Despite ongoing fieldwork focusing on the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic periods of the Aegean, the eastern part of this region, especially western Turkey, remains almost entirely unexplored in terms of early prehistory. There is virtually no evidence from this area that can contribute to broader research themes such as the dispersal of early hominins, the distribution of Early Holocene foragers and early forager-farmer interactions. The primary aim of the Karaburun Archaeological Survey Project is to address this situation by collecting data from the eastern side of the Aegean Sea, thereby contributing to the currently debated issues of Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean prehistory.

The narrative of socio-political development on the semi-arid island of Cyprus during the early first millennium BC (c. 1100–500) has focused largely on the institutions, practices and material culture of major centres and their interrelationships with growing maritime networks. Less studied are the landscapes surrounding these coastal and inland towns, which helped condition the increasing wealth and power of authorities through the management of agropastoral and metal goods, and through the creation of new mortuary, ritual and community spaces (Iacovou 2014). These regional contexts, whose settlements and land-use practices have now been recorded through several survey projects, provide a rich yet under-used source of material for investigating social transformations during this period. Ongoing interdisciplinary work in the Vasilikos and Maroni Valleys of south-central Cyprus has begun systematic analysis of these landscape changes and their long-term contexts. The project is focused on a 150km2 research area situated 20km east of the ancient polity of Amathus, extending from the central Troodos massif down to the coast (Figure 1).

Lessons from history on sustainability, collapse and resilience are the ultimate goal of the Byzantine Bio-Archaeology Research Program of the Negev (BYBAN) (Tepper et al. 2015). Addressing the unprecedented flourishing and collapse of the Byzantine Negev agricultural settlements (fourth–seventh centuries AD), the BYBAN project offers a unique and original approach. It focuses on ancient middens and domestic contexts, which provide an exceptional focus on the materiality of daily life. Archaeobotanical research is central to this project because the copious plant remains retrieved are a reflection of the region's agricultural economy and its environmental sustainability. This approach will enable us to answer important research questions about the Byzantine–Islamic transition in the Negev: what were the major cash and subsistence crops? Which were grown locally, and which, if any, were imported? How, if at all, did the agricultural economy change during the Byzantine–Islamic transition? Were there any major changes in climatic conditions, and, if so, can they be implicated as a cause for agricultural collapse?