Prestige, Distinction, and Competition: The Anatomy of Socioeconomic Complexity in Fourth to Second Millennium B. C. E.

The Chalcolithic to Early Bronze Age transformation on Cyprus (mid-later 3rd millennium B. C. E.) documents an important stage of social, economic and political development on the island. Many explanations have been offered for this transformation, most based around external intervention or stimulus. However, this paper argues that the potential offered by the external world only became relevant to Cyprus because of, and in the context of, internal developments within Cypriot society. It is suggested that competition among emergent elites on Cyprus, expressed inter alia through competition for prestige and distinction, led to an interest in the external world. This initial contact in turn prompted further rapid changes driven from within Cypriot society, since knowledge of the external world both offered and forced new definitions of power upon Cypriot society.