Rizokarpaso is a large Greek community in the occupied district of Ammochostos, on the Karpasia peninsula. It lies 67 kilometres northeast of Ammochostos, at an altitude of 150 metres, on the spine of the peninsula, between the northern and the southern sea. Its land reached as far as Cape Apostolos Andreas, the eastern tip of Cyprus, and included the monastery of the same name and the site of the ancient city of Karpasia. In the 1960 census it had 3,154 inhabitants, of whom 3,151 were Greeks.

Name

The village keeps the name of ancient Karpasia, the city on its coast, which the Greek geographer of the 1st century BC Strabo describes as “Karpasia, a city with a harbour”. In the sources of the Greek medieval period the place is called Karpasion, and the 15th-century Cypriot chronicler Leontios Machairas calls it Karpasin, the name by which, according to the 19th-century Greek scholar Athanasios Sakellarios, the whole peninsula was still known in his day. The form “Riso Carpasso” appears in the 16th-century Cypriot chronicler Florio Bustron.¹

Founding and first records

Rizokarpaso is the successor of ancient Karpasia. According to the British archaeologist D. G. Hogarth, who travelled through the Karpasia in 1888, the people of the coastal city were most probably driven by pirate and Arab raids to move up to the spine of the peninsula, where the present village took shape. Sakellarios notes that Rizokarpaso was built with stones from its ruins.²

On the village land the official gazetteer of place names of Cyprus (Gazetteer) records the place-name Palochorion, near Chelones on the south coast. The British architect George Jeffery, who recorded the monuments of Cyprus in 1918, describes there a deserted village with ruined houses and a large ruined church, and further east the abandoned settlement of Agridia, with the ruins of four churches. According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, the people of Palochorio and of another small settlement, Korakas, settled in Rizokarpaso when they left their villages. The village had three parishes: Agia Triada, the oldest, Anavrysi and Leko.³

Archaeological sites

Ancient Karpasia lies on the north coast, about three and a half kilometres north of the village, around the church of Agios Filon. In 1935, 1937 and 1938 the British archaeologist Joan du Plat Taylor surveyed and partly excavated it for the Department of Antiquities. She investigated the area around the church and the late city wall, and mapped the moles of the harbour. Sakellarios saw the mole, built of large squared stones joined with metal clamps, and notes that fishermen were destroying it to take the lead.⁴

The tombs of the city are cut into the rocks west of the harbour and at Tsampres. In 1937 and 1938 the Department of Antiquities, with the participation of the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, excavated 29 chamber tombs at Tsampres and 19 at Afentrika, in use from the late 6th or early 5th century BC to the 2nd century BC. The finds were divided between the Cyprus Museum and museums in Oxford, Cambridge, London and Sydney. Many of the tombs have crosses carved in them, because they were reused by the Christian inhabitants.⁵

At Anavrysi, in the village itself, du Plat Taylor excavated in 1937–38 a tomb of the Geometric ancient Greek period; from it comes a ring vase with four small vessels and two animal heads set on the ring, now in the Cyprus Museum. In 1971 the Department of Antiquities excavated at Latsia, northeast of the village, a half-looted tomb of the Geometric and Archaic period, with pottery, clay birds, clay helmeted soldiers and a pair of gold boat-shaped earrings.⁶

East of Karpasia, at Afentrika, which the Register of Ancient Monuments identifies with the ancient city of Ourania, the Department of Antiquities cleared the ruined basilicas of the Asomatoi and of the Panagia in December 1964. From 2011 to 2019 a surface survey was carried out there without the permission of the Republic of Cyprus and with the approval of the occupation regime; it recorded a natural harbour, sherds of 6th- and 7th-century amphorae and presses for oil or wine.⁷

At Cape Apostolos Andreas, at Kastros, a French mission excavated in 1970–73 a pre-Greek settlement of the aceramic Neolithic, with circular stone houses and many bone tools. Fish bones and fishing tools show that its people also lived from fishing. A little further on stood the temple of Aphrodite Akraia, which Strabo places at the tip of the peninsula; in 1961 the Department of Antiquities still recorded its foundations and Roman sherds on the surface. In 1969–70 an Oxford underwater mission explored the seabed around the Kleides islets and located eight wrecks and about 200 anchors.⁸

Antiquity

Karpasia was one of the harbours of eastern Cyprus, and most probably belonged to the kingdom of Salamis. Hogarth believed that Karpasia and Ourania were from early times the main ports of the area and received trade from the Asian coasts.⁹ Funerary inscriptions from the ruins of the city were found in Rizokarpaso, written in the Cypriot syllabic script, in which the ancient Cypriots wrote Greek. They give Greek names such as Philotimos and Philodamos, and one of them reads, as Sakellarios read it:

Ὀνασικύπρω ἠμὶ τῶ

That is: “I am (the tomb) of Onasikypros”.¹⁰

In the Ptolemaic Greek (“Hellenistic”) period, in 306 BC, Demetrios Poliorketes, in his war with Ptolemy for Cyprus, landed his army on the coast of Karpasia and took Ourania and Karpasia by storm before besieging Salamis. This is recorded by the Greek historian of the 1st century BC Diodorus of Sicily. From the same period comes an honorary inscription for a certain Leonnatos, son of Archion, whom the city calls “ἡγεμόνα ἔπανδρον”, that is, a brave officer. In the Roman period Karpasia still existed as a city; the Roman writer Pliny mentions it as Carpasium.¹¹

Greek medieval period (“Byzantium”)

In the early Greek medieval period Karpasia became the seat of a bishopric. Its first bishop was Saint Philon, whom Epiphanios, bishop of Constantia, ordained around 382 and to whom he entrusted his own diocese when he travelled to Rome. Philon wrote a commentary on the Song of Songs, and the church above the old harbour is dedicated to him. Machairas names among the saints of Cyprus three bishops of Karpasia, Philon, Synesios and Sosikrates. The great basilica of Agios Filon dates from the 5th century, and the basilicas of the Asomatoi and of the Panagia at Afentrika from the 6th–8th century.¹²

After the Arab raids the population lived inland. Around Rizokarpaso stand churches of the middle Greek medieval period, Agia Athanasia, Agia Marina, Agia Mavra and Agios Filon of Agridia, and the eastern part of the church of Agios Synesios dates from the 12th century. Jeffery notes that Philon and Synesios, two of the early bishops of Karpasia, gave their names to ancient churches of Rizokarpaso.¹³

Frankish rule, Venetian rule

Under Frankish rule the Latin Church confined the Greek Orthodox bishops to four seats, far from the towns. The Greek bishop of Ammochostos was obliged to reside in Rizokarpaso, and Agios Synesios became his cathedral. As late as 1472 a bull of Pope Sixtus IV names Karpasia, which the 19th-century French historian Louis de Mas Latrie identifies with Rizokarpaso, among the places from which the Greek bishops took their titles and where they could hold court among their own people.¹⁴

In the 14th century Karpasin belonged to the de La Roche family. Machairas writes that in the 1360s, while King Peter I was away in Europe, six Turkish galleys plundered Karpasin and many villages and carried off captives; the lady of Karpasin, wife of Alfonse de La Roche, was very nearly taken as well. In 1425 the sultan of Egypt sent a fleet, which landed at Chelones of Rizokarpaso and the next day sailed on to Ammochostos.¹⁵

The village had been a fief of Louis de Verny and after his death had passed to the crown. In March 1468 King James II exchanged it for the 1,000 bezants that his heirs were owed by the royal treasury, and in October he added to the fief of his son, Aguet de Verny, the draught animals and oxen of the royal estate of the village and a serf of Rizokarpaso, Nikolaos son of Giannis, with his wife, who lived at Athienou. Shortly afterwards the same king created the county of Karpasia for the Catalan noble Jean Perez Fabrice, and under Venetian rule the title passed to the Venetian Giustiniani, whose authority lay chiefly over Rizokarpaso and Agios Andronikos.¹⁶

Bustron writes of Karpasia that it had been a city founded, by tradition, by Sarpedon, and that in his day it was a village of noblemen, with very good air and plentiful water, built on a hill a little inland from the coast, with many churches with mosaic floors.¹⁷

Turkish rule

In the property survey carried out by the Ottoman administration in 1832/33, which recorded only those who owned property, Rizokarpaso appears as a Christian village with 103 property-owning households, one of the largest villages of the district of Karpasia. It had cotton fields, mulberry gardens with water-wheels, 1,747 olive trees, carob trees, 2,438 sheep and goats, 83 pairs of oxen, horses and mules, beehives, 28 horse-driven mills, watermills and two olive presses.¹⁸

The Scottish traveller Alexander Drummond, who passed through in 1745, saw a new church with very old wood carving in the sanctuary, finer than any he had seen in a Greek church, which must have come from another church. A manuscript of 1733, kept in the church of Agia Triada, preserved the services of Saints Philon, Synesios and Thyrsos, bishops of Karpasia, and of Saint Photeini.¹⁹

British rule

At the end of the 19th century Sakellarios found in Rizokarpaso 1,860 inhabitants and Greek primary schools for boys and for girls, and describes the village as built in quarters, full of fruit trees and water. According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, the first road reached the village in 1880, a post office opened in 1886 and a police station in 1905.²⁰

Churches and monasteries

The main church of the village is dedicated to Saint Synesios. Its eastern part is of the 12th century and it was extended in the 18th century; it is an Ancient Monument. Jeffery notes the medieval Greek arcading on its three apses. The parish church of Agia Triada is of the 19th–20th century; its stone and marble templon was made with materials from the ruins of Agios Filon. In the village there are also the church of the Archangel, an Ancient Monument, the church of the Panagia in the cemetery, built in 1948, and the chapels of Agios Georgios and Agios Ioannis Prodromos.²¹

At the tip of the peninsula stands the monastery of Apostolos Andreas, an Ancient Monument. According to tradition, the Apostle Andrew landed there and made a spring of healing water flow, which made the place a pilgrimage. Its old church is of the 15th century and the main church was built in 1867. According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, in the 19th century the monastery paid the teachers of the village school. Three kilometres west of the village, in the forest, is the monastery of Panagia Eleousa, with a double-aisled church of the 15th–16th century; the chapel of Panagia Eleousa is an Ancient Monument.²²

Also Ancient Monuments are the ruins of the basilica of Agios Filon on the coast, with the 11th–12th-century church built inside it; the churches of Afentrika, the Asomatoi and the Panagia of the 6th–8th century, Agios Georgios of the 11th century and the later Panagia Afentrika of the 16th century; the Panagia of Syka; the churches of Agia Athanasia, Agia Marina and Agia Mavra, with wall paintings on its ceiling, in the fields around the village; and Agios Filon of Agridia and Agios Fotios of the 12th century. The ruined Panagia of Dafnonta of the 15th–16th century and Agios Georgios at Mesovouni are Ancient Monuments as well.

On the village land there are also the chapels of Agios Ioannis, of the 12th century, Agios Nikolaos, Agios Ioannis Theologos, Agios Iakovos and Agios Avvakoum.

Economy and society

According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, before 1974 Rizokarpaso was one of the main tobacco-growing villages of the Karpasia, with about a third of its production, and grew cereals, olives and carobs. It had some of the largest flocks in the district and two fishing shelters, at Chelones and at Agios Filon. The Rizokarpaso Co-operative Credit Society was founded in 1918 and the Co-operative Grocery in 1947. The cooking of Rizokarpaso, with its skordalia, its snails, its colocasia and its stuffed suckling pig baked in the wood oven, was entered in 2021, according to the same encyclopaedia, in the National Inventory of Intangible Cultural Heritage.²³

Education

According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, from about 1840 a certain Klonaros taught letters in his house, and in 1858 the first teacher of Greek arrived, Charalambos Kramvis from Akanthou. In 1879 the teacher Zacharias Klonaridis, a native of Rizokarpaso who had studied in Larnaka and Athens, had 40 pupils. Later a secondary school was founded, which operated until 1974.²⁴ In the school year 1973–74 the Lower Primary School had 136 pupils and five teachers and the Upper Primary School 141 pupils and five teachers.

Population

According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, Rizokarpaso had 1,858 inhabitants in 1881, 1,734 in 1891, 2,299 in 1901, 2,762 in 1911 and 3,068 in 1921.²⁵ In 1931 it had 3,257 inhabitants, 3,250 Christians and 7 Muslims, and in 1946 4,064, including the monastery of Apostolos Andreas, of whom 4,052 were Orthodox and 11 Muslims (the 1931 and 1946 censuses recorded only religion). In both censuses it was the largest village of the district of Ammochostos. In 1960 it had 3,154 inhabitants, of whom 3,151 were Greeks, and in 1973 2,629 Greeks.

National struggles

In the Enosis plebiscite of 1950, 2,000 inhabitants signed in the two parishes of the village, Agia Triada and Agios Synesios. The Register of EOKA Fighters lists 926 Greek inhabitants of the village who took part in or assisted the Struggle. The EOKA fighters Petrakis Giallouros and Panagiotis Kaspis came from Rizokarpaso.²⁶

The Turkish invasion of 1974

During the Turkish invasion of 1974 Rizokarpaso was occupied by the Turkish army. Its people, as throughout the northern Karpasia, stayed in their homes and found themselves in confinement, enclaved. The European Commission of Human Rights cites a UN report according to which on 26 August 1974 the Turkish army arrested 500 Greeks in the Karpasia, and the inhabitants could not harvest the tobacco because most of the young men were detained. Witnesses told the Commission that a curfew was imposed and that the enclaved could not go from one village to another, and the Commission found strong indications that in June 1975 inhabitants of the Karpasia were expelled in groups.²⁷

According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, in October 1975 1,966 enclaved Greeks lived in Rizokarpaso, in December 1976 1,583, in April 1978 1,353, in May 1980 1,002 and in December 1985 497. According to the reports of the UN Secretary-General, in 1976 the Greeks of the area could not leave the environs of their villages without permission, and they complained that they were being pressed, particularly by the Turkish Cypriot police, to sign applications to leave for the free areas. The Greek population of Rizokarpaso was thus gradually subjected to ethnic cleansing, and the Turkish occupation forces and the illegal occupation authority prevent the return of the displaced inhabitants.²⁸

The primary school reopened in September 1975. In 1977 it was one of only two Greek primary schools in the occupied area, with five teachers and 166 pupils. Because no secondary school was allowed, children had to leave for the free areas to continue their studies, and at Christmas 1977 boys over 16 and girls over 20 were not allowed to spend the holidays in their homes. In 2003 the Turkish Cypriot authorities refused to add a seventh grade to the school, and 15 of the 23 pupils who had finished primary school had to leave. A secondary school was allowed for the first time since 1974 in August 2004. In March 2026, 251 enclaved persons lived in Rizokarpaso, most of those who remain in the occupied area.²⁹

Two inhabitants of Rizokarpaso were recorded as missing and are still missing: a civilian, who disappeared at Agios Memnon in Ammochostos, and a soldier, who disappeared in the area of Agios Georgios, Keryneia. In the village itself five dead are recorded, all enclaved civilians, among them a child. Three other inhabitants of the village were killed elsewhere, a civilian in the hospital of Ammochostos and two soldiers, at Keryneia and in the area of Nicosia airport.

The 2009 list of churches in the occupied areas of the Church of Cyprus records that the chapel of Agios Avvakoum was demolished by the Turks. The monastery of Apostolos Andreas fell into ruin after 1974 until its restoration began in 2013; in the village cemetery many of the grave crosses are broken.³⁰