Vothylakas (also Vathylakas) is a Greek community of the occupied district of Ammochostos, on the Karpasia peninsula. It lies 47 kilometres northeast of Ammochostos, at an elevation of 170 metres, on the south side of the peninsula, near Lythragkomi and Neta. In the 1960 census it had 509 inhabitants, all Greeks.

Name

According to the village’s tradition, as recorded by its Community Council, the name comes from a deep pit (vathys lakkos) from which the people of the surrounding area drew water before the place was settled.¹ The official gazetteer of place names of Cyprus (Gazetteer) writes “Vothylakas”. In the censuses of British rule the village is written “Vathylakka” (1931) and “Vathylakkas” (1946), and in the results of the 1950 Enosis plebiscite “Vathylakas”.

Founding and first records

The earliest written record of the village found so far is the Ottoman property survey of 1832/33. The British architect George Jeffery, who recorded the monuments of Cyprus in the early 20th century, describes Vathylakas in 1918 as a hamlet, and notes that on the coast lay the sites of several ruined villages; one of them survived as a chiftlik (farm estate) with a small old church, Neta.²

Turkish rule

In the property survey of 1832/33, which recorded only those who owned property, Vothylakas is recorded as a Christian village with 13 property-holding households. They sowed cotton and fodder crops, and had mulberry gardens, some with a well and a water-wheel, a small vineyard and 235 mountain olive trees. The village had a watermill and five mills turned by animals, and the households owned 23 beehives, 158 sheep and goats and 25 oxen and cows.³

Churches and monasteries

The parish church of the village is dedicated to Saint George and was built in 1905, in the northern part of the settlement.⁴ The older church of Agios Georgios, in the cemetery, dates from the 16th–17th century and has remains of wall paintings. It is an Ancient Monument; the Register of Ancient Monuments lists it as the church of the Panagia (Agios Georgios).

Just outside the southern edge of the village stands the Greek Orthodox chapel of Agios Theodoros, of the 14th century, which is also an Ancient Monument. According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, it was once painted throughout, and only its north wall and sanctuary had survived. The villagers believed that anyone who laid a hand on the trees and bushes that had grown inside the ruins would fall gravely ill and might even die.⁵ The village also has the chapel of Agioi Konstantinos and Eleni.

Economy and society

According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, before 1974 the inhabitants grew mainly cereals, olives, carobs and tobacco, and kept sheep and goats. Part of the state forest of Kavallis, to the north, and of the forests of Mazeri and Moutti tou Mylou, to the south, towards the sea, lay within the village’s boundaries.⁶ In 1943 the Vathylakas Cooperative Credit Society was founded.

Population

According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, Vothylakas had 213 inhabitants in 1881, 224 in 1891, 241 in 1901, 300 in 1911 and 385 in 1921.⁷ In 1931 it had 466 inhabitants, all Christians, and in 1946 577, of whom 572 were Orthodox and 5 Muslims (the 1931 and 1946 censuses recorded only religion). In 1960 it had 509 inhabitants and in 1973 503, all Greeks. In the school year 1973–74 the village’s Greek primary school had 69 pupils and two teachers.

National struggles

In the 1950 Enosis plebiscite 347 inhabitants signed, essentially all the adult Greek inhabitants. The Register of EOKA Fighters lists 173 Greek inhabitants of the village who took part in or supported the Struggle.

The Turkish invasion of 1974

During the Turkish invasion of 1974 Vothylakas was occupied by the Turkish army. According to the Great Cyprian Encyclopaedia, most of the inhabitants stayed in the village, enclaved; in October 1975 they numbered 402, and the following year the primary school even operated for a short time. By October 1976 all had been forced to leave.⁸ The Greek population of the village was thus ethnically cleansed, and since then the Turkish occupation forces and the illegal occupation authority prevent the inhabitants from returning.

In the village itself one dead is recorded, an elderly civilian inhabitant who had stayed on, enclaved.

The occupation authorities illegally converted the church of Agios Georgios into a mosque: they removed the crosses and walled up the south entrance to make a mihrab. According to Cyprus Religious Heritage, when a new mosque was built in the village the church was abandoned, and when it was recorded in 2022 its bell tower was propped up with scaffolding. Parts of the apse and roof of the old cemetery church had collapsed, much of the cemetery wall had fallen, and the grave crosses lay scattered inside and outside it. All the doors and windows had been removed from the chapel of Agios Theodoros.⁹