The Department of Antiquities has announced the completion of the first phase of the 2024 annual excavations carried out by the Archaeological Research Unit (ARU) of the University of Cyprus, within the framework of the 'Palaepaphos Urban Landscape Project' (PULP), which has been running since 2006 under the direction of Professor Maria Iakovou. Undergraduate and doctoral students of the Department of History and Archaeology of the University of Cyprus, postdoctoral researchers from the University of Siena UNISTRASI with their professor Dr. Jacopo Tabolli also took part in the team which was supported by the collaborators of the Palaepaphos Project (PULP) from the Cyprus University of Technology (CUT), Dr. Athos Agapiou, Digital Data and Geographic Information Systems Manager and Dr. Kyriakos Themistocleous, responsible for the yearly updated orthophotograph of the landscape. A press release said that the excavation lasted over a period of 5 weeks and focused on the Laona tumulus and the eastern wall of La ona (Fig.2) which seems to form a single walled part of the acropolis that connected Laona with the Hadjiabdoulla plateau. The main objective of this year's excavation was to locate the level on which the tumulus of Laona was erected upon. It was determined that the ancient engineers-architects of the tumulus, rather than choosing to build the tumulus on the floor of the internal phase of the earlier Cypro-Classical wall (which was buried and preserved inside the tumulus), decided to remove the previous floor and erected the tumulus on a lower (half a meter) and more stable geological subsoil. It is estimated that a total of 10,000 cubic meters of marl and composite clay layers in various colors were needed for its construction. This confirms that the Laona tumulus remains the largest built monument in ancient Cyprus. The construction of the tomb is dated to the late 4th century BC, the period that historically corresponds to the conflict of the Macedonian successors of Alexander the Great. Undoubtedly, it is noted, its construction is the work of experienced tumulus constructors, a monumental funerary monument that - with the sole exception is the contemporary but smaller tumulus of the cenotaph of Salamis - both were not familiar to the funerary architecture of Cyprus. It appears that the tumulus, despite its extraordinary size, has covered only a section of 65 meters of the eastern wall of Laona, which continues its course southwards to cover the short distance that separates it from the Hadjiabdoulla plateau. Therefore, the second objective of the 2024 summer mission was to fully investigate the area between the eastern boundary of the Laona wall and the eastern wall that protects the palace complex at the Acropolis of Hadjiabdoulla. The preliminary excavation was carried out in three areas. Among others, the external side of the Laona wall, where in 2023 the corner of the earlier stone monument covered by the Cypro-Classical fortification was identified, was excavated up to the foundation level and it w as attested that a significant part of it consists of impressive worked stones and was thus incorporated into the Laona wall. The pottery which was left in the foundation and the floor of use dates back to the Late Bronze Age. It is the first time that in one of the residential enclaves of the founding phase of Ancient Pafos, that a built stone monument of the 13th-12th century B.C has been identified. The area of the excavations carried out from 2009 until today in Laona and Hadjiabdoulla revealed mainly monuments of the acropolis dating to the 5th-4th century BC, covers an area of 28,800 square meters and measures 120m x 240m. Source: Cyprus News Agency