Cyprus (Greek) » History

The importance of religion within the Greek Cypriot community was reinforced when the Archbishop of the Church of Cyprus, Makarios III, was elected the first president of the Republic of Cyprus in 1960. For the next decade and a half, enosis was a key issue for Greek Cypriots, and a key cause of events leading up to 1974 when Turkey invaded and occupied the northern part of the island. The island remains divided today, with the two communities almost completely separated.

Many Greek Cypriots, most of which lost their homes, lands and possessions during the Turkish invasion emigrated mainly to the U.K., Australia and Europe. There are today over 200,000 Greek Cypriots emigrants living in Great Britain. By the early 1990s, Greek Cypriot society enjoyed a high standard of living. Economic modernization created a more flexible and open society and caused Greek Cypriots to share the concerns and hopes of other secularized West European societies.

The Republic of Cyprus joined the European Union in 2004, officially representing the entire island, but suspended for the time being in the Turkish occupied north.

Longer Historical Perspective

The Greek Cypriots trace their origins to the descendants of the Achaean Greeks and later the Mycenaean Greeks, who settled on the island during the second half of the second millennium B.C. The island gradually became part of the Hellenic world as the settlers prospered over the next centuries. Alexander the Great liberated the island from the Persians in 333 B.C.

After the division of the Roman Empire in A.D. 285 Cypriots enjoyed home rule almost nine centuries under the jurisdiction of the Eastern Empire of Byzantium, something not seen again until 1960. Perhaps the most important event of the early Byzantine period was that the Greek Orthodox Church of Cyprus became an independent autocephalous church in 431. The Byzantine era profoundly molded Greek Cypriot culture.

The Greek Orthodox Christian legacy bestowed on Greek Cypriots in this period would live on during the succeeding centuries of foreign domination. Because Cyprus was never the final goal of any external ambition, but simply fell under the domination of whichever power was dominant in the eastern Mediterranean, destroying its civilization was never a military objective or necessity. During British rule (1878-1960), the British brought an efficient colonial administration, but government and education were administered along ethnic lines, accentuating differences.