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Greek Cypriot
Greek Cypriot refers to the Greek-speaking population of
Cyprus. They form the island's largest ethnic community, nearly
80 percent of the population, with the second largest ethnic
community being the Turkish Cypriots. The Greek Cypriots are
mostly Eastern Orthodox Christians, members of the Orthodox
Church of Cyprus, an autocephalous church headed by an Archbishop.
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.
Despite the heavy oppression the period of Ottoman rule (1570-1878)
did little to change Greek Cypriot culture outright. The Ottomans
tended to administer their multicultural empire with the help
of their subject millets, or religious communities. The tolerance
of the millet system permitted the Greek Cypriot community
to survive, administered for Istanbul by the Archbishop of
the Orthodox Church of Cyprus, who became the community's
head, or ethnarch. Although tolerant, Ottoman rule was generally
harsh and inefficient. Turkish settlers suffered alongside
their Greek Cypriot neighbors, and the two groups endured
together centuries of oppressive governance from Istanbul.
One interesting legacy is that many Greek Cypriots adopted
the Muslim title of "Hadji" (bestowed upon Muslims
who have completed the hajj to Makkah) to indicate that they
had completed a pilgrimage to a significant Christian religious
site. Hence, many Greek Cypriot surnames begin with "Hadji-,"
for example: the 18th century Dragoman Hadjigeorgakis, whose
home is now a museum in Lefkosia.
The concept of enosis -- unification with the Greek "motherland"
-- became important to literate Greek Cypriots after Greece
gained its independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1821. A
movement for the realization of enosis gradually formed, in
which the Orthodox Church of Cyprus had a dominant role (see
"Cyprus dispute").
During British rule (1878-1960), the British brought an efficient
colonial administration, but government and education were
administered along ethnic lines, accentuating differences.
For example, the education system was organized with two Boards
of Education, one Greek and one Turkish, controlled by Athens
and Istanbul, respectively. The resulting education emphasized
linguistic, religious, cultural, and ethnic differences and
ignored traditional ties between the two Cypriot communities.
The two groups were encouraged to view themselves as extensions
of their respective motherlands, and the development of two
distinct nationalities with antagonistic loyalties was ensured.
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 possecions
during the Turkish invasion emigrated mainly to the U.K.,
Australia and Europe. There are today over 200,000 Greek Cypriots
emigrants living only in London.
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.
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Turkish Cypriot
Turkish Cypriots are those inhabitants of Cyprus who are
ethnically Turkish, as opposed to those who are of Greek (the
Greek Cypriots) or other ethnicity. Within Northern Cyprus
the term is sometimes used to refer explicitly to indigenous
Cypriots as opposed to Anatolian Turkish migrants who have
settled there in the past two decades.
With the Ottoman conquest, the ethnic and cultural composition
of Cyprus changed drastically. Although the island had been
ruled by Venetians, its population was Greek. Turkish rule
brought an influx of settlers speaking a different language
and entertaining other cultural traditions and beliefs. In
accordance with the decree of Sultan Selim II, some 5,720
households left Turkey from the Karaman, çel, Yozgat,
Alanya, Antalya, and Aydin regions of Anatolia and migrated
to Cyprus. The Turkish migrants were largely farmers, but
some earned their livelihoods as shoemakers, tailors, weavers,
cooks, masons, tanners, jewelers, miners, and workers in other
trades. In addition, some 12,000 soldiers, 4,000 cavalrymen,
and 20,000 former soldiers and their families stayed in Cyprus.
The Ottoman Empire allowed its non-Muslim ethnic communities
(or millets) a degree of autonomy if they paid their taxes
and were obedient subjects. The millet system permitted Greek
Cypriots to remain in their villages and maintain their traditional
institutions. The Turkish immigrants often lived by themselves
in new settlements, but many lived in the same villages as
Greek Cypriots. For the next four centuries, the two communities
lived side by side throughout the island. Despite this physical
proximity, each ethnic community had its own culture and there
was little intermingling. Both communities, for example, considered
interethnic marriage taboo, although it did sometimes occur.
Until the island came under British administration in 1878,
there were only rough estimates of Cyprus's population and
its ethnic breakdown. In more recent times, population figures
became highly controversial after it was agreed that the government
established in 1960 was to be staffed at a 70-to-30 ratio
of Greek and Turkish Cypriots, although the latter made up
only 18 percent of the island's population. For this reason,
the population figures were a vital issue in the island's
government, likely to affect any far-reaching political settlements
in the 1990s.
About 40,000 to 60,000 Turks lived on Cyprus in the late
sixteenth century, according to Ottoman migration figures.
In the eighteenth century, the British consul in Syria believed
that the Turkish population on the island outnumbered the
Greek population by a ratio of two to one. According to his
estimates, the Greek Cypriots numbered between 20,000 to 30,000
probably due to the Turkish oppression and the Turkish population
around 60,000. Most historians do not accept his estimate,
however. If there was a Turkish majority, it did not last.
By the time of the first British census of the island in 1881,
Greek Cypriots numbered 140,000 and Turkish Cypriots 42,638.
One reason suggested for the small number of Turkish Cypriots
was that many of them sold their property and migrated to
mainland Turkey when the island was placed under British administration.
There was a significant Turkish Cypriot exodus from the island
between 1950 and 1974 when thousands left the island, mainly
for Britain and Australia. The migration had two phases. The
first lasted from 1950 to 1960, when Turkish Cypriots benefited
from liberal British immigration policies as the island gained
its independence, and many Turkish Cypriots settled in London.
Emigration would have been higher in this period, had there
not been pressure from the Turkish Cypriot leadership to remain
in Cyprus and participate in building the new republic.
The few years leading to 1974 the number of Turkish Cypriots
on the island remained mainly constant. The number of Turkish
Cypriots in 1974 was 118,000.
After the Turkish invasion in 1974 with the subsequent occupation
of the north and according to Turkish-Cypriot newspapers,
over one third of Turkish Cypriots emigrated from the occupied
area between 1974-1995 because of the economic and social
deprivation which prevails there with concurrent expulsion
of the Greek population. In addition, Turkey begun to move
settlers from Anatolia in the island which reached around
115.000 (2001 figures), in violation to the Geneva Conventions
Protocol of 1977, which considers it a war crime. As a result
the Turkish Cypriots who remain are today outnumbered by the
Turkish troops together with the colonists.
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