of this study is to examine the emergence and early history Cypriot Sigillata. It is based on the author's conviction that chang any archaeological material - in casu a characteristic ceramic ware of the Eastern Mediterranean in the Late Hellenistic and Rom periods - must be due either to deliberate or unconscious choices m by individuals. If so, a proper understanding of these may consequen help us to decipher some of the underlying historical processes. ] Hayes, K.W. Slane and other scholars have clarified many of the iss involved, but the question has not yet been the subject of a separate vestigation from the perspective of this particular ware. The ontogenesis of Cypriot Sigillata from the late 2nd century BC the early 1 st century AD is analysed below on the background of the ramic tradition in its presumed source area: Western Cyprus. An tempt is made to determine whether we are dealing with a developm that was primarily local or one brought about by external factors - combination of the two. The results are set in a wider context by a b account of the early development of the other major Hellenistic Roman red-gloss wares of the Aegean and the Levant. The countries of the Eastern Mediterranean have been unevenly plored by archaeologists, and the material at hand is accordingly by means as complete as one might wish for. Also, the available publ tions of excavations and surveys differ widely in scope and quality this as in other fields of research it is all too easy to confuse facts w Jactoids, i.e. "mere speculations or guesses which have been repeated often that they are eventually taken for hard facts") The conclusi reached below should accordingly be regarded as preliminary and o to revision when the record becomes more fully known.