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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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GIOVANNI MARITI
Travels in the Island of Cyprus
page 39

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wholly so : their appearance is revolting, their manners very coarse and rude. Their religious exercises take place three hours after sunset, and consist in whirlings and contortions and howls which become bestial bellowings, terrible to hear. One of them meanwhile clashes cymbals or beats a drum, shouting continually Allah (God) : at last they fall faint from fatigue, and foam fearfully at the mouth : it is now that Mohammadans believe that the Santons are conversing with God and Mohammad. Recovered from their swoon they feast and consort with youths and women after a most unseemly fashion. These monks however enjoy no great credit with their fellow Mohammadans. Their convents are chiefly in Anatolia. The third order of monks, the Abdali, have no convents, but wander over Asia from one city to another, as they find more or less sympathy with their manner of life, which is much the same as that of the Santons ; with this difference, that the Abdali are visited with great devotion by women, who have such faith in them that even in the public streets and markets they yield themselves to their lusts, merely taking care to cover both parties with a large cloth. In many parts of Syria such monstrous indecency is forbidden, but in Cairo they are fre-quently guilty of it. This may give the reader some small idea of these Turkish monks. To return to Larnaca: about a mile to the north-west of the city is a small church dedicated to St George, which is called the little St George to distinguish it from another and large church, with the same dedication, a mile to the west of it, which is one of the most ancient in the diocese of Citium. In these churches a Papas or Greek priest officiates on feast-days only, when Mass is said there. They are adorned with various pictures, painted on the walls and on panels ; there is nothing else remarkable about them. Throughout the island and kingdom of Cyprus there is no part so bare of trees as the neighbourhood of Larnaca. There 3-2 IV] Of the City of Larnaca 35

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