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Selected and rare materials, excerpts and observations from ancient, medieval and contemporary authors, travelers and researchers about Cyprus.
 
 
 
 
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CLAUDE DELAVAL COBHAM
Exerpta Cypria
page 83

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Cyprus. You may read, his epitaph on the left of the choir of this church. "To Jacques de Lnsignan, king of Jerusalem, Cyprus and Armenia, be praise unstinted for his noble deeds and his triumphs over tho enemy. To claim the honours which were refused him this new Caesar invaded and won the kingdom of Cyprns, took side with the powerful arms of Venice, reduced Amegnstus, and united himself in marriage with their daughter Kathelina, a very goddess in beauty. A pious, wise, clement, munificent and magnanimous prince, surpassing all in arms and war. Him savage death struck down iu the 13th year of his reign and 33rd of his age, and ont off in his cradle his posthumous son, July 6, 1473. Catherine, the Venetian, Queen, his consort [erected the monument]. Francis [de Pernisiis de] Vicheria, the servant of Christ, Bishop of Famagusta, composed [the epitaph].-" On a stone behind the altar yon may read these words, " Francesco de Prioli being in command of the Venetian fleet the banner of S. Hark was happily raised in Cyprus, February 2S, 1488." There is another church of no great size called S. Ilaria Hydria, in which on the right hand is preserved one of those waterpots in which was the water which Christ at the marriage of Cana in Galilee turned into wine. It is a large earthen pot, one handle of which is completely torn off, while the other is partly broken. Besides these two is a third, the Greek church of S. George, in which yon see the marble monument of Epiphanius, with a Greek inscription so wasted by age that it cannot be read in its entirety. Somewhere near this church there lived at that time an old man of small stature called Pietro Paolo, who was said to be of the family of the Scaligeri of Verona. At tho capture of that city the Venetians banished him, being yet a boy, to Cyprus, where he was kept for a long time in the castle, but he gained at last leave to wander at his will, but always within the city walls. It had been forbidden him to many, but by a concubine he begat a sou aud two daughters, whom he married to two Belgians; one was a doctor of medicine, the other instructed boys in the liberal arts. Both of these throughout our stay in Famagusta did us many kind offices. The animal income of the bishop of this city is reckoned at 3000 golden ducats. Not far from the city is the sito of old Famagusta or Salajnin, in which Paul and Barnabas preached the gospel of Jesus Christ. Some of its ruins can still be seon, as well as a church with the subterranean prison of S. Catherine, which seems to be cut out of the rock. Justin writes thus of Salamis (Hist. Xii. 3), " the Galiciaus assert that after the close of the Trojan war Teueer, whom his brother Ajax' death had alienated from their father Telamon, when he was not received in Salamis retired to Cyprus, and there founded a city bearing the name of his old home." On April S we left Famagusta, and crossing the very great plain which lies in the middle of the island, bounded by a long string of villages and mountains, we arrived in one day's jonrney at Nicosia. This is a city of some size and beauty, where lives an archbishop, whose annual income reaches (so report goos) the sum of 12,000 golden ducats, and most of tho nobles of the island. One can make the circuit of the city in an hour and a quarter. In a monastery of the Franciscans the body of S. Francis, a iJnrgundian knight, is shown in a wooden bier. There is another monastery of the same order, in which most of the kings of Cyprus are buried, and right royal are their sepulchres. From the time of the kings of Cyprus many French nobles live here, who still preserve the French costume, and enjoy many immunities and privileges. They keep their vassals, who are called Barici, in the state of slaves : some of them are born serfs, some are born free and sold later for certain duties only. A free woman who marries a slave bears slave children: in the Roman law it is different, for the offspring of a free mother and a servile father is born free. A slave cannot marry 78 EXCERPTA CYPRIA.

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