Cyprus History

Evidence suggests that the first settlers came to Cyprus as early as 5800 B.C. from Asia Minor.  After 1500 BC, people from southern Greece came to trade and some settled on the island, spreading their language and building many temples.  By 1000 BC, the inhabitants and their culture were largely Hellenic in origin, but since then they were ruled in succession by Assyrians, Egyptians, Persians and one of the generals under Alexander the Great.  In 58 BC, Cyprus became part of the Roman Empire and a hundred year later,  the apostle Paul arrived, accompanied by Barnabas.  The two missionaries traveled across Cyprus preaching the new religion and making converts.

During the rule by all the invaders, the Cypriot kingdom was largely left to rule itself, which allowed local culture to survive.  On religion, an important development occurred with the martyrdom of Barnabas and the discovery later of his tomb.  This led to the Church of Cyprus eventually being declared by Emperor Zeno in 432 AD to be autocephalous (that is, ecclesiastically autonomous, enjoying the privilege of electing and consecrating its own bishops and archbishops and ranking equally with the churches of Antioch, Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Constantinople).

From the 12th century on, Cyprus was ruled briefly by Richard the Lion Heart, the Franks, the Venetians and then the Ottomans.  The Ottomans applied the millet system to Cyprus, which allowed religious authorities to govern their own non-Muslim minorities. This system reinforced the position of the Orthodox Church and the cohesion of the ethnic Greek population. Most of the Turks who settled on the island during the three centuries of Ottoman rule remained when control of Cyprus was ceded to Great Britain in 1878.  Many left for Turkey during the 1920s, however. The island was annexed formally by the United Kingdom in 1914 at the outbreak of World War I and became a crown colony in 1925.

Cyprus gained its independence and established a constitutional republic in 1960, after an anti-British campaign by the Greek Cypriots.  Archbishop Makarios, a charismatic religious and political leader, was elected president.

Soon afterwards, serious differences arose between the Greek and Turkish communities about the constitution, leading to violence in 1963 and 1968. 

In July 1974, Athens supported a coup against President Makarios, citing his perceived abandonment of enosis. Turkey, citing the 1960 Treaty of Guarantee, intervened militarily to protect Turkish Cypriots taking control of 38% of the island (and forming the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus), resulting in mass migration of the two ethnic groups to their own communities.  The UN has maintained a peacekeeping force on the island which has remained largely violence free except in 1996 when tension arose and some deaths occurred.

The internationally recognized Greek Cypriot-controlled Republic of Cyprus joined the EU on 1 May 2004.