Karakoumi is a small Greek community in the occupied district of Keryneia. It lies 1 kilometre east of Keryneia, 20 metres above sea level, on the coastal plain of Keryneia, beside the sea. According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, it was the smallest village of the district in area.¹ In the 1960 census it had 206 inhabitants, 194 of them Greeks.

Name

According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, which cites Simos Menardos and other scholars of the place names of Cyprus, the name was formed from the Turkish words kara, “black”, and kum, “sand”, that is “black sand”, perhaps from the dark colour of the sand on the village’s shore. The same encyclopaedia questions the Turkish origin of the name, because the village was always purely Greek.² The official gazetteer of Cyprus gives the name as “Καράκουμι, τό”. The place name “Karakoumitika” also comes from the name of the village; the gazetteer records it on the land of the village itself and on the land of neighbouring Kazafani.³

Churches and monasteries

The village’s Greek Orthodox parish church is dedicated to Saint Vasileios and dates from the 19th century. It is a small church, built near the shore.⁴

Economy and society

According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, before 1974 the inhabitants grew mainly cereals, olives and carobs, and a few citrus fruits, while there was almost no stock-raising.⁵

Until the invasion of 1974, the Cyprus Red Cross Home for Sick Children operated at Karakoumi, a convalescent home where the children stayed and received treatment. It also had a workshop for those children who were able to do creative work. After the invasion it was moved to Lemesos.⁶ According to the Union of Communities of Keryneia District, children with breathing problems were sent there for the clean air of the village.⁷

Education

According to the Union of Communities of Keryneia District, the Greek primary school was housed in a small building that Kostas Katsellis had donated to the inhabitants.⁸ In the school year 1973–74 it had 40 pupils and two teachers. In the same year a primary school also operated inside the Red Cross convalescent home, with 25 pupils and two teachers.

Population

Karakoumi was always a small village, but its population grew steadily in the 20th century. According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, the village had 43 inhabitants in 1891, 41 in 1901, 36 in 1911 and 41 in 1921.⁹ In 1931 it had 55 inhabitants, all Christians, and in 1946 119, all Orthodox (the censuses of 1931 and 1946 recorded only religion). In 1960 it had 206 inhabitants: 194 Greeks, 10 English and 2 others. In 1973 the Greek inhabitants numbered 228.

National struggles

In the Enosis plebiscite of 1950, 82 inhabitants signed, essentially all the adult Greek inhabitants.

The Turkish invasion of 1974

During the Turkish invasion of 1974 Karakoumi was taken by the Turkish army and its Greek population was ethnically cleansed. Those who stayed in the village were enclaved. According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, they numbered 31 in November 1975, 21 in February 1976 and only 7 in October 1976, and in the end they too became refugees.¹⁰ Today no enclaved person lives in the village. Since 1974 the Turkish occupation forces and the illegal occupation authority prevent the return of the inhabitants.

Two inhabitants of Karakoumi were recorded as missing, one soldier and one civilian, and their remains have not been located to this day. They vanished in the area of Templos and at Keryneia, neither of them in the village.

The church of Agios Vasileios has been desecrated and looted, and the 2009 list records it as in immediate danger of collapse. Today it is in ruins: its roof has collapsed and large cracks have opened in its walls.¹¹