1 PYLA-KOKKINOKREMOS: Short report of the 2019 campaign 1 Directors: Joachim Bretschneider, Jan Driessen & Athanasia Kanta A sixth joint excavation campaign between the Universities of Ghent, Louvain and the Mediterranean Archaeological Society took place at Pyla-Kokkinokremos from the 26 th of March until the 26 th of May, 2019. Since its discovery in the early 1950s, the Late Bronze Age settlement of Pyla-Kokkinokremos has occupied a prominent position in the debates surrounding the ‘collapse’ of Bronze Age Mediterranean societies c. 1200 BCE. Several elements contributed to the site’s particular status in the Late Cypriot IIC-IIIA settlement landscape: - the short-lived character of the site – founded towards the end of the 13 th c. BCE and abandoned during the first quarter of the 12 th c. BCE - its exceptional ‘casemate’ architecture - its multi-ethnic material culture – with references to Sardinia, Crete, Egypt, Anatolia, the Syro- Palestinian coast and Mycenaean Greece. In 2014, Prof. Joachim Bretschneider (UGhent), Prof. Jan Driessen (UCLouvain) and Dr. Athanasia Kanta (Mediterranean Archaeological Society) inaugurated a new excavation project at Pyla-Kokkinokremos following previous successful investigations by Dr. Dikaios, Prof. Karageorghis and Dr. Kanta. Sector 3 Jan Driessen & Florence Gaignerot The UCLouvain team under the direction of J. Driessen and F. Gaignerot-Driessen concentrated on the central plateau of the hill, as in previous years, opening a series of soundings to explore whether occupation was similar to that attested around the edges. Intensive agricultural exploitation and rising bedrock had already shown in previous campaigns that, despite the presence of archaeological traces, much had been destroyed. Four new soundings were opened. Three of these were located in the very centre of the plateau, near the 2014 test 3.1. Two of these tests (3.8, 3.9) reached bedrock almost immediately but the third one (3.10) came upon extensive architectural remains with, in close association, a pottery deposit. The presence of multiple wall plaster fragments here is surprising in view of their absence elsewhere on the central plateau. Amongst the finds is a mushroom-shaped stone tool, identified as the top of a slow wheel of a type that is primarily attested in Egypt and the Near East (Fig. 1). The fourth test (3.11) was opened in the south part of the central plateau and also came upon well-preserved wall alignments and a pottery deposit. The least these tests show is the dense occupation of the central plateau. 1 We thank Dr. Marina Solomidou-Ieronymidou and Dr. Despo Pilides at the Department of Antiquities for their kind collaboration as well as Dr. Anna Satraki at the Larnaca Museum, Eftychia Zachariou, and the authorities of the British Sovereign Base of Dhekelia, especially Michael Gregoriou. Likewise, we want to express our gratitude to the following persons for their cooperation on site and in the Larnaca Museum: S. Debrabandere, G. De Hooghe, L. De Keukelare, J. Deryckere, E. Dewerte, A. Donald, F. Germonpré, C. Hadjivassili, G. Jans, R. Jung, I. Kostopoulous, P. Manolis, B. Melkebeek, M. Papadakis, F. Porta, M. Psillakis, A.-S. Van den Mooter, M.-C. Van Gansbeke, J. Vanneste, A.-S. Van Vyve, L. Vercruysse, M. Vrachnakis, and S. Hermon and his team from The Cyprus Institute: M. Faka, D. Abate, A. Leonidou, S. Gasanova, M. Polig and V. Vassallo. Our students – P. Anderson, S. Baert, R. Cerulus, B. Evrard, A. Juchtmans, M. Libert, L. Malfliet, S. Rosseel, F. Vanherweghe and J. Wilmet – deserve a sincere thank you as well. Excavations were financed by the Institute for Aegean Prehistory, the ARC-A World in Crisis?, FWO G010218N and Ghent University.