One region, and one only, pursues its artistic course without regard to the contemporaneous tendencies prevailing in the Greek world, and that is the island of =Cyprus=. Here again the causes are largely political, as we shall see; largely also ethnographical and geographical, from the character of the inhabitants and the position of the island, a meeting-place and bone of contention between the great nations of the Eastern Mediterranean. For this reason we propose to deal first with the pottery of Cyprus, which has little in common with that of the rest of Greece, and always retains something of its primitive character, though it is always as much influenced from Greece on the one hand as from the East on the other. It is in Cyprus also that we meet with some of the earliest remains of pottery yet found on Greek soil. § 1. CYPRIOTE POTTERY BIBLIOGRAPHY Cesnola, _Cyprus_; O.-Richter, _Kypros, the Bible, and Homer_; Perrot and Chipiez, _Hist. de l’Art_, iii. p. 648 ff.; _Cyprus Mus. Cat._ (Myres and O.-Richter); _B.M. Excavations in Cyprus_ (Turner Bequest), 1894–6; Dümmler in _Ath. Mitth._ xi. (1886), p. 209 ff.; _Archaeologia_, xlv. p. 127 ff.; Pottier, _Cat. des Vases ant. du Louvre_, i. p. 82 ff., and other references there given. In order to understand aright the history of Cypriote art, it is indeed necessary to know something of its ethnography and political history, and the various influences to which it has been subjected. But space forbids us to do more than make very brief allusions to the more important of these features. Speaking generally, Cyprus may be regarded as a centre wherein have met all the currents of ancient civilisation, forming an amalgamation of artistic elements. Thus Cypriote art, though it loses in originality, gains in interest; and yet though often slavishly imitative, it has at bottom great individuality, more especially in its pottery. Hence it will be seen that it is essentially necessary to consider the pottery of Cyprus as a thing apart. As regards chronology, except for a certain determinable sequence of artistic phases, even more caution than in dealing with Hellenic art is required. The remarkable conservatism and persistence of types exhibited by Cypriote art has more than once proved a pitfall, and has given rise to considerable controversy at one time or another. Dates can only be used in the vaguest manner. The pottery of Cyprus falls under three headings, which for convenience, though not perhaps with the strictest accuracy, are usually defined as follows:— 1. _Bronze Age_, from about 2500 B.C. to 800 B.C. 2. _Graeco-Phoenician period_, from 800 B.C. to 400 B.C., overlapping with