Cypriot Land Mines

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We couldn’t get to the fifth-century B.C. tomb at Pyla, said to be one of the finest of the period, because minefields were being cleared that day and the road was closed. Pyla, on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus, lies near the border between the Republic of Cyprus in the south and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), which occupies the northern third of the island. According to Giorgos Georgiou, the archaeologist from the Cyprus Department of Antiquities who had been assigned to us that day, the decision to clear the minefield was a result of a 021recent rapprochement between the two sides.

But we hit a different kind of mine, a diplomatic one, which blew up in our face.

We had decided to visit the archaeological sites of Cyprus because the most distinguished archaeologist in the country, Vassos Karageorghis—a former director of the department of antiquities, a retired professor at the University of Cyprus and the excavator of Salamis, among many other sites in Cyprus—was a member of Archaeology Odyssey’s editorial advisory board. Archaeologist Robert Merrillees, a former Australian ambassador to Israel and now head of the Cyprus American Archaeological Research Institute (CAARI), an affiliate of the American Schools of Oriental Research, was also a member of our editorial advisory board. These relationships, I was sure, would enable us easily to get an in-depth appreciation for Cyprus’s rich archaeological heritage—from the Neolithic period to the 19th century of our own era.

I knew that Cyprus was politically divided, so I made inquiries as to whether it was possible to visit 022archaeological sites on “the other side.” I was told that we could cross into northern Cyprus through the Nicosia checkpoint on day trips, but that we had to be back in the south by 5:00 p.m. So we planned three day trips to the north. When I mentioned this in an email to Karageorghis, he replied that a visit to the north would be “unethical.” He told me that an Israeli group had “very bitterly regretted” a visit to the Turkish Cypriot-controlled area of the island.

This is what had happened: Each year Avner Raban, head of Haifa University’s maritime archaeology program, leads a cruise of students to coastal archaeological sites. In 2000, the students cruised the southern coast of Turkey, then sailed southeast to visit sites on the northern coast of Cyprus, less than 45 miles from the coast of Turkey. Raban wrote a day-by-day account of the cruise in the program’s newsletter. This so disturbed friends in southern Cyprus, including Karageorghis, that Raban felt obliged to issue an “apology” for, in what must have 023been carefully negotiated diplomatic language, “overstepping the boundaries which friendship allows.” In this way, cordial relations with colleagues in southern Cyprus were maintained.

Upon hearing that we were planning to go to the north, Robert Merrillees asked for our assurance that if we did plan to visit the north, we would publish nothing about it in the magazine. “I personally cannot be associated with any publication that causes offense to our Cypriot hosts,” he wrote me.

I replied that we always try to avoid politics in our archaeological coverage, but that we are archaeological journalists who, as a matter of principle, cannot be told where to visit or what to report. I pointed out that we had published articles on Leptis Magna in Libya, Baalbek in Lebanon and, in our sister magazine Biblical Archaeology Review, an article by the director of antiquities of Saudi Arabia. We had also reported on the Palestinian Authority’s excavation in Gaza based on a personal visit. “I think you know,” I added, “that we do try to be fair and make an honest judgment.” I also touted the merits of freedom of the press.

Merrillees replied, “I do not, of course, dispute your right as a journalist to go where and report what you wish.” Our decision to go to the north, however, “leaves my role as a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of Archaeology Odyssey open to misinterpretation … CAARI depends for the success of its operations on the goodwill and cooperation of … the archaeological community in Cyprus, and we cannot knowingly allow ourselves to be associated with anything that has the potential to have our credentials and motives questioned or bring CAARI into disrepute.” Merrillees added that his stance was in no way “the result of outside pressure,” nor did it preclude a future “working relationship with you and Archaeology Odyssey.”

Merrillees concluded that our decision to visit the 024north left him “with no choice but to resign.” Karageorghis, too, resigned.

In Washington, we had been in contact with the Embassy of Cyprus and the representative of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. The TRNC representative arranged archaeological guides for us at a variety of sites we wanted to see in the north, but I was dubious of making the trip if we were going to have difficulties in the south. I explained to our contact at the Embassy of Cyprus in Washington that Karageorghis and Merrillees had resigned and that I did not want to make the trip unless we would be warmly welcomed in the south and provided with professional archaeological guides at sites we had selected. I was assured that I had nothing to worry about.

Both the government of Cyprus and the representative of the TRNC were as good as their word. We were graciously and competently received in the south as well as in the north. Archaeologists were available to explain all of the sites that we had planned to see in both areas of the island.

But politics was unavoidable. The depth of feeling on both sides is intense and passionate. Each side is absolutely certain that the position of the other side is blatantly indefensible. And archaeological issues have been politicized, just as everything else has been.

Cyprus became an independent country only in 1960. Before that the island was ruled by an enormous number of outsiders. Neolithic settlers arrived 9,000 years ago, even before metal was used and pottery invented. We saw some of their strange circular stone and mudbrick houses clustered at a site called Kalavasos-Tenta on the island’s southern coast. The village was protected by a wall and a moat that still survives in places. These Neolithic people buried their dead beneath the plastered or beaten-earth floors of their circular houses; archaeologists have found a number of these burials. The most intriguing structure in the settlement consists of a series of three concentric circles; the complex may have been the residence of the headman of the village or, some have speculated, a religious shrine, although nothing in the finds suggests a religious use. Much of the site is now protected by a smartly designed, round, tent-like roof that may well provide a model for other endangered sites, especially those with difficult-to-preserve mudbrick.

In the following millennia, Sea Peoples, Phoenicians, Assyrians, Egyptians, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Crusaders and Venetians, to name only a few, held sway in Cyprus. In 1571, the island was added to the Turkish Ottoman Empire, of which it remained a part for 300 years. By 1878, however, the Ottoman Empire was in serious financial straits and agreed to lease the island to Great Britain, which administered the island until 1922, when Cyprus became a British colony. (Turkey had sided with the Central Powers in the First World War and now had to pay the price.)

There has never been a Cypriot people as such—only two communities, Greek and Turkish. They are separate religiously (Greek Orthodox and Muslim), educationally (completely separate educational systems), economically (the Greek Cypriots have always been 025better off), culturally (modern versus traditional) and politically (the Greek Cypriots are the majority and the Turkey Cypriots the tolerated minority).

Nevertheless, a Cyprus independence movement gradually developed, with Greek Cypriots advocating enosis (unity with Greece) and Turkish Cypriots supporting taksim (partition between the two communities). In 1950 the Greek Orthodox Church, always powerful in Cypriot politics, took a referendum on enosis and found that 95 percent were in favor of uniting with Greece.

Beginning in 1955, Greek Cypriot campaigns for independence turned violent. The violence was directed, however, not only against the British, but also against Turkish Cypriots. The British expelled the Greek Cypriot leader Archbishop Makarios, who was implicated in the terrorism, to the Seychelles. In the hope of stopping Greek Cypriot terrorism, however, Britain released Makarios the following year and permitted him to return to Cyprus.

As inter-communal strife increased, Britain called a conference in 1959 in Zurich, out of which came the so-called 1960 Accords, signed by Turkey, Greece and Great Britain. Turkey gave up its support for partition and Greece relinquished its support for enosis. The Republic of Cyprus was born. A new constitution established a bi-communal federal state in which the president was to be a Greek Cypriot and the vice-president a Turkish Cypriot. Each had a veto over legislation. The legislature was to be 70 percent Greek Cypriot and 30 percent Turkish Cypriot, elected by their respective communities. Government administrators were to be hired in the same proportions. Turkey, Greece and Great Britain “guarantee[d] … th[is] state of affairs.” In effect, the constitution could not be amended without the agreement of the two communities. Britain retained sovereignty over two areas on the island for its military contingent.

This governmental structure lasted a bare three years. In December 1963 violence again broke out and the Turkish Cypriot legislators and administrators, fearing their lives, fled to Turkish enclaves. Of hundreds of casualties, the great majority were Turkish Cypriots. The British troops proved powerless to stop the violence. In March 1964 the Security Council of the United Nations established a peacekeeping force in Cyprus (UNICYP), which remains there to this day. In March 1965 the Turkish Cypriot members of the legislature sought to return to their seats but were prevented by the Greek Cypriot government of Archbishop Makarios. Britain and Turkey protested, but to no avail. In short, the 1960 Accords 026were unilaterally abrogated by the Greek Cypriots, who sought to justify their position under the legal “doctrine of necessity.”

This was followed by a decade of violence and counter-violence, each side accusing the other of barbarities. Talks were held in numerous forums, but they all ended in deadlock.

In 1974 the Greek military junta that had ousted the Greek civilian government came to Cyprus and ousted Makarios as well. He fled the island and was replaced by the junta leader, Nicos Sampson, known as the “hammer of the Turks.” Fearing for Turkish Cypriot lives and concerned that enosis was about to become a reality, Turkey invaded the island on July 20, 1974. On July 23, the junta was ousted from mainland Greece and a civilian government took over. Two days later, a cease-fire was agreed upon for Cyprus. On August 14, after negotiations once again broke down, a new two-day advance by Turkish forces left 37 percent of the island under Turkish control. Over 150,000 Greek Cypriots fled to the south. The following year the two sides agreed to a regrouping of their populations. Almost 50,000 Turkish Cypriots abandoned their property in the south. Today there are almost no Greek Cypriots living in the north or Turkish Cypriots living in the south.

In 1975 the Turkish Cypriots in the north formed the Turkish Federated State of Cyprus. In 1983 they asserted their independence as the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. That is the situation today. Northern Cyprus has been a de facto state for more than a quarter century.

One good thing: There is very little violence on either side. This tranquil situation has prevailed for nearly a decade and, according to some sources, much longer. Hence, there is not much pressure for a change in the quarter-century-long status quo.

While planning to visit the TRNC, we had been told a number of things: that we should advise the American Embassy about our trip to the north, that we would never know if we would be allowed through on any particular day or for a series of days, that 48-hour advance notice was required, that we must be careful not to allow the Turkish Cypriot authorities to stamp our passports, and that we would see the streets in the north heavily guarded with Turkish troops and tanks (approximately 30,000 Turkish troops remain in the north).

The first time we approached the checkpoint it reminded us of going through Checkpoint Charlie, years earlier, from West to East Berlin. But it was in fact toto caelo different. We did not give advance notice; we simply appeared. No trouble at all. The Turkish Cypriot authorities didn’t need us to tell them not to stamp our passports; they knew the rules. After walking through the buffer zone, we were cheerily greeted by our Turkish Cypriot host. In our three day trips to northern Cyprus, we saw no tanks and only two soldiers posted at the entrance to a military barracks in the countryside.

The Greek Cypriot border authorities were just as cordial as the Turkish Cypriots. On our return, they would call a taxi for us and invite us inside their small office to sit down while we waited.

We could hardly imagine a trip to Cyprus without visiting the north—any more than we could imagine a trip to the island without seeing the south. Some of Cyprus’s most impressive remains are in the north—places like storied Salamis, the 45-foot Kyrenia shipwreck with its packed cargo of amphoras that lay for 2,300 years just a mile beyond the safety of the Kyrenia harbor, and the breathtaking monastery of St. Hilarion on a rugged mountain outcrop. There are equally impressive sites in the south—like the Late Bronze Age city of Kition with its huge ashlar walls, the intricate mosaics of Paphos, and the 12th-century painted church at Asinou with its series of brightly colored panels portraying the life of Christ.

Politics was involved not only in our decision to visit the north, but also surfaced in archaeological issues. There is absolutely no cooperation between archaeologists in the south and in the north. An archaeologist with the Cyprus Department of Antiquities asked us if we would send copies of pictures we took in the north because the department had no other way of knowing what is happening there archaeologically. Any Greek Cypriot archaeologist who visits the north would certainly be out of a job the next day.

Southern Cyprus is clearly more prosperous and 027obviously wants to choke the north economically. There can be no other reason for the rule requiring a visitor to return to the south at night. Visitors on day trips are forbidden to make purchases in the north. Visitors who enter the island from the north cannot visit the south. An embargo on exports from northern Cyprus is imposed not only by the south but also by European countries.

Both sides know there is no solution, but they continue to hold weekly talks at the presidential level. (In fact, not quite at the presidential level: The 028“government of Cyprus” refuses to recognize Rauf Denktash as the “president” of the TRNC, though that is his position. Instead, he is referred to as the “leader,” in contrast to “President” Glafkos Clerides in the south.)

Cyprus (the government in the south that claims sovereignty over the whole island) is due to become a member of the European Union in 2004. This could well precipitate a crisis because Turkey, which also seeks entry into the European Union, would clearly be vetoed by Cyprus unless Turkey were to give up its support for the TRNC. In this way, the government in the south hopes (in vain) that it will be able to extend its writ to the north. Turkey, on the other hand, threatens to “integrate” northern Cyprus into mainland Turkey if Cyprus is admitted into the European Union.

The north hopes to have its own independence recognized one day. It too believes time is on its side. True, it is suffering economic hardship, but it is willing to pay that price to ensure its security, Turkish Cypriots say. Besides, the TRNC hopes to build a water pipeline from Turkey, which is only 45 miles away (mainland Greece is 300). The south will need this water and will agree to recognize the independence of the north to secure it. So the argument runs.

A recent report of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (titled “Cyprus: What if the Talks Fail?”) concluded that the north-south issues are “hideously complicated.” That, at least, is something we can all agree on. Unfortunately, the resolution of the crisis depends less on the situation on the ground than on global issues having little to do with the differences between the Greek and Turkish Cypriots—such as the relative strengths of their lobbies in Washington and global interests in Turkey versus Greece. One former American diplomat who is deeply involved in the south told me that he would deny it if questioned but the fact is that Turkish Cypriots are in the right. Yet they remain unrecognized and shunned by the international community.

The ancient site of Salamis lies just north of the Green Line that divides the two sectors, on the east coast of the island. It is not the famous Salamis, an island off the coast of Greece where the Greek fleet defeated Persian invaders in 480 B.C., ushering in the great age of Classical Greece—but the two Salamises are related. According to legend, one Teukros, a hero of the Trojan War and the son of the king of the Greek island of Salamis, founded the Cypriot city of Salamis on his way back to Greece in the 12th century B.C.

Cypriot Salamis is a huge site that at its height covered more than 600 acres. It has been excavated by a number of archaeological expeditions. As early as 1890, a mission from the British Museum excavated there. For 22 years, from 1952 to 1974, a Cypriot expedition mostly led by Vassos Karageorghis worked at Salamis. Simultaneously, a second 029archaeological team, from the University of Lyon, led by the late Jean Pouilloux, excavated the site from 1965 to 1974. Remains from almost every period from the Bronze Age through medieval times have been found, but the most impressive are the elaborate Royal Tombs (c. 800–500 B.C.) and the Roman public edifices.

The Royal Tombs (not really royal, just rich) are impressive, each with its own elaborate entrance road (dromos). On some of these dromoi, which are in effect plazas fronting the tombs, a horse is buried, presumably the steed of the deceased. The most imposing of the tombs, labeled Tomb 79, was excavated by Karageorghis in 1966. Inside the tomb were a bronze cauldron decorated with griffins and sirens, silver plate, chariots and horse bones. The excavators also found magnificent ivory plaques (see photo of ivory plaque in the sidebar to this article) that adorned a wooden throne—which has been reconstructed and is now in the Archaeological Museum in Nicosia.

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The most elaborate building at Salamis is the Roman bath and gymnasium complex, with its columned exercise court (palaestra) originally graced with larger-than-life statues; two swimming pools; hot and cold baths, several decorated with intricate and colorful mosaics; and a latrine that originally had 44 seats.

Since Salamis is now in the TRNC, a new excavation has been undertaken by Cosku Özguner of Ankara University in Turkey. “Unethical,” charges Karageorghis. Archaeologists from the south claim that the Turkish excavation violates scholarly ethics because the site was under excavation by teams from France and Cyprus, which now have the rights to the site. Moreover, a pamphlet given to me by the current director of the department of antiquities, Sophocles Hadjisavvas, charges that Özguner wants to excavate “a spot where he could have quick and spectacular results.”

At Salamis, we asked to be taken to the new Turkish excavations. They appeared to be ordinary excavations of a Roman bath. The Turkish excavators have also cleared the dumps of previous excavations in order to better reveal ancient shops in the agora.

When we told Ahmet Erdengiz, director of political affairs of the TRNC, about the Greek Cypriot complaint, he replied, “Why should Mr. Karageorghis have the only right to this very large site?” 031Hadjisavvas conceded that large sites often have more than one excavation going on at a time. At Idalion in southern Cyprus, for example, we visited two excavations currently being conducted simultaneously.

But Hadjisavvos had a more fundamental complaint about the Turkish dig in Salamis. International law forbids archaeological excavation by an occupying power. Salamis is now in “occupied Cyprus,” he says. But, of course, the TRNC does not regard itself as an occupying power.

Erdengiz, on the other hand, told me, “Mr. Karageorghis is invited to come and continue his dig at Salamis.” This is unthinkable to Karageorghis. He will not even visit the site he has loved since childhood (he was born eight miles north of Salamis, in the village of Trikomo).^a

During the Cypriot Late Bronze Age (c. 1600–1050 B.C.), Enkomi, which lies less than two miles from Salamis, was the most important city on the island. During this period, the city—and perhaps the entire island—may have been known as Alashiya (Alasia). This suggestion is based on references in the 14th-century B.C. Amarna letters, cuneiform correspondence between two successive Egyptian pharaohs and other Near Eastern rulers. Several of the letters were exchanged between the pharaoh and the king of a country called Alashiya, which has never been identified. The king of Alashiya promises the pharaoh shipments of copper and other luxury goods. Similar references are found in other ancient inscriptions. Because Cyprus was rich in copper and produced great quantities of it at this time (and later),^b several scholars, including the famous French excavator of contemporaneous Ugarit on the Syrian coast, Claude Schaeffer, have argued that Alashiya is none other than Cyprus.

Enkomi is full of imposing Late Bronze Age architecture. The pubic buildings are made of very large squared stones called ashlars. Considerable evidence of metal production was also found at the site, along with grandiose tombs with rich finds. Enkomi was apparently abandoned when the adjacent river estuary that provided shelter from the exposed harbor silted up. It was then that Salamis was founded, probably by people from Enkomi.

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Enkomi was excavated most recently from 1971 to 1973 by a team from the University of Lyon under the direction of Olivier Pelon. The final report on this excavation remains unwritten. The excavation finds are locked and stored at the site, untouched by the Turkish Cypriot authorities since 1974. They would like the excavator to study the finds and write a report. This is especially important because, as the entry on Enkomi in the Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaeology in the Near East states, “Some significant points in the chronology of Enkomi have not yet been settled.” Ahmet Erdengiz responded, “If the excavator doesn’t want to excavate anymore, that is his business. But he could come and write a report.”

We contacted Pelon at the Institut d’Archeologie Orientale in Lyon. “I am in total ignorance of what has become of the finds,” he replied. “It has been impossible for me … to visit the site officially.” A source at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in Paris tells us that the French Foreign Ministry has instructed archaeologists not to work in northern Cyprus.

“The fact is, unfortunately,—and I wholeheartedly regret it—that under the present circumstances no resumption of the work of excavation or even study may be envisioned in the near future,” Pelon wrote us.

Many archaeological sites on the island, including Salamis and Enkomi, as well as the later painted churches in the north (there are many more in the south), are badly in need of conservation and restoration. The TRNC has neither the money nor the expertise. They need and want help. But the TRNC is unrecognized. UNESCO, for example, will not process an application from the TRNC, explaining that UNESCO deals only with “a state authority.”

A paradox: Everyone agrees that the work should and must be done. The sites include many that the Greek Cypriots are especially devoted to. It is not that they love the sites in northern Cyprus less, but that they hate the TRNC more. So the sites continue to deteriorate. The excavation reports remain unwritten. And the status quo will almost surely continue—unless Greece and Turkey someday go to war over Cyprus.

We couldn’t get to the fifth-century B.C. tomb at Pyla, said to be one of the finest of the period, because minefields were being cleared that day and the road was closed. Pyla, on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus, lies near the border between the Republic of Cyprus in the south and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), which occupies the northern third of the island. According to Giorgos Georgiou, the archaeologist from the Cyprus Department of Antiquities who had been assigned to us that day, the decision to clear the minefield was a result of a 021recent […]