5

Since the so-called “copper oxhide ingots” are considered one of the most common forms of raw copper exchange in the Mediterranean Late Bronze Age, the question of their provenance and function of has been receiving the attention of scholars. In this international trade the first place has long been attributed to Cyprus, owing to the intense extraction which is attested on the island as early as the Early Bronze Age. In the case of Crete, the absence of natural copper resources, resulting in the necessary import of metals, has encouraged the idea among archaeologists that there was a system of exchange of Minoan ceramics for Cypriot oxhide ingots. Catling (1979) was the first to adjust this model, followed by Knapp (1990). The aim of these few pages is to define and check the pertinence of their respective theories, from the data on published provenance and context for the Cretan copper oxhide ingots.