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Cyprus (/ˈsaɪprəs/ ⓘ), officially theRepublic of Cyprus, is anisland country in the easternMediterranean Sea, located off the coast of theLevant inWest Asia. Cyprus is thethird largest and third most populous island in the Mediterranean, afterSicily andSardinia. It is located southeast ofGreece, south ofTurkey, west ofSyria andLebanon, northwest ofPalestine andIsrael, and north ofEgypt. Its capital isNicosia and largest city isLimassol. Cyprus hosts theBritish military basesAkrotiri and Dhekelia, whilst the northeast portion of the island isde facto governed by the self-declared,largely unrecognisedTurkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, which is separated from the Republic of Cyprus by theUnited Nations Buffer Zone.
Cyprus was first settled byhunter-gatherers around 13,000 years ago, with farming communities emerging by 8500 BC. The lateBronze Age saw the emergence ofAlashiya, an urbanised society closely connected to the wider Mediterranean world. Cyprus experienced waves of settlement byMycenaean Greeks at the end of the2nd millennium BC. Owing to its rich natural resources (particularly copper) and strategic position at the crossroads of Europe, Africa, and Asia, the island was subsequently contested and occupied by several empires, including theAssyrians,Egyptians, andPersians, from whom it was seized in 333 BC byAlexander the Great. Successive rule byPtolemaic Egypt, theClassical andEastern Roman Empire,Arab caliphates, theFrench Lusignans, and theVenetians was followed by overthree centuries of Ottoman dominion (1571–1878). Cyprus was placed underBritish administration in 1878 pursuant to theCyprus Convention and formally annexed by the United Kingdom in 1914.
The island's future became a matter of disagreement between itsGreek andTurkish communities. Greek Cypriots soughtenosis, or union with Greece, which became a Greek national policy in the 1950s. Turkish Cypriots initially advocated for continued British rule, then demanded the annexation of the island to Turkey, with which they established the policy oftaksim: portioning Cyprus and creating a Turkishpolity in the north of the island. Followingnationalist violence in the 1950s, Cyprus wasgranted independence in 1960. Thecrisis of 1963–64 brought furtherintercommunal violence between the two communities, displaced more than 25,000 Turkish Cypriots intoenclaves, and ended Turkish Cypriot political representation. On 15 July 1974,a coup d'état was staged byGreek Cypriot nationalists and elements of theGreek military junta. This action precipitated theTurkish invasion of Cyprus on 20 July, which captured the present-day territory of Northern Cyprus anddisplaced over 150,000 Greek Cypriots and 50,000 Turkish Cypriots. A separate Turkish Cypriot state in the north wasestablished by unilateral declaration in 1983, which was widely condemned by theinternational community and remains recognised only by Turkey. These events and the resulting political situation remain subject toan ongoing dispute. (Full article...)
TheCypriot wine industryranks 50th in the world in terms of total production quantity (10,302 tonnes), and much higher on a per-capita basis. The wine industry is a significant contributor to the Cypriot economy through cultivation, production, employment, export and tourism. (Full article...)
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![Image 46Cypri insvlae nova descript. 1573, Ioannes à Deutecum f[ecit]. "Map of the island of Cyprus, newly drawn by Johannes van Deutecom in 1573." (from Cyprus)](/mt/?noimg=&dark=on&url=http%3a%2f%2fen.wikipedia.org%2fwiki%2fFile%3aAtlas_Ortelius_KB_PPN369376781-073av-073br.jpg)
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Religions in Cyprus
Countries with related heritage
Nearby countries
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