The Archbishops of Cyprus in the Modern Age : The Changing Role of the Archbishop-Ethnarch, their Identities and Politics [1 ed.] 9781443850810, 9781443849296

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The Archbishops of Cyprus in the Modern Age

Cyprus Historical and Contemporary Studies Cyprus, a full member of both the Commonwealth and the European Union, has had an eventful and troubled history for such a small island state. From antiquity to modern times, Cypriots have formed an interesting melange, where different peoples, in terms of race, religion, ethnicity, class, language and other determinants, have shared a common homeland, collective experiences, popular traditions and often social, political and economic inequalities and hardships. Cyprus and its inhabitants have had a multi-faceted relationship with various ancient, medieval, and modern civilisations and empires. This relationship has sometimes been fraught and at other times fruitful, resulting in interesting legacies and influences. The mission of Cyprus Historical and Contemporary Studies (CHCS), as the first and only peer-reviewed academic book series to specialise in presenting scholarly research and debate on any period of the history of Cyprus, is therefore vitally important. CHCS aims to publish quality research on all periods and in all areas of the history of Cyprus. Aside from historians, CHCS publishes work from other disciplines, recognising that scholars other than historians contribute to the understanding of the histories of Cyprus. The series also focuses on setting Cyprus’ experience in the wider scene by publishing books that place the island in its Mediterranean, European, Near Eastern, and global contexts. It also publishes on any contemporary theme, including the Cyprus ‘Problem’. CHCS is committed to excellence in scholarship, stringent refereeing of book proposals and manuscripts, and is inclusive and apolitical, priding itself in publishing cutting edge scholarship from all scholars, irrespective of affiliation, that goes beyond deterministic and nationalistic accounts. CHCS is an ambitious book series, publishing the most current and exciting research on Cyprus. Series Editor, Dr Andrekos Varnava, School of International Studies, Flinders University of South Australia.

The Archbishops of Cyprus in the Modern Age: The Changing Role of the Archbishop-Ethnarch, their Identities and Politics

Edited by

Andrekos Varnava and Michalis N. Michael

The Archbishops of Cyprus in the Modern Age: The Changing Role of the Archbishop-Ethnarch, their Identities and Politics, Edited by Andrekos Varnava and Michalis N. Michael This book first published 2013 Cambridge Scholars Publishing 12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2013 by Andrekos Varnava, Michalis N. Michael and contributors All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-4929-4, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-4929-6

I dedicate this book to my father Varnavas Michael Varnava, born in Frenaros, Famagusta, and resident of Melbourne since 1952. —Andrekos Varnava I dedicate this book to the memory of my father Nicos Michael. —Michalis N. Michael

TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of Figures ........................................................................................................... ix Series Editor Introduction ....................................................................................... xi Acknowledgements ................................................................................................xiii Chapter One ............................................................................................................... 1 Archbishop-Ethnarchs since 1767 Andrekos Varnava and Michalis N. Michael Chapter Two.............................................................................................................17 Chrysanthos, 1767-1810: Grappling with the Vicissitudes of Ottoman Power Theoharis Stavrides Chapter Three ..........................................................................................................41 Kyprianos, 1810-21: An Orthodox Cleric ‘Administering Politics’ in an Ottoman Island Michalis N. Michael Chapter Four ............................................................................................................69 Panaretos, 1827-40: His Struggle for Absolute Power during the Era of Ottoman Administrative Reforms Michalis N. Michael Chapter Five .............................................................................................................88 Makarios I, 1854-65: The Tanzimat and the Role of the Archbishop-Ethnarch Kyprianos D. Louis Chapter Six ............................................................................................................ 106 Sophronios III, 1865-1900: The Last of the ‘Old’ and the First of the ‘New’ Archbishop-Ethnarchs? Andrekos Varnava

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Chapter Seven ....................................................................................................... 148 Kyrillos II, 1909-16: The First Greek Nationalist and Enosist Archbishop-Ethnarch Andrekos Varnava and Irene Pophaides Chapter Eight ........................................................................................................ 177 Kyrillos III, 1916-33: Between Sophronios III and Kyrillos II Irene Pophaides Chapter Nine ......................................................................................................... 211 Leondios and the Archiepiscopal Question, 1933-47: The Demise of an Apolitical Ethnarchy? Alexis Rappas Chapter Ten........................................................................................................... 240 Makarios III, 1950-77: Creating the Ethnarchic State Sia Anagnostopoulou Chapter Eleven ..................................................................................................... 293 Chrysostomos I, 1977-2006: Makarios III was ‘A Difficult Act to Follow’ Andrekos Varnava Contributors .......................................................................................................... 311 Selected Bibliography ........................................................................................... 314 Index....................................................................................................................... 322

LIST OF IMAGES

Front Dust Jacket: Collage of Figures, 1, 2, 7, 14, 15, 16, 17, 20. Figure 1: Portrait of Archbishop Chrysanthos at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus .... 40 Figure 2: Portrait of Archbishop Kyprianos at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus .... 64 Figure 3: Portrait of the Ethno-Martyr, Archbishop Kyprianos. Source: Postcard, Toufexis, Series 2, no. 81, 1906: Courtesy of the Laiki Group Cultural Centre Photographic Archive ..................................................................................................... 65 Figure 4: Memorial to the Ethno-Martyr, Archbishop Kyprianos. Postcard, Toufexis, Series 2, no. 89, 1906: Courtesy of the Laiki Group Cultural Centre Photographic Archive .............................................................................................................................. 66 Figure 5: Kyprianos’ statue at the Archbishopric. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2006. Figure 6: Inscription on Kyprianos’ statue at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2008 ................................................................................................. 67 Figure 7: Portrait of Archbishop Sophronios III at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus .............................................................................................................................. 141 Figure 8: Signature of Archbishop Sophronios III, on letter to Grand Vizier, 27 May 1867. Source: HR.TO/449/6, 27 May 1867: Courtesy of BaûbakanlÖk OsmanlÖ Arûivleri (BOA) .............................................................................................................. 142 Figure 9: ‘Greek Priests Blessing the British Flag at Nicosia’. Source: Illustrated London News, 18 August 1878 .................................................................................................... 143 Figure 10: Archbishop Sophronios III taken in 1878 by Max Ohnefalsch-Richter Source: Magda Ohnefalsch-Richter, Greek Customs and Traditions in Cyprus, 1913: Courtesy of the Laiki Group Cultural Centre Photographic Archive .................... 144 Figure 11: Archbishop Sophronios III’s statue at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2008................................................................................. 145 Figure 12: ‘Sophronios behind bars’, statue of Archbishop Sophronios III at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2008 .................................. 146 Figure 13: Inscription on Sophronios’ statue at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2008 ............................................................................................... 147 Figure 14: Portrait of Archbishop Kyrillos II at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus .......176 Figure 15: Portrait of Archbishop Kyrillos III at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus .......210 Figure 16: Portrait of Archbishop Leondios at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus .. 239 Figure 17: Portrait of Archbishop Makarios III at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus .............................................................................................................................. 290

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Figure 18: Vandalised Statue of Makarios III at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2008 ............................................................................................... 291 Figure 19: New Marble Statue of Makarios III at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2008................................................................................. 292 Figure 20: Portrait of Archbishop Chrysostomos I at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus .............................................................................................................................. 310

SERIES EDITOR INTRODUCTION

For centuries, certainly since the onset of Ottoman rule, and in particular the mid-18th Century, the archbishops of the autocephalous Cypriot Orthodox Church have wielded a great deal of political power. Most people in their fifties and beyond would remember the bearded monk who became a politician, Archbishop Makarios III, and indeed his presence at Madame Tussauds is a reminder of his stature. But were all Cypriot archbishops so politically mindful and powerful? Where they all Greek nationalists? This study is the first ever to explore the peculiar role of the archbishop-ethnarch, and in so doing offers valuable historical and political insights into the phenomenon. The idea for the edited volume was born out of a discussion Michalis Michael and I had in Adelaide in 2009 on how Greek and Greek Cypriot researchers tended to be uncritical and biased in favour of their own ethnic identities. We decided to do a project that combined Michalis’ expertise in Church history, with my interest in the impact of political modernity on Cyprus. Much of the preparation has been done while both of us have lived and worked in different parts of the world, and this is no easy task. This edited volume has, therefore, been a long time in the making, and dare I say, long overdue. Despite the very prominent political, social and economic roles of Cypriot archbishops since Ottoman times, very little work has been published on them, and when there is some, it usually takes the form of hagiography. Meanwhile, it has only been in recent years that work linking the development of political modernity in Cyprus to the political, social and economic development of the island has appeared. Combining these two themes will hopefully show that the role of the archbishop-ethnarch has been far from static, and indeed has taken on different forms throughout the last three centuries. This book is not an attack on the Church of Cyprus nor is it anti-Church of Cyprus; in fact, on the contrary, it seeks to restore the historical record, and offer the Church a starting point from which to reassess its past and move forward. The Church of Cyprus, as with all other churches in the Western world, has a social and spiritual role to play in society. Therefore, this book should be read first and foremost as a political history of religious

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authorities, and secondly as a work of how nationalist politics evolved and was co-opted by religious authorities in order to re-obtain political authority from a secular colonial power. It was with these themes in mind that we selected the world class contributors. This is the type of exciting research that this series purports to offer, and I hope that other scholars follow our lead in putting forward ideas of similar importance. Series Editor, Dr Andrekos Varnava.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This volume has been in the making for over two years and has had a number of trials and tribulations. We would not have produced it without the hard work of many people and the help of many others. First and foremost we would like to thank our contributors for accepting the invitation to contribute to this volume and for producing such excellent contributions. We would like to single out two of the contributors for going beyond the call of duty: Haris Stavrides for his work on the chapter by Sia Anagnostopoulou, and Irene Pophaides for arranging permissions and taking the photographs from the Holy Archbishopric. In this last connection we would like to thank the Archbishop of Cyprus, Chrysostomos II, and the archivist of the Holy Archbishopric of Cyprus for granting us this permission. Our universities, beyond paying our salaries, also provide many other support services that both of us used to produce this volume. We must also thank the team at Cambridge Scholars Publishing for their patience and also their professionalism, and Dominic Thompson for a great job proofreading the entire manuscript. Finally we would like to thank our families for their patience and understanding. Andrekos Varnava, Senior Lecturer in Imperial and Military History, Flinders University. Michalis N. Michael, Assistant Professor of Ottoman History, University of Cyprus. January 2013.

CHAPTER ONE ARCHBISHOP-ETHNARCHS SINCE 1767 ANDREKOS VARNAVA AND MICHALIS N. MICHAEL

Soon after being controversially ‘elected’1 Archbishop of Cyprus in October 2006, Chrysostomos II announced that the giant statue of Archbishop Makarios III, which stood in the Archiepiscopal grounds in old Nicosia, would be removed, cleaned (it was vandalised in September 2008 with red paint) and re-erected at the Throne of the Virgin Mary three kilometres west of Kykkos Monastery – one of the wealthiest monasteries of the Eastern Orthodox Church in the world – where Makarios was buried, upon his own request, in 1977.2 Was this the beginning of the demystification of the Makarios legend? No. This move was merely an attempt at a re-invention, since ‘Big Mac’ was replaced with a more life-like (at least in terms of size) and pious (it is made of luminous white marble) statue, thus shifting the terms of his glorification from one of archbishop-ethnarch and political father of the ‘Greek nation in Cyprus’ to spiritual father of his religious flock as well, although it is hard to see such a shift succeeding given his hero/cult like status in the Greek Cypriot political and popular consciousness. Many Western readers of a generation or two ago would be familiar with Archbishop Makarios III, the President of Cyprus from 1960 until his death in 1977, and before that during the 1950s the political leader of the enosis (union with Greece) movement. During the 1950s he was called, amongst Chrysostomos was controversially elected because he barely received 10 per cent of the people’s vote in a very complicated and ultimately undemocratic election process. Sunday (Cyprus) Mail, 5 November 2006. For these elections see also: Victor Roudometof, ‘Orthodoxy and Modernity in Cyprus: The 2006 Archiepiscopal Elections in Historical Perspective’, Journal of Contemporary Religion, XXIV, 2, 2009, 189-204. 2Cyprus Mail, 24 January 2007; Sunday (Cyprus) Mail, 22 June 2008; Cyprus Mail, 24 October 2008; Sunday (Cyprus) Mail, 14 December 2008. 1

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other names, ‘Black Mac’, and portrayed as a religious fanatic Rasputin-like figure that approved of EOKA (1955-59) terrorism in the name of enosis.3 Then in the 1960s and early 1970s, he became the ‘Castro of the Mediterranean’, a trouble-maker for the West because he kept Cyprus in the neutral camp during the Cold War, which for many in the West, particularly successive US governments, effectively meant that because he was not ‘with us’ he was ‘against us’. Today his presence in the West lives on as a wax dummy at Madame Tussauds. Makarios was the embodiment of the spiritual and temporal leader in the age when such leaders hardly existed anywhere else, certainly not in the West, and before they developed in some Islamic countries. Makarios was instrumental in placing Cyprus on the map, yet for reasons that for many people were not good, since much of the international community, even those sympathetic to the enosis movement, associated the island with terrorism and with a leader who combined his spiritual role as head of the Church with his temporal – ethnarchic – role as the head of the government, which was an alien concept to Western societies, where church and state had been separated for centuries. Thirty-five years after the death of Archbishop Makarios III, the time has come to debate his role and the role of other archbishops of Cyprus as archbishops and as ethnarchs, that is, as leaders who combined their spiritual responsibilities as heads of the Cypriot Orthodox Church, with their roles as political leaders of the Cypriot Orthodox community. Did other archbishops of Cyprus before and after Makarios III combine their roles as ‘archbishop-ethnarchs’ in the same way as he did? Were they also nationalist leaders, who claimed the Cypriot Christians were Greeks, and demanded enosis? The word ethnarch has had a very interesting historical development according to the entry in the Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, although always referring to a leadership title.4 In Antiquity the title of ethnarch was used in the Levant to refer to rulers of vassal kingdoms who did not rise to the level of a monarch. With the split in the Roman Empire, the Eastern Roman Empire retained the title to refer to the rulers of foreign tribes or realms outside the empire. By the 10th century the term had changed again, acquiring a more local and technical bureaucratic meaning for high-ranking commanders of foreign mercenaries serving in the Byzantine army. When the Ottoman S. L. Carruthers, ‘EOKA and the Struggle for Enosis in Cyprus, 1955-59’, Winning Hearts and Minds: British Governments, the Media and Colonial Counter-Insurgency, 1944-1960, Leicester University Press, London, 1995, 239-44. 4 A. P. Kazhdan, The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, II, Oxford University Press, New York, 1991, 734. 3

Archbishop-Ethnarchs since 1767

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Empire took control of the Near and Middle East there was much continuity with its Byzantine predecessor, and this was no different for the title ethnarch. The title was now bestowed on the heads of the religious groups (millets), the non-Muslim communities, the Orthodox Christians, Armenian Christians, and Jewish communities, since the system divided society along religious lines. The term had been inverted: the spiritual and political leaders of the non-Muslim populations of the Ottoman Empire were now designated by the term ethnarch, which had formerly been associated with foreigners inside or outside the Byzantine Empire. The historiography of the term ethnarch in its modern or Ottoman context, and that of the archbishops of Cyprus, is weak, and both are dominated by studies focussing on Archbishop Makarios III. Essentially there are two lines of thought: one that accepts the twin role of the archbishop-ethnarch as a historical and God-given right, in much the same way as monarchs in pre-modern Western Europe, and which therefore has been a constant from timeimmemorial as the torch-bearer of Greek national identity and liberation from foreign (Latin and Ottoman) rule in the island; and a second which allows for more grey amongst the very black and white first interpretation, which considers how the role changed over time to the different needs of the church and society and within the different political and social structures in place (during Latin and Ottoman rule). This book offers a more nuanced portrait of the role of the archbishop-ethnarch within the appropriate historical and theoretical contexts. The first school of thought, the ‘deterministic school’, is well represented by Greek and Greek Cypriot authors, as well as favourable Western biographers. In 1967, Theodore Papadopoullos, the then director of the Cyprus Research Centre, in the Ministry of Education and Culture of the Republic of Cyprus, published an interesting (despite being largely forgotten) article in the Journal of Contemporary History titled ‘Orthodox Church and Civil Authority’.5 He argued that ‘the present status of the head of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus as an ethnarch and political chief has been, so to speak, devolved upon him by history’. In other words, as with ancien regime monarchs, the Cypriot archbishop-ethnarch had a God-given historical passage to his status and power. This status, Papadopoullos claimed, was also predetermined by history, which, in his words, ‘prescribes that ethnarchic policy must keep in harmony with national aspirations’ and ‘the policy of the head of the church qua ethnarch cannot contradict those aspirations without Theodore Papadopoullos, ‘Orthodox Church and Civil Authority’, Journal of Contemporary History, II, 4, October 1967, 201-9.

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entailing the criticism attaching to an ultra vires action’. So from timeimmemorial the Cypriot archbishop-ethnarchs have represented the nationalist interests of the Greek Orthodox people of Cyprus, and these nationalist interests, judging from Papadopoullos’ entire article, centre on Hellenism, keeping it alive during Ottoman rule, and advocating for enosis during British rule and even in post-colonial Cyprus, despite the consociational constitution precluding it. Thus the role of the Cypriot archbishop-ethnarchs has been a constant, while the Eastern Orthodox Christians of the island have always been politically active and had an ethnic national awareness as ‘Greeks’. Finally, one is left wondering whether Papadopoullos was conveying a veiled warning to Archbishop Makarios III against wavering over enosis, a warning that was not heeded, since in November 1967, a month after Papadopoullos’ article appeared, Makarios announced a new policy on the ‘Cyprus question’, the policy of what was ‘feasible’ (independence) rather than what was ‘desirable’ (enosis), meaning that enosis was possible, but not feasible now.6 The works of P. N Vanezis belong to the same school of thought. In a trilogy of monographs, published between the years 1971 and 1979, Vanezis praises Makarios and his overall political action.7 He also perceives the political role of the Church of Cyprus as something natural without wondering when, why and in which historical framework this political role became a reality, and how it managed to remain constant throughout long periods of relative peaceful rule under Franks, Venetians, and Ottomans. Characteristically, in his first work about Makarios, titled Makarios: Faith and Power, Vanezis implied that the political role of the Archbishop of the Church of Cyprus dated back to the Byzantine period, and so there was ‘nothing unprecedented or original in the career of Archbishop Makarios’.8 Projecting this stereotypical portrait of the ecclesiastical leader who is also the ‘father’ of the ethnos, Vanezis basically remains within the framework of the prevailing historiography in relation to the political role of the archbishop of Cyprus and especially that of Makarios, thus reinforcing the absence of scientific

6 See Richard A. Patrick, Political Geography and the Cyprus Conflict: 1963-1971, University of Waterloo, Ontario, 1976, 142-6; Halil Ibrahim Salih, Cyprus: The Impact of Diverse Nationalism on a State, University of Alabama Press, Alabama, 1978, 60-1; 7 P. N. Vanezis, Makarios: Faith and Power, Abelard-Schuman, London 1971. Same author, Makarios: Pragmatism v. Idealism, Abelard-Schuman, London 1974 and Makarios: Life and Leadership, Abelard-Schuman, London 1979. 8 Vanezis, Faith and Power, 37.

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work on Makarios himself, but also on the institution of the archbishop during the colonial era. 9 Most recently, an article by Christos Kassimeris and Andreas Philaretou appeared, attempting to explain the charismatic leadership of Makarios III, which also falls within this school of thought.10 With the exception of the interesting use of theory, the article essentially regurgitates the views of Papadopoullos and Vanezis, and, in an hagiographic fashion, absolves Makarios of any crimes committed by the Greek Cypriot government or semi-government paramilitary forces in the 1960s and 1970s, while accepting that the respect, support and reverence of the Cypriot people for Makarios was automatic and holistic. Thus, this article as well, can only be seen as deterministic on the issue of the archbishop-ethnarch. The exception to the rule is the article by Paul Sant Cassia, at the time in 1982 a young Maltese anthropologist, titled ‘The Archbishop in the Beleaguered City’.11 Sant Cassia was far more liberated than Papadopoullos, Vanezis and Kassimeris and Philaretou; he was not a Cypriot or a Greek, nor did he work in Cyprus, and also Makarios had died five years earlier. He focussed on explaining the popularity of Makarios III, arguing that it centred on an ‘abstract ideal’, that of Greek nationalism, and his oratory on his ‘contradictory roles as Churchman and Politician, and his attempts to deal with the problems which that entailed’. In trying to explain the historical circumstances of this twin role and the presence of Greek nationalism, Sant Cassia allows that there were some grey areas but essentially, as with Papadopoullos, the Cypriot archbishop-ethnarchs represented the Greek nation in Cyprus. He differs from Papadopoullos in that he does not accept the origins of the dual role of the Cypriot archbishop-ethnarchs as God-given or pre-ordained, and claims this was ‘because it (the Cypriot Orthodox Church) had for centuries been a religion of subject peoples [and] had not (with the exception of Russia) been faced with the problem of defining and separating where the State ends and the Church begins (as occurred in Western Europe)’. This book will take this explanation further by placing it Robert Holland, ‘The Historiography of the Late Colonial Cyprus: Where do We Go from Here?’, H. Faustmann, N. Peristianis (eds), Britain in Cyprus. Colonialism and PostColonialism, 1878-2006, Bibliopolis, Mannheim 2006, 446. 10 Christos Kassimeris and Andreas Philaretou, ‘Playing Politics with Charisma: Archbishop Makarios III and the Cyprus Issue’, Politics, Culture & Socialization, I, 4, 2010, 337-352. 11 Paul Sant Cassia, ‘The Archbishop in the Beleaguered City: An Analysis of the Conflicting Roles and Political Oratory of Makarios’, Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, VIII, 1982, 191-212. 9

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more firmly in its Ottoman socio-political and socio-economic contexts, and it will show how the power of the Ottoman archbishop-ethnarch was reduced under British rule, forcing the archbishop-ethnarch into adopting a new method by which to exercise political power in a modern world and under a British colonial system. The role of the Archbishop of Cyprus as ethnarch of his people is both a controversial and misunderstood phenomenon. It was misunderstood during British times by many British civil servants, politicians and administrators because it was anathema for them that a religious leader should also be a political leader, owing to the separation of church and state in their society. One person who understood the term well was Harry Luke, who combined two ‘hats’, as both a colonial service official in Cyprus between 1910 and 1919, and a historian of Ottoman Cyprus and a commentator on contemporary Cyprus (writing travel accounts, memoirs and commentaries on Cyprus). In his classic Cyprus: A Portrait and an Appreciation, Luke, unlike most other commentators, firmly situated the twin role of archbishop-ethnarch in its Ottoman roots, and questioned the ‘nationalist’ dimension of the role, by emphasising its Ottoman political and legal context.12 Luke found the role of Makarios III as archbishop-ethnarch ironic because the archbishop ‘affected to maintain an Ottoman practise long after the constitutional basis of the practise had vanished’.13 This was a most perceptive observation, as will be seen in this book, and especially in the chapter on Makarios III. Yet despite the aggravation of many a colonial service officer in Cyprus over this curious combination, they all acquiesced and many even accepted what the historian William Miller claimed in 1922 that ‘nearly all Eastern Churchmen are politicians’14 without ever attempting to understand why and how. Most accepted the local position that this role was determined by circumstance and was God-given. Not only had this ignorance prevailed, but during the twentieth century, when the Church of Cyprus co-opted ethnic nationalism and enosis in order to re-establish their political power, which had diminished under British modernity, the British also accepted that the Church had always been this way – that, in the words of a more contemporary historian, ‘the survival of the Church (of Cyprus) and that of a

Sir Harry C. Luke, Cyprus: A Portrait and an Appreciation, Harrap, London 1957 (revised 1965), 78-9, 182-3. 13 Ibid., 182-3. 14 William Miller, A History of the Greek People (1821-1921), Methuen, London, 1922, 281. 12

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Hellenic “nation” on the island was indissolubly connected in the same way as the Catholic faith of the Gael of Ireland’.15 This acceptance accords with the beliefs of most Cypriot and Greek Orthodox Christian people that the Archbishop of Cyprus was (and for some still is) a particular type of ethnarch. They believe that during Latin rule the Church was suppressed and persecuted and that little changed during Ottoman rule, with the exception that the Church was acknowledged as the representative of the ‘Greek’ Orthodox Cypriots. They believe that the archbishop purposefully led a policy to preserve the ‘Hellenic character’ of Cyprus in order that one day he would re-awaken the ‘Hellenic spirit’ within all Orthodox Christians of Cyprus. For this reason numerous hagiographic biographies and biographical works have appeared on Archbishop Kyprianos, the ‘ethno-martyr’ and on Makarios III,16 while virtually nothing has been published on those perceived as less ‘nationalist’ archbishops, such as Chrysanthos and Sophronios III, even though they were the two longest serving archbishops in the modern era. Nationalism dictated that nationalist discourses of the past needed creating. Archbishop Kyprianos was a logical target, given that he had been executed by the Ottomans in 1821 after being accused of links with members of the ‘Friendly Society’ that was leading the Greek revolt and of trying to spread the revolt to Cyprus. As will be seen in the chapter on Kyprianos, his creation as an ethno-martyr was a nationalist project of revision of the past, since Kyprianos, as one of the most powerful archbishop-ethnarchs, had been loyal to the Ottoman state, yet, according to Ottoman documents, too powerful for the local governor, who saw a way of removing him.17 Another example of nationalist revision of history in order to create a script of the ‘Greek’ nation in Cyprus was the long-held fabrication that Archbishop Sophronios or Bishop Kyprianos of Kitium welcomed the first high commissioner of Cyprus in 1878 with declarations of Robert Holland, Britain and the Revolt in Cyprus, 1954-1959, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1998, 6. 16 On Kyprianos see Paraskevas Agathonos (ed.), ƂƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ: Ɛ ƬƜƱƴƵƱơƲ ƴƧƲ ưƟƳƴƥƹƲ ƪơƩ ƴƧƲ ươƴƱƟƤƯƲ (The Archbishop of Cyprus Kyprianos: The Martyr of Faith and Homeland), Machairas Monastery, Nicosia, 2009; On Makarios see Panos Myriotis, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ ƴƯ ƖƫƯƣƩƳƬƝƭƯ ƒƜƳƯ (Makarios the Flaming Cassock), Nicosia, 1977; Ɛ ƆƨƭƜƱƷƧƲ ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ 1913-1977 (The Ethnarch Makarios 1913-1977), C. A. L. Graphies, Cyprus, 1977; George Christodoylou Mouskos, Ɛ ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ žưƹƲ ƴƯƭ ŻƦƧƳơ (Makarios How I Lived Him), Nicosia, 1984; Alexandros K. Karapanagopoulos, Ɛ ƂƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ ƪơƩ ƆƨƭƜƱƷƧƲ ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ ƊƊƊ. ƓƴƩƣƬƝƲ Ƃƣƾƭ ƪơƩ ƂƣƹƭƟơƲ, ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƼ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƼ ơưƼ ƑƧƣƝƲ ƂƸƥƵƤƥƟƲ, Athens, 1996. 17 Michalis N. Michael, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƯƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞ ưƥƱƟƯƤƯ (1571-1878): ƈ ƳƴơƤƩơƪƞ ƳƵƣƪƱƼƴƧƳƧ ƴƧƲ Ƴƥ ƨƥƳƬƼ ưƯƫƩƴƩƪƞƲ ƥƮƯƵƳƟơƲ, Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia, 2005, 215-40. 15

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loyalty contingent on the British ceding Cyprus to Greece. It has since been shown that no such speech was made.18 Both cases of revising the past for nationalist purposes aim to portray an archbishop-ethnarch as one who represented the ‘Hellenic character’ of the Orthodox Christians of Cyprus and an enosis advocate. The overarching aim of this collection is to revise what was a revisionist re-interpretation of the role of the archbishop-ethnarch by authors influenced by nationalism and to therefore set the record straight through systematic scientific historical methodology. As a whole, this collection will argue that the role of the archbishop-ethnarch was not a constant in the pre-modern and modern eras – that is, from the period of the Enlightenment and the later stages of Ottoman rule, through to British rule and the postcolonial period of independence. So this book aims to explore the changing role of the ‘archbishop-ethnarch’ within Cypriot society, economics and primarily politics, across three distinct periods in Cypriot history (Ottoman, British and independence), which therefore sees Cypriots evolving from being an Ottoman millet, to British colonial subjects, and finally to citizens in an independent republic. In a broader context, this was also a period of profound historical change, upheaval and conflict for Europeans (from the French Revolution, the two World Wars, to the European Union), and the question that must be asked is how did this broader context impact upon Cyprus and the questions this book seeks to answer. Did all archbishops try to combine the spiritual and political offices of the role in the way nationalist discourses have claimed? Were all the archbishops firebrand nationalists? The book explores the differing approaches of various archbishops to how they saw and implemented their leadership style based on the different historical contexts and personal approaches. Thus this book focuses on the relations between the various archbishops and those powers either dominating or influencing Cyprus, whether these forces were external or internal, and their relations with the Cypriot people. In this sense, this volume is just as much a social history as it is a political history. This book explores these themes through the changing roles of the archbishop-ethnarchs of Cyprus, their identities and their politics from Chrysanthos in the 18th century to Chrysostomos I into the 21st century. It therefore covers the period between the years 1767, the year of Archbishop Chrysanthos’ enthronement, to the year 2006, when Archbishop Rolandos Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus during the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century, Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia 1996, 25-8; Andrekos Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915: The Inconsequential Possession, Manchester University Press, 2009, 152-79.

18

Archbishop-Ethnarchs since 1767

9

Chrysostomos I died and the current archbishop, Chrysostomos II, was enthroned. During these two and a half centuries, the island, consecutively, passed from Ottoman to British rule, and finally to independence with the creation of the Republic of Cyprus in 1960. The desire for the Church of Cyprus and especially of the higher clergy to be politically involved remained a constant throughout this period, yet the nature of the political involvement was always shaped by the dominant political framework that existed. This varied. So the process of integration into the Ottoman ideological and political framework shaped the political role of the Church during Ottoman times; during British colonial rule, after failing to continue the strategy pursued during Ottoman times, the Church evolved into an institution of opposition to the imperial power and its ideological and political framework, even though it attempted to manipulate this framework to achieve its ends; while finally, after leading the movement that overthrew British rule, and in doing so established itself both as an ‘other’ in relation to both the British colonial rulers and settlers, as well as the Turkish Cypriot community and other national minorities, such as the Maronite and Roman Catholics, and Armenians, it evolved into a repressive force against the Turkish Cypriot community, which it was supposed to share power with in the post-colonial consociational government.19 Throughout these two centuries the Cypriot Church was relatively effective in adapting to the changing broader and local political circumstances affecting the island and its political role. This edited volume provides a study of ten archbishops of Cyprus and how they went about trying to exercise political, social and economic power across the last 250 years. The first case, authored by Theoharis Stavrides, studies Chrysanthos, archbishop from 1767-1810. His long tenure spanned the final three decades of the 18th century and the first decade of the 19th century, a period of political instability and financial duress for the Ottoman Empire generally and particularly for its periphery, as it was challenged by various external powers, such as Russia in the Black Sea, and the French in the eastern Mediterranean. The Ottoman pre-occupation with foreign threats to its territorial integrity may have contributed to the increased power and 19 Andrekos Varnava, Nicholas Coureas, & Marina Elia (eds.), The Minorities of Cyprus: Development Patterns and the Identity of the Internal-Exclusion, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne, 2009; Christalla Yakinthou, Political Settlements in Divided Societies: Consociationalism and Cyprus, Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2009; Andrekos Varnava & Christalla Yakinthou, ‘Cyprus: Political Modernity and the Structures of Democracy in a Divided Island,’ in The Oxford Handbook of Local and Regional Democracy in Europe, (eds.) John Loughlin, Frank Hendriks and Anders Lidstrom, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 455-77.

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authority of the Church of Cyprus, since it experienced a cultural renaissance and economic wealth. Meanwhile, Chrysanthos was able to establish a practise of nepotism and clientelism that has largely remained the norm, not only in the structures of the Cypriot Church, but more broadly in Cypriot society.20 This increased authority was seen in the archbishop’s successful struggles against powerful Ottoman governors, whose dismissal Chrysanthos managed to obtain, most notably the notorious Haci Baki. However, the last decades of the 18th century were marked by the rise of Dragoman Hadjigeorgakis Kornesios, who was closely connected to Chrysanthos, but who also challenged the primacy of the Church in the local political stage. In the early years of the 19th century, the Cypriot Church, led by an aged and ailing Chrysanthos, was increasingly overshadowed by the Dragoman’s power. Chrysanthos’ close ties with Hadjigeorgakis, who was executed in 1809, as well as the backlash against his perceived nepotism, led to Chrysanthos’ downfall and replacement by Kyprianos, a new and dynamic cleric, in 1810. Michalis N. Michael addresses the role of Archbishop Kyprianos (181021), an important person in the history of the island, especially for nationalist narratives. He analyses Kyrpianos’ life and course under the Ottoman ideological and political framework of the beginning of the 19th century and the nature of his political power as it evolved after the near four decades of Chrysanthos’ ethnarchy and the more recent dominance of Hadjigeorgakis. Michael focusses on the relations between the Ottoman imperial centre, which was trying to decentralise its administrative structures, and the Cypriot Orthodox Church, which had become an even more authoritarian political institution in Ottoman Cyprus under Kyprianos. All these factors compose the framework under which Kyprianos was raised to the archbishop’s throne of Cyprus in 1810, and explain his own execution, and that of hundreds of other Cypriot notables aligned to him, in July 1821, an event from which Kyrpianos emerged as an ethno-martyr, especially later in the 19th century, at least according to nationalist historiography. Michael also authors the chapter on Archbishop Panaretos (1827-40) whose primacy ends with the start of a new era for the Ottoman Empire; that of the Tanzimat. As Michael shows, Panaretos was fighting to preserve his political power in an Ottoman Empire that was dramatically changing and entering a complex period of reformation. During his primacy the first 20 On Cypriot clientelism generally see Hubert Faustmann, ‘Clientelism in the Greek Cypriot Community of Cyprus Under British Rule’, The Cyprus Review, X, 2, Autumn 1998, 41-77.

Archbishop-Ethnarchs since 1767

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important administrative reformations in Cyprus took place, nine years before the official proclamation of the Tanzimat. Additionally, Panaretos had been on the throne during the establishment of the Greek Kingdom, a new ideological pole for Orthodox elite, while the vigorous presence of the rich Orthodox in Larnaca foreshadowed the effort of the laity to enter the sphere of power of the Church. The consequence of all these developments was the loss, to some degree, of the Church’s absolute control, while the reforms of the Tanzimat, which were officially announced in 1839, a year before the removal of Panaretos from the Archbishop’s throne of Cyprus, changed the administrative and political structures in the island. Kyprianos Louis, the author of the chapter on Makarios I, archbishop from 1854-65, shows that what change there was since Panaretos was due to the implementation of the second Tanzimat. The political, economic and social context in which any modernisation efforts transpired was determined by various factors, but above all by the desire of the leadership of the Cypriot Orthodox Church to maintain and secure its powerful and privileged position in the Ottoman bureaucracy. In order to do this it willingly accepted the formalisation of its political role through the new legal mechanisms, even if this meant including secular elites. This gave it additional power and prestige, which it used in order to control the education system that the Ottomans now encouraged. In this way they were able to implement an education system that combined the new secular curriculum with their desire to create model Ottoman subjects, those being moral Christians who respected all their neighbours regardless of religion. So overall Archbishop Makarios I was a man emblematic of the Tanzimat reforms. Andrekos Varnava writes on the difficult and complex period of transition from the Ottomans to the British under Archbishop Sophronios III, archbishop from 1865-1900. Sophronios’s life and actions during his long primacy of thirty-five years are analysed in the framework of the important ideological and administrative changes of the second half of the nineteenth century. Varnava argues that Sophronios was the last of the ‘old’ and the first of the ‘new’ archbishop-ethnarchs. He was the last of the ‘old’ because he wanted to continue the practise of church co-option by the state under the British as it had been practised under the Ottomans, which had given the church a privileged political, social and economic position. Yet Sophronios was the first of the ‘new’ because he saw the church as a modernising agent, urging the British to introduce judicial equality and supporting representative institutions. Yet he was not ‘modern’ enough, hence his neglect in the historiography and the successful fabrication of his legacy by nationalist politicians and clergy soon after his death. He was a very different ‘new’ to

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the ‘new’ as represented by his eventual successor, the firebrand Hellenic nationalist Kyrillos Papadopoulos. Sophronios wanted to maintain the power of the high clergy of both Christians and Muslims, through cooperating with the British, while at the same time he wanted the British to introduce equality before the law for both Christians and Muslims. Sophronios was a far more complicated ethnarch and a rare intellectual for the Church of Cyprus for many reasons, but in particular because he appreciated the potential damage of nationalism, namely Hellenism, for the Cypriot people, since he did not have a Greek national identity, and wanted to retain the Ottoman system of religious national identities. The chapter on Archbishop Kyrillos ƊƊ, who started his primacy after the end of the Archiepiscopal Question in 1910 and lasted only six years, was cowritten by Andrekos Varnava and Irene Pophaides. They note that in Cypriot historiography and Cypriot national consciousness Archbishop Kyrillos II is treated well because there has been no ambivalence to him being a Greek nationalist that championed enosis. The authors show that Kyrillos II was the first Greek nationalist and enosist archbishop-ethnarch and the first political brawler. He adapted to and used the British introduction of political modernity by reconfiguring the political power of the church, not through Sophronios’ failed co-option efforts, but through positioning the church as a political and ideological opposition to the British. He also used the British introduction of political modernity, such as the encouragement of ‘Greek’ and ‘Turkish’ identities in the areas of education, to further his enosist aims. Yet despite his obsession with enosis and his brawling nationalist tactics, once he became archbishop he moderated his tactics to attempt to achieve his ends. Nevertheless, Kyrillos II was the first archbishop to mould his role as ethnarch into the nationalist political leadership that most people have come to associate with the role. Irene Pophaides writes on his successor, Archbishop Kyrillos III (191633), a prelate that according to the author was indisputably an important figure in the history of ethnarchy in Cyprus. Pophaides argues that Kyrillos III saw his role as an archbishop-ethnarch as encompassing the dual duty of leading his community spiritually and politically. She argues that Kyrillos, during his seventeen-year office, faced and responded to a number of challenges of a religious, ecclesiastic, political and nationalist nature, his handling of which revealed his perception of the authority and role of the ethnarch as something between the approaches and perceptions of his two predecessors, although progressively moving closer to his immediate predecessor, with whom, ironically, he had had a very bitter and even violent struggle between 1900 and 1910 as to who would succeed Sophronios.

Archbishop-Ethnarchs since 1767

13

Undoubtedly, as is mentioned in this chapter, Kyrillos III has not been surrounded by the glory of a national martyr, yet his archiepiscopacy substantially contributed to the subsequent progress of the enosist struggle along increasingly less moderate lines and to the nationalist ethnarchic tradition as opposed to the co-operative tradition of Ottoman and earlier British times. Archbishop Leondios (1947) and the ‘second’ Archiepiscopal Question (from 1933-47) are studied by Alexis Rappas, who notes that although officially Leondios served the shortest term as archbishop in the history of the Cypriot Church, he was a towering figure having led the Church through fourteen difficult years as Locum Tenens before his enthronement. Following island-wide Greek Cypriot demonstrations and the burning down of the governor’s residence in October 1931, Cyprus was subjected to a very atypical, compared to Malta for example, authoritarian rule severely restricting freedom of speech, movement and assembly, and other civil liberties. Leondios, as Locum Tenens, worked hard to reclaim the archbishop’s moral title to ethnarchy and his brand of nationalism often clashed with that of shrewd conservative politicians who expected him to take a stronger stand against the rising left-wing. The chapter focuses on the ‘Archiepiscopal Question’, the tug-of-war between the Orthodox clergy and colonial authorities regarding the filling of the archiepiscopal throne’s vacancy following the incumbent’s death in 1933. It argues that the Church, which had been weakened following the 1931 events, maintained itself as the main pole of nationalist politics in Cyprus despite the rise of different ideologies and also different views on enosis and British rule, largely because of Leondios’ confrontational attitude towards colonial authorities. The author points out that in the late 1930s Leondios was ‘fabricated’ as a national leader of a much different sort than what he himself intended his role to be, and concludes by highlighting the relative marginalisation of Leondios’ agency in the context of an increasingly intense rivalry between the conservative right and the progressive left among Greek Cypriots during and soon after World War II. The most well-known archbishop-ethnarch of Cyprus, Makarios III (195077) and the complex period of his primacy are studied by Sia Anagnostoupoulou. She notes that in the historiography on Makarios little attention has been paid to the role that he laid claim to and even placed above that of the President of the Republic of Cyprus: the role of ethnarch. Anagnostoupoulou contrasts the role of the archbishop-ethnarch as it evolved from a collaborationist political leader under the Ottoman system, through the irredentist ideology of the Greek state that was adopted after British modernity side-lined the archbishop-ethnarch, with that of the President of the

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Chapter One

Republic of Cyprus, a modern, secular, and bi-communal state. The Church of Cyprus, the author argues, was organized during the colonial period as an ethnarchic Church, that is, it led an ‘ethno-religious people’ struggling for its incorporation into the imagined ‘national body’. The Archbishop of Cyprus was ethnarch to the extent that the Church was ethnarchic. With Makarios, however, the ethnarchism of the archbishop became gradually autonomous from that of the Church. In this chapter, the author explores how Makarios changed the traditional ethnarchic role in relation to the ‘national centre’, Enosis, and the ethnarchic Church, but mostly how it became synonymous with the ethnarchic state that Makarios created as the president of a post-colonial and independent republic. This helps to explain the first partition of the island in 1963-4 after a civil war between Greek and Turkish Cypriots, and the second partition after the Turkish military intervention of 1974. The last chapter, again by Andrekos Varnava, focuses on Archbishop Chrysostomos I (1977-2006) and how he saw his role as the archbishopethnarch in the aftermath of the death of Makarios in 1977. In interpreting Chrysostomos’ approach to being the archbishop-ethnarch, the author underlines his efforts to follow in his predecessor’s footsteps and his failure to realise this. According to the author, following on from Makarios’ ethnarchic state, Chrysostomos believed that it was his duty to be actively involved in all facets of the Cyprus ‘problem’, and there was still no desire on the part of the church and some political elites to see a division of church and state. Makarios’ success in dominating all aspects of Greek Cypriot life, whether supported or not, influenced Chrysostomos’ attempt to mimic Makarios rather than attempt to forge his own path. That is why Chrysostomos always referred to Makarios to promote or justify his ideas and policies. Another factor that decisively influenced Chrysostomos’ course as archbishop-ethnarch was how he reacted to the war of 1974. The author shows that in many ways Chrysostomos’ reactions to the aftermath of the war and the political problem that resulted were based on the ethnarchic state that Makarios had created. His approach was understandable for someone who not only succeeded Makarios, but who was also a product of Makarios’ ethnarchic state, as well as of the war of 1974 and the policy of blaming the international community and the Turks and Turkish Cypriots for the outcome of that war. This chapter has introduced the reader to the historiography, theories, themes and scope of this volume, and in the absence of a concluding chapter it now offers a few remarks on the results. This volume shows that, although all archbishop-ethnarchs in Cyprus across the last 250 years endeavoured to dominate the politics, society and economics of the island, two types of archbishop-ethnarch emerge. The first type, only seen during Ottoman times,

Archbishop-Ethnarchs since 1767

15

looked to the East, that is, to the Ottoman imperial centre, from which the power of the archbishop-ethnarch was derived. Thus cooperation (or some might say collaboration) with the imperial centre and its officers in the periphery, was the only strategy possible to maintain their political, social and economic power in the island. Cyprus was therefore considered to belong to the ‘East’ and therefore within the religious collective identity espoused by the Ottoman state, which happened to be a continuation of the Eastern Roman Empire. The second approach looked ‘West’ and to the modernity of the Enlightenment and in particular the emerging nationalist project. This approach took root only in the 20th century and came to dominate the approaches of all 20th century archbishop-ethnarchs, largely because the previous approach no longer maintained the power of the archbishop-ethnarch or the higher clergy within the British colonial system. Looking to the modernity of the West and to a higher authority than the imperial centre and its officers in the periphery, this new approach appealed to the ‘imagined community’ or to the ‘dream-nation’ for prestige and power.21 This approach resulted in the ‘Eastern’ looking political elites and the peasant, and later labouring, classes transforming into members of the extended Greek nation in Cyprus. This culminated in the political violence of the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, and Makarios’ ethnarchic state. This is of course rather ironic given that the concept of the ‘ethnarch’ was fundamentally ‘Eastern’, even though the cooption of local elites was a common practise of many imperial systems, especially the British. The only exception to these two types was Sophronios’ long period as archbishop-ethnarch, where he looked both ‘East’ and ‘West’, but mostly ‘East’. He looked ‘West’ in so far as he wanted equality before the law for all members of society, although he still wanted the Church to have a privileged position as protected and protector of the state and the policies of the imperial centre, as it had had in Ottoman times. Also, Sophronios did not look ‘West’ in relation to collective identity and rejected nationalism as an evil that would jeopardise the peace between Christians and Muslims in the island. This is the first book to deal with the unique and complex phenomenon of the archbishop-ethnarch and thus has great significance for contemporary Cyprus. It presents ten cases, across various periods of ‘modern’ history, and therefore from different historical contexts. It has found that although the various archbishop-ethnarchs have maintained the same desire to hold political, social and economic hegemony, they have used different methods Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, Verso, London, 1983; Stathis Gourgouris, Dream Nation: Enlightenment, Colonization, and the Institution of Modern Greece, Stanford University Press, Stanford, California, 1996.

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Chapter One

to do so, and have had varying rates of success. Therefore, not only does this book say a great deal about the nature of religious and political leadership during the transition from pre-modern to modern political and social awareness, but it also says a great deal about the local political and social problems (including the phenomenon of nationalism as it developed in Cyprus) that Cyprus has faced and still faces, not least of which is the division of the island. It can only be hoped that in moving forward towards reunification, that the Church also evolves in the necessary direction so that a bi-zonal, bicommunal state might be successfully realised. This book can represent a significant turning point for the Church of Cyprus, since it aims to understand the past role of the Church in the political life of the country. Readers will interpret the evidence and arguments presented in this volume as they deem fit; some, mostly nationalists, will be critical of those archbishops’ who worked with the Ottoman and British authorities, while others will praise (or at least understand) this, and criticize the nationalism that has prevailed over the last century, that yet gave rise to violence and war, and the partition of the island and separation of its two main communities. In light of the results of this book the reader must ask, can the Cypriot Church play the constructive role needed to reconcile the Cypriot people and reunify the island? Can it play the role of a Cypriot Church, as it evidently did pre-1900, or will it continue to represent a chauvinist brand of Cypriot Hellenism?

CHAPTER TWO CHRYSANTHOS, 1767-1810: GRAPPLING WITH THE VICISSITUDES OF OTTOMAN POWER THEOHARIS STAVRIDES

In his book on the history of the Church of Cyprus under the Ottomans, Archbishop of Athens, Chrysostomos I Papadopoulos (1923-38), titled the ten-page chapter devoted to Archbishop of Cyprus, Chrysanthos (17671810), ‘Sufferings of the Church by the Turks’ («ƋơƪƾƳƥƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƵưƼ ƴƹƭ ƔƯƽƱƪƹƭ»), implying that this was a dark period, during which the local Church suffered at the hands of the Ottoman authorities. Reflecting traditional Greek historiography, Papadopoulos maintained that, during Chrysanthos’ long administration, ‘the condition of the Church did not improve in any way, since the tyrannical Turks mercilessly oppressed the Christians’.1 On the other hand, in a later passage, the same author indicates that this same period has been characterized as ‘the golden age of the Greek Orthodox Church in Cyprus’, ‘due to [Chrysanthos’] general cultural activity and the great works accomplished under him’.2 Exaggerated as they may be, both of these assertions contain a grain of truth, since, although it coincided with a period of political instability and financial duress, Chrysanthos’ long and eventful administration was a period of increased power and authority, as well as of cultural activity for the Church of Cyprus. The foundations of this increased power for the Church lay in processes that had started a few decades earlier, during the tenure of Chrysanthos’ prepredecessor. Archbishop Philotheos (1734-59) was an educated cleric, who had studied in the Patriarchal School of Constantinople and had worked as a



1 Chrysostomos Papadopoulos, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥưƟ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ (1571-1878) [The Church of Cyprus in the Turkish Period (1571-1878)], Typographeion Phoinix, Athens, 1929, 93. 2 Ibid., 95-6.

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private teacher in the Ottoman capital in the early 18th century. Upon his rise to the Archiepiscopal Throne in 1734, he introduced a series of reforms and innovations that contributed to the improvement of the self-consciousness and organization of the Church of Cyprus.3 The first and most important of these reforms was the founding of a school immediately upon his accession, which appears to have been the first such school to be funded by the Archbishopric during the Ottoman period.4 Another one of Philotheos’ significant innovations was the introduction of the Grand Codex of the Archbishopric, a codex in which all important decisions and documents concerning the Church, which had been hitherto scattered, were collected for the first time.5 Philotheos also gave particular emphasis to the idea of the autocephalon, that is, the autonomy of the Cypriot Orthodox Church vis-à-vis the Eastern Orthodox Patriarchates, and in 1740 wrote an essay on the Church of Cyprus and its privileges, in which he stressed that the Archbishop of the island, although not called as such, held the same status and possessed the same privileges as the Patriarchs.6 This idea he also tried to popularize and instil in his flock, using the medium of the ‘poor man’s Bible’, a painting program he commissioned in the cathedral of St. John in Nicosia, through which he



3 Archimandrite Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ ƴƧƲ ƎƞƳƯƵ ƋƽưƱƯƵ [Chronological History of the Island of Cyprus], Nikolaos Glykys, Venice, 1788, 315; Loizos Philippou, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥưƟ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ [The Church of Cyprus in the Turkish Period], Kypriologiki Vivliothiki, Nicosia, 1975, 94; Sir George Hill, A History of Cyprus, IV, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1952, 345; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 71; Andreas Mitsides, «ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥưƟ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ» [‘The Church of Cyprus in the Turkish Period’], ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ [History of Cyprus], VI, (ed.) Theodoros Papadopoullos, Makarios III Foundation, Nicosia, 2011, 622. 4 Theoharis Stavrides, «ƈ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƞ ƆƪươƟƤƥƵƳƧ ƳƴƧƭ ƋƽưƱƯ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƐƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞ ƑƥƱƟƯƤƯ (1571-1878)» [‘Greek Education in Cyprus during the Ottoman Period (1571-1878)’], in ibid., 398-402; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 78-79; Hill, History, 346; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 623-4. 5 Hill, History, 346; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 107; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 634. For the contents of this codex, see Charilaos Papaioannou, «ƋƾƤƧƮ Ƃŷ ƴƧƲ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƞƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ: ƑƟƭơƮ ƴƹƭ ƥƭ ơƵƴƾ ưƥƱƩƥƷƯƬƝƭƹƭ ƥƣƣƱƜƶƹƭ» [‘Codex I of the Archbishopric of Cyprus: A table of the documents contained in it’], ƖƹƲ, I, 1911, 225-44. 6 Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 71, 73; Hill, History, 346-7; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 107; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 633. For the text of this essay, see Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 370-90.

Chrysanthos, 1767-1810

19

attempted to illustrate the history of the Church of Cyprus and its privileges.7 The renovation of the Church of St. Barnabas and the publication in Venice of the Akolouthia (Church Service) of the same Saint, founder of the Church of Cyprus and closely connected to the privileges granted to it by Byzantine Emperors, were also in line with the same ideology.8 In addition to the ideological prestige of the Church, Philotheos also attempted to enhance its more tangible political power. With an embassy he dispatched to the Sublime Porte in 1754, he managed, among other things, to obtain a firman, which appointed the island’s Greek Orthodox bishops as kocabaûÖ, supervisors and representatives of the reaya, with the power to have recourse to Istanbul, circumventing the local Ottoman authorities.9 That is, Philotheos managed to achieve official sanction for the political authority of the prelates over the Greek Orthodox of Cyprus. On the one hand, this was a result of the ability of the Cypriot prelates to make use of high connections in the capital, while on the other hand, it reflects the need of the central authorities to benefit from the spiritual prestige and administrative organization of the local Church, in order to control the island, which was lying in the Ottoman periphery.10



Günter Paulus Schiemenz, «Ɛ ƘơƫƬƼƲ 148 ƳƴƯƭ ƋơƨƥƤƱƩƪƼ ƎơƼ ƴƯƵ ƂƣƟƯƵ ƊƹƜƭƭƧ ƳƴƧ ƌƥƵƪƹƳƟơ» [‘Psalm 148 in the Cathedral of St. John in Nicosia’], ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƤơ ƋƝƭƴƱƯƵ ƍƥƫƥƴƾƭ ƊƥƱƜƲ ƍƯƭƞƲ ƋƽƪƪƯƵ, III, 1996, 203-56; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 72-3; Philippos Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ ưƥƱƟ ƴƧƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ [Historical Information concerning the Church of Cyprus], Typographeion Ermis, Athens, 1875, 102; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 96-7. Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 624-5. 8 Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 104-6; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 71; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 626. 9 Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 315-6; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 76-8; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 104; Nuri Çevikel, ‘Deøiûim Döneminde bir OsmanlÖ Eyâleti KÖbrÖs (1750-1800)’, in Dünden Bugüne KÖbrÖs Meselesi, (eds.) Ali Ahmetbeyoølu and Erhan Afyoncu, Tarih ve Tabiat VakfÖ, Tatav YayÖnlarÖ, ùstanbul, 2001, 108-109; Theoharis Stavrides, ‘Cyprus 1750-1830: Administration and Society’, in Ottoman Cyprus. A Collection of Studies on History and Culture, (eds.) Michalis N. Michael, Matthias Kappler and Eftihios Gavriel, Harrassowitz Verlag, Wiesbaden, 2009, 91-2; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 631; Antonis Hadjikyriacou, ‘Society and Economy in an Ottoman Island: Cyprus in the Eighteenth Century’, Unpublished PhD diss., School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 2011, 168-9. 10 Michalis N. Michael, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƐƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞ ƑƥƱƟƯƤƯ (1571-1878): ƈ ƳƴơƤƩơƪƞ ƳƵƣƪƱƼƴƧƳƞ ƴƧƲ Ƴƥ ƨƥƳƬƼ ưƯƫƩƴƩƪƞƲ ƥƮƯƵƳƟơƲ [The Church of Cyprus during the Ottoman Period (1571-1878): Its Gradual Formation into an Institution of Political Authority], Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia, 2005, 137-138; Michalis N. Michael, ‘An Orthodox Institution of Ottoman Political Authority: The Church of Cyprus’, in Ottoman Cyprus, 214-5. 7

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It is within this context that Chrysanthos became Archbishop of Cyprus. Despite the political instability and the upheavals of the second half of the 18th century, the self-awareness and self-confidence instilled during Philotheos’ tenure allowed the Church to weather the storms and reach the zenith of its power under Ottoman rule. According to some authors, Chrysanthos’ administration in the last quarter of the eighteenth century marks the point at which the Church of Cyprus became the de facto political authority on the island, although, as will be seen, at this particular juncture its power was limited, and even threatened, by the Dragoman’s authority.11 Chrysanthos was born in the village of Treis Elies in the mountainous Marathasa region, an agriculturally poor region that produced a great proportion of the island’s clerics and prelates in this period.12 Before being ordained, he had been married and had a son,13 but upon the death of his wife, he became a monk and later served as Bishop of Paphos from May 1762 to January 1767. He was elected archbishop on 5 January 1767, a few days after the death of his predecessor, Archbishop Paisios (1759-67), on New Year’s Day of 1767.14 According to a note in Codex I of the Archbishopric of Cyprus, Chrysanthos was elected ‘through the common encouragement and request of all the clergy and the people’, apparently implying that he was elected to the Throne by a convention consisting of both clerics and laymen, as is still the practice on the island.15

 Çevikel, ‘Deøiûim Döneminde’, 109; Michael, EƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 92 n. 226. Kleovoulos Myrianthopoulos, ƈ ƓƵƬƢƯƫƞ ƴƧƲ ƍơƱơƨƜƳƧƲ ƥƩƲ ƴƧƭ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƭ [The Contribution of Marathasa to the Church], Typographeion Kosmos – Io. Kyriakides, Limassol, 1939. 13 According to the scant information on Chrysanthos’ son, Michael, he was living in Venice, where he published a book in 1801, under the name ‘Michael son of His Beatitude’ («ƍƩƷơƞƫ ƴƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƩƹƴƜƴƯƵ»), while in 1815 he was in Cyprus, where he lent 10,000 piastres to his father’s successor, Archbishop Kyprianos, see Kostis Kokkinoftas, «Ɛ ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ (1805-1821) ƪơƩ Ƨ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴƩƪƞ ƋƱƟƳƧ ƴƯƵ 1810» [‘Chrysanthos of Paphos (1805-1821) and the Ecclesiastical Crisis of 1810’], ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƤơ ƋƝƭƴƱƯƵ ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƾƭ ƆƱƥƵƭƾƭ XXIII, 1997, 246-7. 14 Ibid; Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 325; Konstantinos I. Myrianthopoulos, ƗơƴƦƧƣƥƹƱƣƜƪƩƲ ƋƯƱƭƝƳƩƯƲ, Ư ƅƩƥƱƬƧƭƥƽƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 1779-1809, ƞƴƯƩ ƓƵƬƢƯƫơƟ ƥƩƲ ƴƧƭ ƊƳƴƯƱƟơƭ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥưƟ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ (1570-1878) [Hadjigeorgakis Kornesios. The Dragoman of Cyprus, 1779-1809, or Contributions to the History of Cyprus under the Turks (1570-1878)], Typographeion Mouson, Nicosia, 1934, 53-5 62-3; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 114; Kostis Kokkinoftas, «ƔƯ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƼ ƴƯƵ ƊƹơƪƥƟƬ ƑơƫƫƯƵƱƩƹƴƟƳƳƧƲ» [‘The Chronicle of Ioakeim of Pallouriotissa’], ƑƯƫƩƴƩƳƴƩƪƞ ƋƽưƱƯƲ XI, 1997, 34; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 649; On Michael, the son of Archbishop Chrysanthos, see Kokkinoftas, «ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ», 246-7. 15 Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 325; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 680. 11 12

Chrysanthos, 1767-1810

21

The first crisis that Archbishop Chrysanthos had to confront, immediately upon his accession to the Throne, concerned his relations with MuhassÖl Süleyman Baki. The latter had obtained the governorate of Cyprus in 1766, following a protracted period of upheaval on the island: riots that had started in Nicosia in October 1764, because of the imposition of heavy taxation, escalated to the assassination of MuhassÖl Cil Osman Pasha and the burning of the Governor’s palace. In the following year, Halil Aøa, Dizdar of Kyrenia led a revolt, which lasted for a year and was suppressed after much bloodshed and two long blockades and sieges of the island’s capital. This great upheaval led to famine in the year of Süleyman’s arrival on the island.16 According to a codex of the Archbishopric, Süleyman Baki was ‘a tyrannical man, and cunning in his ways and mind, insatiable, machinating against everyone untold plots and frauds and persecutions, in order to satisfy his love of money’. In the same codex, it is related that Chrysanthos, immediately upon his accession, resolved to put a stop to MuhassÖl’s tyranny, in order to free his flock from his rapacity, and this ‘he achieved with great toil’. Thus, in the following year, the Archbishop succeeded in having Süleyman Baki replaced by ‘a wise and quiet man’ Haci Ömer Aøa.17 However, this success did not signal the end of the Archbishop’s conflict with the local Ottoman authorities. Another crisis of the early years of Chrysanthos’ administration came with the Turko-Russian War of 1768-74. Like the local Ottoman officials, the Archbishop seemed to be treading a dangerous path, trying to find balance between his loyalty to the Sultan and an attempt not to offend the Russians. According to Giovanni Mariti, when, in 1772, a squadron of the Russian fleet under captain Panagiotis Alexianos stopped in Paphos and Limassol for supplies, it did not encounter any resistance, since ‘the sentiment of the Governor was not to irritate the Enemy, and not to show any opposition, when he was presented in a pacific manner, and did not try to proceed to the villages, in order to commit hostilities’.18 In this way, both the lay and the

 16 On the assassination of Cil Osman and the revolt of Dizdar Halil, see Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 318-24; Giovanni Mariti, Travels on the island of Cyprus, (trans.) Claude Delaval Cobham, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1909, 94-110; Myrianthopoulos, ƗơƴƦƧƣƥƹƱƣƜƪƩƲ, 53-5; Kokkinoftas, «ƔƯ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƼ», 32-34 & XII, 1997, 34-7. 17 Philippou, EƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 192. Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 649. 18 Giovanni Mariti, Istoria della Guerra della Soria, II, Florence, 1774, 44-5 ; Ioannis Hasiotis, «ƈ ƂƬƶƩƳƢƞƴƧƳƧ ƴƧƲ ƐƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞƲ ƋƵƱƩơƱƷƟơƲ ƳƴƧƭ ƋƽưƱƯ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƑƯƫƩƴƩƪƞ ƴƹƭ ƆƵƱƹươƺƪƾƭ ƅƵƭƜƬƥƹƭ (1571-1878)» [‘The Questioning of Ottoman Rule in

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religious authorities of the island’s two main communities elicited the praise of Archimandrite Kyprianos for helping Cyprus avoid the fate of the Morea and Crete, whose participation in the Orlov Revolt of 1770 provoked grave reprisals on the part of the Ottomans.19 However, the Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca, which terminated the war, and with which the Russian Czar claimed the right to intervene in the Ottoman Empire in favour of the Sultan’s Greek Orthodox subjects, complicated the relations between Chrysanthos’ flock and the local authorities.20 As a result of this treaty, the local authorities ceased to trust the loyalty of the island’s Orthodox population, their suspicions becoming evident in the subsequent Turko-Russian War of 1787-92: in 1788, tensions ran high and the authorities proceeded to arm the local Muslim population, while disarming the Christians, whom they regarded as the enemy’s potential collaborators. In one instance, following rumours that the priests of the church of St. Lazarus in Larnaca kept 400 rifles, the town’s authorities made a thorough search without substantial results.21 One of the most prominent aspects of Chrysanthos’ tenure of the archiepiscopal throne was culture. Although it is traditionally considered that schools ceased to function in Cyprus during his tenure, chiefly due to the adverse economic effects of the Haci Baki incident, when the bishops had to contract heavy loans, there are several indications that, even at this time, the Church continued the funding of the functioning of schools.22 This was a result of the dynamic created by the efforts of Archbishop Philotheos, who had founded a school in the first half of the 18th century and employed Ephraim the Athenian, a renowned scholar of the times, as teacher. During his twenty-year-long service in the school (1742-61), Ephraim produced several students who continued his efforts, rendering Greek Orthodox education in Cyprus self-sustaining.23 A series of letters,



Cyprus and the Policies of the European Powers’], in IƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, VI, (ed.) Papadopoullos, 230. 19 Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 325-6; Hill, History, 93. 20 On the Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca, see Caroline Finkel, Osman’s Dream. The Story of the Ottoman Empire 1300-1923, John Murray, London, 2005, 377-9. 21 Paul et Anna Pouradier Duteil, Chypre au temps de la Révolution française, Ministry of Education, Nicosia, 1989, 43-4 ; Hasiotis, «ƂƬƶƩƳƢƞƴƧƳƧ», 232. 22 Stavrides, «ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƞ ƆƪươƟƤƥƵƳƧ», 404-5 ; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 235-6 ; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 97-8; Hill, History, 354 ; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 652. 23 Stavrides, «ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƞ ƆƪươƟƤƥƵƳƧ», 402-4 ; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 235.

Chrysanthos, 1767-1810

23

written by men residing in Cyprus during the period 1803-1807, in extremely elaborate classical Greek language, bears witness to the existence on the island of a small, albeit isolated, group of highly educated and literate men, who may have been graduates of Ephraim’s school.24 The educational flowering of the period led the highest ranks of the Church to a new selfconsciousness, eloquently expressed in a letter of Archbishop Chrysanthos, dated May 13, 1806, in which he commended Spanish traveller Ali Bey alAbbasi for a memorandum he wrote on the destruction of the locust, congratulating ‘those who will enjoy the company of a hero in all respects like our Greek forefathers’.25 In 1808, efforts were made to regenerate Eastern Orthodox education in Cyprus, through a series of generous donations by both Dragoman Hadjigeorgakis Kornesios and a monk of the Monastery of Machairas, aiming at the founding of a new school in the vicinity of the Archbishopric. These efforts proved abortive due to the downfall of Hadjigeorgakis in 1809 and of Chrysanthos in 1810, although they probably contributed to the subsequent founding of a new school by Archbishop Kyprianos in 1812.26 Under Chrysanthos, the Church also funded numerous publications in printing-houses in Europe, and especially in Venice. As was the case with Greek book-production in this period in general, the majority of these publications were of ecclesiastical content.27 Notable among the books published by Cypriots in this period was the History of the Archimandrite



Chrysostomos Papadopoulos, Ɔƪ ƴƧƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴƩƪƞƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƟơƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ [From the Ecclesiastical History of Cyprus], Ekklesiastikos Keryx, Larnaca, 1912, 83-97. 25 Claude Delaval Cobham, Excerpta Cypria: Materials for a History of Cyprus, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1908, 411-2. «…ƳƵƣƷơƟƱƯƬƥƭ Ƥƥ ƴƯƩƲ ƬƝƫƫƯƵƳƩƭ ơưƯƫơƽƳơƩ Ɲƭơ ƞƱƹơ ƪơƴƜ ưƜƭƴơ ƼƬƯƩƯƭ ƴƯƩƲ ưƱƯƣƼƭƯƩƲ ƧƬƾƭ ŻƫƫƧƳƩƭ…». It is possible that this letter may have been written by Oikonomos, and future Archbishop, Kyprianos, who had studied in the Danubian Principalities. 26 Stavrides, «ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƞ ƆƪươƟƤƥƵƳƧ», 406-8; Hill, History, 354; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 236-7; Kokkinoftas, «ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ», 259; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 672-4. 27 On the largely ecclesiastical content of books in this period, see Georgios Veloudis, ƔƯ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƼ ƔƵưƯƣƱơƶƥƟƯ ƴƹƭ ƄƫƵƪƞƤƹƭ ƳƴƧ ƃƥƭƥƴƟơ (1670-1854): ƓƵƬƢƯƫƞ ƳƴƧ ƍƥƫƝƴƧ ƴƯƵ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƯƽ ƃƩƢƫƟƯƵ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƆưƯƷƞ ƴƧƲ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ [The Greek Printing House of Glykys in Venice (1670-1854): Contribution to the Study of the Greek Book in the Turkish Period], Ch. Bouras, Athens, 1987, 142. 24

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Kyprianos, printed in Venice in 1788, which counted Archbishop Chrysanthos among its subscribers.28 Another aspect of the period’s culture was the extensive project of renovation of churches on the island, under the auspices of the Archbishop. According to a list in a codex of the Archbishopric of Cyprus, between 1768 and 1795, eighty-one churches were renovated by Chrysanthos in the diocese of the Archbishopric only,29 while relevant lists in the codices of other bishoprics indicate that this was a general phenomenon in Cyprus in the late 18th century.30 This intense building activity suggests that, despite adversity, the Church must have had a significant income during this period, an income that was probably connected to its tax-collecting role. Tax-collecting was one of the most important privileges of the prelates in this period. According to Spanish traveller Ali Bey, …the Greeks pay their bishops tithe and first-fruits, fees on dispensations and others, and large voluntary offerings. These princes of the church receive the imposts assessed on the community so as to pay to the Turkish government its annual claim, and to share with it a kind of monopoly […] the handling of taxes brings enormous gains to the spiritual heads of the people, who suffer in silence lest a worse evil befall them.31

Registers of the Orthodox tax-paying population that are preserved in the Archives of the Archbishopric of Cyprus bear testimony to the role of the island’s Church in taxation.32 The prelates enjoyed, to a large extent, a freehand in the allocation and collection of the taxes, especially since they were in possession of the tax-registers, which were written in Greek, a fact that made



28 Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 404; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 96-7; Hill, History, 354; Philippou, EƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 133-5; Kokkinoftas, «ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ», 258-9; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 667-8. 29 N. G. Kyriazis, «ƋƴƧƬơƴƯƫƯƣƩƪƼƲ ƋƾƤƩƮ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƞƲ: Ɛ ƂƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ ƪơƩ ơƩ ƆưƩƳƪƥƵơƟ ƴƹƭ Ǝơƾƭ» [‘Land Codex of the Archbishopric: Archbishop Chrysanthos and the Repairs of the Churches’], ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, XIII, 1937, 69-70; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 127-30; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 97; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 666-7. 30 See, for example, Sophronios Michaelides, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƪơƴƜ ƋƟƴƩƯƭ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ [History of the Church of Kitium], Holy Bishopric of Kitium, Larnaca, 1992, 142-6, 159, for the renovation of churches in the Kitium diocese. 31 Cobham, Excerpta Cypria, 396. 32 Georgios A. Dionysiou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƪơƩ ƖƯƱƯƫƯƣƟơ ƳƴƧƭ ƋƽưƱƯ ƴƯƭ ƔƥƫƥƵƴơƟƯ ƂƩƾƭơ ƴƧƲ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ (1770-1856) [Church and Taxation in Cyprus in the Last Century of the Turkish Period (1770-1856)], Ministry of Education and Culture, Nicosia, 2007, 46-7.

Chrysanthos, 1767-1810

25

it difficult for the local Ottoman authorities to control.33 Using their privileges, the prelates were in a position to buy crops at advantageous prices and then sell them for profit or, in certain cases, to impose inordinate taxes. N. Çevikel interprets several of the usurpations of Cypriot Episcopal Thrones during the 18th century as, in part, the reaction of the island’s Orthodox subjects to oppressive measures of particular Archbishops.34 However, the bishops were also answerable to the Ottoman authorities, being responsible for collecting and delivering to them the taxes of their flock. In several instances, Archbishop Chrysanthos had to borrow from the Europeans of Larnaca in order to deliver the miri to the Porte in time. In a letter to French Consul Benoît Astier in February 1773, Chrysanthos promised to repay his debt to him in the following months, since he was having trouble collecting the miri from his flock ‘because of the misfortunes’, while in a document of October 1786, he acknowledged a debt of 2,240 piastres for 12% interest, which he had borrowed ‘for the needs of the local affairs’.35 Besides local Europeans, Archbishop Chrysanthos could also borrow from high Ottoman officials, like the sarraf of the Grand Vezir, to whom he owed money in the spring of 1786.36 This pressing need to obtain the funds demanded by the Ottoman authorities often led the Archbishop to exert pressure on the tax-payers, invoking the threat of the lay authorities, who could use force in the collection of taxes. In a circular, addressed to the Orthodox priests and laymen of the kazas of Karpasia and Famagusta in July 1809, Archbishop Chrysanthos advised his flock to pay their taxes promptly, warning that the Governor would otherwise use force, sending ‘strict officials’, who would remain in every village and would not leave until the taxes were paid.37 In the wake of the 1804 revolt, Chrysanthos attempted to make up for the debts the Church had incurred by taxing his flock, through the institution of the zeteia (ƦƧƴƥƟơ), the collection of donations from the Orthodox flock, which was theoretically voluntary, but was, nonetheless, backed by the force of the lay authorities. In a document issued on 28 September 1807, and addressed to the priests and laymen of certain villages of his diocese, the Archbishop informed them that he was sending monk Leondios to collect the zeteia, threatening punishment by Ottoman officials if they would fail to

 Hadjikyriacou, ‘Society and Economy’, 196-7. Çevikel, ‘Deøiûim Döneminde’, 110-2. 35 Dionysiou, EƪƪƫƧƳƟơ, 45, 145. 36 Hadjikyriacou, ‘Society and Economy’, 175. 37 Dionysiou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ, 152. 33 34

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hand over the funds demanded. A year later, in August 1808, Chrysanthos wrote another letter to the priests and laymen of some villages of his diocese, openly threatening to send a grammatikos or tahsildar to collect more money, if they would not hand over the requested sums to monk Leondios.38 The most serious test of Chrysanthos’ administration came with the rise to power of MuhassÖl Haci Baki Aøa, in a most widely-publicized event. Unlike all previous Ottoman Governors, who came from outside the island, resided there for one or two years, and then left, Haci Baki was a local Cypriot. Moreover, rising from humble origins, from being a woodcutter from the village of Klavdia in the kaza of Larnaca, Haci Baki rose to power gradually, over a period of almost three decades, before becoming the island’s MuhassÖl.39 Thus, at the time of his Governorship (1777-84), the Church had to confront, for the first time, a native MuhassÖl, whose gradual rise to power made him particularly powerful, since, in the meantime, he had apparently managed to forge and maintain his own networks of patronage in both Cyprus and Istanbul. Nevertheless, the prelates did not become aware of the danger posed by Haci Baki and apparently provided him with support in his initial rise to power. In his relevant account, British Consul Michel de Vezin wrote that the prelates initially supported Haci Baki, who was ‘raised to this dignity by the influence of the Archbishop and his friends’. According to de Vezin’s version of the story, the prelates were content to share the spoils of power with Haci Baki, until a conflict of interests regarding their respective profits led them to venture to Istanbul, demanding his dismissal from the Porte.40 The basic idea that the Cypriot Governor was supported, in his early steps, by the prelates, is also accepted by Archimandrite Kyprianos, who wrote that Haci Baki ‘assembled the Ulema and the aghas, and with infinite cunning and flattery persuaded them all, and the Bishops as well, to write of him in favourable terms to the Porte, that he might be appointed to complete the unexpired term of the Governorship’. According to Kyprianos, initially, Haci Baki deceived the bishops by ‘[feigning] a kind of good nature’ and ‘[bearing] himself mildly’. However, as soon as he attempted to impose heavier taxation



38 Michael, EƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 194-5 n. 517; Grammatikos = tax-collector. Tahsildar = taxcollector. 39 On Haci Baki’s career, see Nikodemos Mylonas, «ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴơ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƜ ŻƣƣƱơƶơ» [‘Unpublished Historical Documents’], ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, III, 1925, 171-4; Myrianthopoulos, ƗơƴƦƧƣƥƹƱƣƜƪƩƲ, 42-3; Hill, History, 94-6; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 193-4; Hadjikyriacou, ‘Society and Economy’, 252-4. 40 Cobham, Excerpta Cypria, 368; Hill, History, 98; Hadjikyriacou, ‘Society and Economy’, 258-9.

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on the reaya, the prelates went against him and travelled to the capital, in order to denounce him.41 Therefore, although the two authors differ radically in their interpretation of the events, they both imply that the Cypriot official initially enjoyed at least the tolerance, if not the actual support of the prelates. In fact, Kyprianos acknowledges the circulation of accusations against the bishops for supporting Haci Baki, but dismisses them as a result of the ingratitude of the Cypriots, who ‘refuse to lend a helping hand to those whose love had prompted them to risk their lives for their compatriots’.42 With or without the support of the Church, during his eight-year-long governorate, Haci Baki Aøa managed to strengthen his political position on the island and accumulated a large property, by gathering in his hands most monopolies, to the detriment of the merchants, by acquiring çiftliks and by collecting illegal taxes and dues. According to Kyprianos, the last straw, which turned the prelates openly against him, was his decision to impose an additional tax of eight piastres on the inhabitants of the island.43 This action triggered the flight of the prelates to the capital, in order to denounce Haci Baki to the Porte. In August 1783, Archbishop Chrysanthos, together with the Bishops of Paphos, Kitium and Kyrenia, left the island for Istanbul to this effect. This was apparently part of their commitment to protect the members of their flock as their leaders, but at the same time it was probably a way to also protect their own power from the increasingly rapacious behaviour of the MuhassÖl. Concern for their own personal safety and fear of Haci Baki’s reprisals may explain the fact that all prelates left the island together, an action that was justified by subsequent events. The MuhassÖl’s response to this action was swift: using his connections in the Ottoman capital, he managed to elicit the exile of the prelates to Mt. Athos. Moreover, his powerful friends exerted pressure on the Patriarchate of Constantinople, which issued a Synodal Letter, ordering the election of



Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 327-8, English translation in Cobham, Excerpta Cypria, 363-4; Hill, History, 98. 42 Ibid., 329, with English translation in Cobham, Excerpta Cypria, 365; Hill, History, 98; Stavrides, ‘Cyprus’, 91; Çevikel, ‘Deøiûim Döneminde’, 112. 43 Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 328; Mylonas, «ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴơ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƜ ŻƣƣƱơƶơ», 200-1; Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 110; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 94; Myrianthopoulos, ƗơƴƦƧƣƥƹƱƣƜƪƩƲ, 43-4; Hill, History, 96-8; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 194-5; Kokkinoftas, «ƔƯ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƼ», 34-35, Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 656. 41

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new prelates on the island. After this, the Cypriots had to elect four clerics in order to occupy the vacant Thrones.44 The Orthodox clergy and laity of the island denounced the MuhassÖl’s actions, writing to the Patriarch of Constantinople that ‘human nature has never seen before such a dragon in human form persecuting our wretched land, reducing everyone to extreme poverty and want of even the bare necessities’, and describing Haci Baki as a ‘murderous and pernicious Cyclops’, apparently referring to the fact that he only had one eye.45 Moreover, in another letter to Patriarch Gabriel IV (1780-5), they informed him that, in spite of the fact that, obeying orders, they had elected new bishops, they ‘are in every way satisfied from [their] true and legitimate holy prelates, who were falsely accused by the powerful and long-lived kingdom, and we accept them as our general leaders until the end of their lives, and we are asking from the mercy of our common mother, the Holy Great Church of Christ, their restitution to their thrones’.46 Meanwhile, Archbishop Chrysanthos and the other ecclesiastical leaders had managed to flee to ùzmir, where they sought the protection of various European Consulates.47 From their base there, the prelates sent a Cretan cleric, Gerasimos, who had formerly served as a teacher in Cyprus, and who later became Bishop of Thessaloniki (1788-1815), to Istanbul, in an attempt to activate their own connections, in order to reverse the Porte’s decision. In spite of his incompetence, which, according to historian Sergios Makraios, led him to squander sums ‘that not even ten persecuting tyrants in their entire lives would not be able to consume’, Gerasimos managed to accomplish his task, by meeting Grand Vezir Halil Hamid Pasha (1736-85) and preparing the ground for the return of the prelates.48



44 Athanasios Komnenos Ypsilantis, Ɣơ ƍƥƴƜ ƴƧƭ ŹƫƹƳƩƭ (1453-1789) [After the Conquest (1453-1789)], Typographeion I. A. Vretou, Constantinople, 1870, 636; Mylonas, «ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴơ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƜ ŻƣƣƱơƶơ», 182-3; Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 328-9; Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 111; Myrianthopoulos, ƗơƴƦƧƣƥƹƱƣƜƪƩƲ, 44-5 & 57-8; Hill, History, 355-7; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 117-8 & 194-5; Kokkinoftas, «ƔƯ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƼ», XI, 1997, 35 & XII, 1997, 38-40; Michael, EƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 73. 45 Mylonas, «ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴơ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƜ ŻƣƣƱơƶơ», 201-2; Myrianthopoulos, ƗơƴƦƧƣƥƹƱƣƜƪƩƲ, 58; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 120-1; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 656-8. 46 Mylonas, «ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴơ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƜ ŻƣƣƱơƶơ», 205-6; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 118-9. 47 Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 328-9; Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 111; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 94; Myrianthopoulos, ƗơƴƦƧƣƥƹƱƣƜƪƩƲ, 46; Hill, History, 355-6; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 118; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 656. 48 K. N. Sathas, ƍƥƳơƩƹƭƩƪƞ ƃƩƢƫƩƯƨƞƪƧ [Medieval Library], III, Typographeion Chronos, Venice, 1872, 356-7; Komnenos Ypsilantis, Ɣơ ƬƥƴƜ ƴƧƭ ŹƫƹƳƩƭ, 686; Kostis Kokkinoftas, «Ɛ ƍƧƴƱƯưƯƫƟƴƧƲ ƉƥƳƳơƫƯƭƟƪƧƲ (1788-1810) ƪơƩ ƬƥƴƝưƥƩƴơ ƗơƫƪƧƤƼƭƯƲ

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As a result of Gerasimos’ actions, Bishop of Kitium Meletios I (1776-97) went from ùzmir to Istanbul and presented the grievances of the prelates to the Sublime Porte. Meletios accused the MuhassÖl for collecting from the island’s inhabitants 30,000 piastres for biscuit, enforcing an order of the Porte that was subsequently cancelled, for increasing the yearly miri, which had been fixed by the Porte to 412 purses, to 772 purses, and for obliging the bishops to lend him 180 purses, forcing them to contract loans with interest from the European merchants living on the island.49 These accusations were supported by a mahzar, in which the ulema and Muslim notables of Cyprus requested the MuhassÖl’s dismissal and exile, listing numerous accusations against him, like the confiscation of inheritances, exporting grain at a time of scarcity, diverting the water supply of Nicosia in order to water his çiftliks, forging official documents, registering an excessive number of tax-payers, etc.50 Because of these accusations, Grand Vezir Halil Hamid Pasha dismissed Haci Baki from the Governorship of Cyprus and summoned him to Istanbul, in order to be judged in the presence of his accusers. An additional consideration leading to this decision was also the fact that the Cypriot Governor was a protégé of the Grand Vezir’s opponent, Kapudan Pasha Hasan Pasha. Although the bishops finally won, they had to pay 14 purses for the expenses of the trial, while the money that the MuhassÖl had extorted was taken over by the Porte as miri.51 Thus, the prelates managed to finally obtain Haci Baki’s dismissal and the restitution of their Thrones, re-establishing their authority over the island. However, their political victory was a financial disaster. Despite their success, the Haci Baki incident left the Church of Cyprus with a total debt of 484,836



(1810-1820) ƄƥƱƜƳƩƬƯƲ» [‘Gerasimos, Metropolitan of Thessaloniki (1788-1810) and later of Chalcedon (1810-1820)’], ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƤơ ƋƝƭƴƱƯƵ ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƾƭ ƆƱƥƵƭƾƭ, XX, 19931994, 298-300. On Gerasimos, see Kokkinoftas, «Ɛ ƍƧƴƱƯưƯƫƟƴƧƲ ƉƥƳƳơƫƯƭƟƪƧƲ», 297-307. 49 Komnenos Ypsilantis, Ɣơ ƬƥƴƜ ƴƧƭ ŹƫƹƳƩƭ, 637-8; Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 329; Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 111; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 94; Myrianthopoulos, ƗơƴƦƧƣƥƹƱƣƜƪƩƲ, 46-7; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 122-3; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 658-9; Hadjikyriacou, ‘Society and Economy’, 256. One purse was equal to 500 piastres. 50 Hadjikyriacou, ‘Society and Econonmy’, 255-6. The account of the Archimandrite Kyprianos (Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 328) confirms many of the accusations presented by the mahzar. 51 Komnenos Ypsilantis, Ɣơ ƬƥƴƜ ƴƧƭ ŹƫƹƳƩƭ, 638; Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 111-2; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 94-5; Hill, History, 357-8; Michael, EƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 138-9 n. 331; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 659-60.

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piastres, about 40% of which fell on the Archbishop, while the rest fell to the other three episcopal thrones.52 Another major result of the Haci Baki incident was an administrative change, which was apparently solicited by the Church and the Dragoman, with the consent of the Kapudan Pasha. In 1785, at the request of the bishops and Hadjigeorgakis, the island’s administration passed from the Grand Vezir to the Divan-i Hümayûn, which appointed the Governor of Cyprus, who collected taxes for the Imperial Treasury, with the recommendation of the Kapudan Pasha.53 Despite the financial damage, the Haci Baki incident empowered the Church, enduring the pressure and proving that it could deal with any Ottoman Governor and maintain its authority. Modern historians suggest that the importance of this event lies in the attestation that ‘the Prelates and the local Ottoman administration in Cyprus functioned in an antagonistic framework of authority with the Sublime Porte as a point of reference, to which they resorted every time the authority of the one overshadowed the authority of the other’.54 In fact, during this period, the administration of the island was the subject of competition between three loci of power: the Ottoman MuhassÖl, the Archbishop, and the Dragoman of the Porte. At various points in the second half of the 18th century and until the events of 1821, a representative of one of these three could prevail, overshadowing the other two, depending on chance, the general political situation, the connections that he could forge, and his personal abilities.55



52 Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 329; Hill, History, 358; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 125 & 195. 53 Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 330; Cobham, Excerpta Cypria, 368-9; Hill, History, 100-1; Nuri Çevikel, KÖbrÖs Eyâleti. Yönetim, Kilise, Ayân ve Halk (1750-1800): Bir Deøiûim Döneminin Anatomisi, Doøu Akdeniz Üniversitesi BasÖmevi, Famagusta, 2000, 63-5; Çevikel, ‘Deøiûim Döneminde’, 107 & 109; Sia Anagnostopoulou, ‘Les rapports de l’ Église orthodoxe avec le Kapudan Pacha (fin du XVIIIème-début du XIXème siècle), in The Kapudan Pasha, his Office and his Domain, (ed.) Elizabeth Zachariadou, Crete University Press, Rethymnon, 2002, 270-1; Stavrides, ‘Cyprus’, 90; Hadjikyriacou, ‘Society and Economy’, 135-6 & 152-8. 54 Michael, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 73-74. 55 Michalis N. Michael, «Ɛ ƍƯƵƷơƳƟƫƧƲ, Ư ƅƱơƣƯƬƜƭƯƲ, Ư ƂƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƤƩƥƪƤƟƪƧƳƧ ƴƧƲ ưƯƫƩƴƩƪƞƲ ƥƮƯƵƳƟơƲ ƳƴƧƭ ƋƽưƱƯ ƴƧƲ ƐƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞƲ ưƥƱƩƶƝƱƥƩơƲ, 17891810» [‘The MuhassÖl, the Dragoman, the Archbishop and the Contest for Political Authority in Cyprus of the Ottoman Periphery, 1789-1810’], ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƤơ ƋƝƭƴƱƯƵ ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƾƭ ƆƱƥƵƭƾƭ 32 (2006): 229-230, 239-240; Stavrides, ‘Cyprus’, 89-98.

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Already before Haci Baki’s rise to power, the bishops had managed to obtain the fall of powerful Dragoman Hadji Iosif, ‘who was almost a sovereign among the Greeks’. Although Archimandrite Kyprianos attributes the latter’s fall to the activity of Haci Baki,56 a report of Venetian Consul Bernardo Caprara, dated 7 April 1773, indicates that this was the work of Archbishop Chrysanthos and the three Bishops, who replaced Hadji Iosif with their favourite, a certain Hadji Lois.57 An indication of the great power of Archbishop Chrysanthos in the years following the fall of Haci Baki was his creation of a network of bishops closely associated with his family. Already in 1776, upon the death of Bishop of Kitium Makarios I (1737-76), the Archbishop managed to install on the vacant Throne his own nephew Meletios I. In 1791, Chrysanthos, feeling that, due to old age, he could not perform his duties adequately, submitted his resignation, but a convention of clerics and laymen decided not to accept it. As a response to this, the Holy Synod of the Church of Cyprus appointed another nephew, and Meletios’ brother, Chrysanthos, as Bishop of Tamassos (1791-7), in order to aid the ailing Archbishop in his duties.58 Upon the death of his brother in 1797, Chrysanthos of Tamassos ascended to the episcopal Throne of Kitium as Chrysanthos I (1797-1810).59 In 1802, Archbishop Chrysanthos, already at an advanced age, submitted his resignation for a second time, ‘since he was weakened by his deep old age and his ailments’, but the Holy Synod blocked this move once again, appointing another cleric, Spyridon, as Bishop of Trimythous, in order to aid him in his duties.60 At a later stage, in 1805, the Archbishop managed to install another namesake and great-nephew, Chrysanthos, as Bishop of Paphos (1805-21).61 In this manner, the Archbishop’s family managed to

 Kyprianos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗƱƯƭƯƫƯƣƩƪƞ, 327. English translation in Cobham, Excerpta Cypria, 363. 57 Archivio di Stato di Venezia, Archivio del Consolato Veneto a Cipro, busta 1, n. 142 (7 April 1773). 58 Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 113-4; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 100-1; Hill, History, 359; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 126-7; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 663-4. 59 Michaelides, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ, 166-70; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 127; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 101; Kokkinoftas, «ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ», 247-8. On Chrysanthos I of Kitium, see Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 663-4 n. 270. 60 Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 114; Hill, History, 359; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 131; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 670-1. On Spyridon, Bishop of Trimythous, see Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 670-1 n. 301. 61 Kokkinoftas, «ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ», 251-6; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 101; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 672-3 n. 308. 56

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occupy three out of the four episcopal Thrones of Cyprus, placing under its control the administrative apparatus of the island’s Church. However, real power after Haci Baki’s demise rested with an associate of the Church who was not a cleric. Hadjigeorgakis Kornesios was closely connected to Archbishop Chrysanthos, since he was his son-in-law, having married his niece, Maroudhia. He rose to the office of Dragoman of the Porte around 1779, presumably under the patronage of Haci Baki himself. Despite the initial support he enjoyed from the MuhassÖl, the Dragoman, in association with the prelates, took the lead in the struggle against his erstwhile protector. The successful conclusion of that struggle left Hadjigeorgakis, who also enjoyed the backing of the Church, as the most powerful political authority in Cyprus for the next twenty-five years.62 There are indications that the Dragoman’s power was enhanced by the Porte’s decision to reinforce his position, when both of the other two alternative poles of local authority were discredited following the conclusion of the Haci Baki affair.63 French consular reports highlight Hadjigeorgakis’ power in that period, indicating that he often played an important role in the rise and fall of local Ottoman Governors, while in March 1790, he was granted by Sultan Selim III (1789-1807) the office of Dragoman for life, directly answerable to the Sublime Porte and not to any local authority.64 Besides the support of the Church and of powerful associates in Istanbul, the Dragoman’s authority was also solidly founded on his tremendous wealth, which was based, in part, on tax-farming and on the exploitation of çiftliks.65 Modern authors have suggested that the Dragoman’s relations with the Sultan, who had issued a hatt-i hümayûn granting to him the office for life, are reminiscent of the corresponding relations of the Phanariot princes, who were granted the administration of an area, and it seems probable that the



Euphrosyne Rizopoulou-Igoumenidou, «ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƞ ƍơƱƴƵƱƟơ ƊƹƜƭƭƯƵ ƋƯƱƭƜƱƯƵ ƴƯƵ ƋƱƧƴƼƲ» [‘Historical Testimony of Ioannis Kornaros the Cretan’], in ƎƝơ ƆƩƪƼƭơ ƪơƩ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƞ ƍơƱƴƵƱƟơ ƊƹƜƭƭƯƵ ƋƯƱƭƜƱƯƵ ƴƯƵ ƋƱƧƴƼƲ [New Icon and Historical Testimony of Ioannis Kornaros the Cretan], (eds.) Christodoulos Hadjichristodoulou, Kostas Gerasimou and Euphrosyne Rizopoulou Igoumenidou, Holy Bishopric of Paphos, Nicosia, 2000, 236; Stavrides, ‘Cyprus’, 96-7. 63 Hadjikyriacou, ‘Society and Economy’, 262-4. 64 Pouradier Duteil, Chypre, 55-69. 65 Michael, «ƍƯƵƷơƳƟƫƧƲ», 218-22 & 230-1; Dionysiou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ, 42-4; RizopoulouIgoumenidou, «ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƞ ƍơƱƴƵƱƟơ», 23-6; Hadjikyriacou, ‘Society and Economy’, 264-7. 62

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Cypriot official had the example of those princes in mind, when he was building his career and ambitions.66 Spanish traveller Ali Bey al-Abbasi gives an idea of the relations between Archbishop Chrysanthos and Dragoman Hadjigeorgakis in the early years of the 19th century, writing that the Archbishop was ‘the prince or supreme spiritual chief of the Greek community on the island’ and was ‘responsible to the Grand Seigneur for the taxes and conduct of the Greek Cypriots’. However, ‘to avoid entering into the details of circumstances, and to excuse himself from the burden of part of the temporal administration, he has delegated his powers to the Dragoman of Cyprus, who has thus become the chief civil authority’. After this, Hadjigeorgakis acquired ‘practically the rank and attributions of a prince of the community, because the Turkish Governor can do nothing to a Greek without the participation and presence of the Dragoman, who is also entrusted with the duty of laying at the foot of the Grand Seigneur’s throne the wishes of his fellow Christians’.67 Ali Bey’s comments do not reflect an institutional change on the island, but rather the personal relations between Chrysanthos and Hadjigeorgakis in the particular historical context, and in this respect we should keep in mind the former’s old age and ailments, as well as the fact that the latter was connected to him through marriage. In fact, the relationship between the authority of the Dragoman and that of the bishops, when Hadjigeorgakis was at the height of his power, has been the subject of debate, with some historians arguing that the Dragoman’s great achievement ‘was the gradual reduction of the prelates to virtual ceremonial figures’.68 Although Hadjigeorgakis appeared to, initially at least, act in concert with Archbishop Chrysanthos and to have amassed his fortune and to have built his political power under the aegis of the Church, he gradually started to act independently from the Archbishop, whom he chose to ignore in several instances, while his power constituted, to an extent, a threat to the authority of the Church. Referring to the ‘fraud of the grains’, a case in which the Dragoman exported, for a high price, the island’s scant crops, provoking famine, which was one of the direct causes of the revolt of 1804, Cretan painter Ioannis Kornaros, who was an eyewitness to the events, wrote that ‘the Archbishop was shouting, was screaming, Who listens? He tore his clothes (I was present). Who took notice? The archon (the Dragoman) was



Michael, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 224; Hadjikyriacou, ‘Society and Economy’, 271-2. Cobham, Excerpta Cypria, 395. 68 Hadjikyriacou, ‘Society and Economy’, 185. 66 67

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dominant, and did not listen to the admonitions neither of the Archbishop nor of anyone else anymore’.69 Because of his great authority and wealth, in the early 19th century, Hadjigeorgakis and his circle built luxurious mansions, wore expensive clothes and rode horses, displaying a behaviour that was considered inappropriate by the Muslim subjects of the Sultan.70 Thus, the Dragoman’s great political and financial power provoked a backlash, which was expressed by the events of 1804-6. In March 1804, the Muslim population of Nicosia rose in revolt and took control of the city. When they asked the Governor for the official documents of taxation, the latter referred them to the Archbishop and the Dragoman, indicating their fiscal responsibilities. Then the mob attacked the Archbishopric, maltreating the old and ailing Archbishop, before proceeding to the house of Hadjigeorgakis, to which they set fire. The Dragoman himself managed to flee to Istanbul, leaving the Christian population of Nicosia to weather the storm. Due to the Archbishop’s old age, the leading role in saving the city’s Greek Orthodox population was played by Kyprianos, Oikonomos of the Archbishopric, who was characterized by Spanish traveller Ali Bey as ‘the guardian angel of his community’. Kyprianos was the one who conducted the negotiations with the rebels and managed to ward off the danger.71 This revolt was soon followed by another serious incident: the invasion of a certain AltÖparmak in the Karpas peninsula in 1806. During this event, the rebels targeted the peninsula’s Orthodox inhabitants, and particularly the Church, destroying churches and monasteries along the way. According to French Consul Regnault, the rebel leader aimed at ‘liberating the Muslims of Cyprus from the Greek yoke’, an image that suggests the way in which many



Rizopoulou-Igoumenidou, «ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƞ ƍơƱƴƵƱƟơ», 32-5; Michael, «ƍƯƵƷơƳƟƫƧƲ», 233-5. Rizopoulou-Igoumenidou, «ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƞ ƍơƱƴƵƱƟơ», 26-32. 71 Cobham, Excerpta Cypria, 395-6; Michalis N. Michael, ‘Local Authorities and Conflict in an Ottoman Island at the beginning of the Nineteenth Century’, Turkish Historical Review, II, 2011, 57-77; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 199; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 101; Myrianthopoulos, ƗơƴƦƧƣƥƹƱƣƜƪƩƲ, 109-17; Phroso RizopoulouIgoumenidou, O ƅƱơƣƯƬƜƭƯƲ ƗơƴƦƧƣƥƹƱƣƜƪƧƲ ƋƯƱƭƝƳƩƯƲ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƆưƯƷƞ ƴƯƵ [Dragoman Hadjigeorgakis Kornesios and His Time], Anastasios G. Leventis Foundation, Nicosia, 1995, 15; Rizopoulou-Igoumenidou, «ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƞ ƍơƱƴƵƱƟơ», 20-2 & 35-8; Michael, «ƍƯƵƷơƳƟƫƧƲ», 235-7; Dionysiou, EƪƪƫƧƳƟơ, 48; Theoharis Stavrides, Studies on the History of Cyprus under Ottoman Rule, Isis Press, Istanbul, 2012, 225-8; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 671-2; Hill, History, 104-9. 69 70

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Muslims perceived the power acquired by the Dragoman and the Church in this period.72 Despite the fact that Hadjigeorgakis managed to survive the revolt of 1804, that event marked the beginning of the end of his power, and five years later, in March 1809, he was arrested and executed in Istanbul.73 Various theories have been proposed concerning the Dragoman’s downfall and execution, mainly focusing on his inordinate political power and great wealth, which was the cause of enmity on the part of various local magnates. Moreover, his politics and his favourable stance towards Russia at the time of a Turco-Russian War (1806-12) could also be another reason for his downfall. The reports of French Consul Regnault make clear that he, at least, considered the Dragoman and the bishops as his most important adversaries, particularly due to their pro-Russian stance, indicating that they were close friends and associates of his arch-enemy, Russian Consul Konstantinos Peristianis.74 In addition to this factor, the Dragoman’s downfall appears to have been connected to the turbulent situation in Istanbul after the revolt of 1807, which had toppled Sultan Selim III, who had shown favour to Hadjigeorgakis by confirming him in his office and by farming out to him various mukataa, and which also probably signalled the fall from power of his influential patrons.75 The events of 1804-6 left the Church with great debts towards the European merchants residing in Larnaca. In 1807, Archbishop Chrysanthos wrote to British Consul Antonio Vonidiziano that he was having difficulties repaying his debts, expressing the hope that, ‘in a little while these tempests would pass and we would please everyone’.76 However, the period that

 72 Papadopoulos, Ɔƪ ƴƧƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴƩƪƞƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƟơƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 86-9; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 101-2; Hill, History, 109-10; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 199; Stavrides, Studies, 228-38. 73 Myrianthopoulos, ƗơƴƦƧƣƥƹƱƣƜƪƩƲ, 135-44; Hill, History, 115-8; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 200; Rizopoulou-Igoumenidou, ƅƱơƣƯƬƜƭƯƲ, 15-6; Michael, «ƍƯƵƷơƳƟƫƧƲ», 237; Stavrides, ‘Cyprus’, 97-8. 74 Kokkinoftas, «ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ», 260-1; Hill, History, 112-5; RizopoulouIgoumenidou, ƅƱơƣƯƬƜƭƯƲ, 16; Stavrides, Studies, 225-8. 75 Kokkinoftas, «ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ», 261-262. Rizopoulou-Igoumenidou, ƅƱơƣƯƬƜƭƯƲ, 16. 76 L. Z. Pierides, «ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴơ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ŻƣƣƱơƶơ» [‘Unpublished Cypriot Documents’], ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, I, 1923, 23-4; Michael, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 283; Kokkinoftas, «ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ», 256.

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followed the death of Hadjigeorgakis appears to have been a troubled one for the Church. In a letter to Bartolomeo Pisani, first Dragoman of the British Embassy in Istanbul, British Consul Antonio Vondiziano wrote, in August 1809, that, due to the revolt of 1804, ‘the Greek Bishops had recourse for considerable loans to the Consuls’, but five years later, they had not managed to fulfil their obligations. The Bishops do not know how to find the money; and as if Cyprus were not in a sufficiently critical condition, it has the additional misfortune of seeing beside the Governor as Kiehaya a certain Cypriote named Ali Effendi…This bandit has succeeded in obtaining complete ascendancy over the mind of the Governor, and in league with the other officials commits daily iniquities, unjustly fleecing the wretched population on the most frivolous pretexts…The poor Bishops, who are troubled beyond measure at such tyranny on the part of the Kiehaya Bey, have approached me in all secrecy, adjuring me in the Lord’s Name to secure your aid in this matter, so that it may result in the deposition and exile from Cyprus of the aforesaid Ali Effendi, Kiehaya Bey of our Governor….77

Despite his understanding for the position of the prelates, Vondiziano managed to obtain a sultanic order commanding the Archbishop to repay his debt, which amounted to 7,000 piastres.78 In the following month, in September 1809, the Consuls wrote collectively to the Archbishop, complaining about the delay in the payment of the debts, to which Chrysanthos replied that, ‘with warm tears’, he had managed to convince the Governor to allow the inclusion of the sum of 100,000 piastres in the taxes of 1809, in order to repay the interest he owed, and promised that he would pay the rest in another year, ‘when the land becomes felicitous, and the tyranny [«ƴơ ƦƯƵƫƯƽƬƩơ»] stops’.79 Far from ceasing, however, the ‘tyranny’ kept aggravating and a couple of months later, in November 1809, Governor Hasan Aøa demanded the sum of 300,000 piastres as bakiye of the taxes of Cyprus. This sum was demanded from the prelates as reaya vekilleri of the island’s Greek Orthodox taxpayers, since the latter could not pay, according to a note in a codex of the Bishopric of Paphos, ‘due to the tyranny of the Agarenes and the looting of the locust’. In order to exert pressure on them, the Governor imprisoned the prelates, who,

 Sir Harry Luke, Cyprus under the Turks, 1571-1878, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1921, 128-9; Hill, History, 111-2 & 115; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 201. 78 Michael, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 283. 79 Ibid., 284-5 & 323-4; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 202; Kokkinoftas, «ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ», 256. 77

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in order to collect the sum demanded, had to sell part of the Church property.80 The financial distress of the Church and the deterioration of the relations of the prelates with the local authorities and the foreign Consuls, highlighted by Chrysanthos’ inability to obtain the exile of the Governor’s kethüda, are indications of the waning of the Archbishop’s authority after the fall of Hadjigeorgakis, which paved the way for his own downfall. By 1809, conditions on the island had changed, and Chrysanthos, who had been able, in the past, to remove powerful Governors, like Süleyman Baki and Haci Baki Aøa, was not in a position to obtain the deposition of Ottoman officials anymore. Moreover, the debts of the Church to laymen, who were members of the nascent bourgeoisie of Larnaca, laid the foundations for the increasingly vocal demand of this latter class, in the course of the 19th century, for involvement in the administration of the property of the Church, and particularly in the management of the treasuries of the Archbishopric and the Bishoprics.81 Taking into account the close association of the Dragoman with Archbishop Chrysanthos, the latter’s downfall a year after the former’s execution should not come as a surprise. In addition to his association with the disgraced Dragoman, Chrysanthos’ presence on the Archiepiscopal Throne was the cause of grievances for several reasons. In the first place, due to his extreme old age and his various ailments, Chrysanthos could not perform his duties adequately. In fact, although his exact date of birth is unknown, taking into consideration the fact that he must have been at least around forty years old at the time of his accession to the Bishopric of Paphos in 1762, he must have been born, at the latest, in the early 1720s, which would make him around ninety years old in the early 1800s. It is noteworthy that in 1806, when Spanish traveller Ali Bey al-Abbasi visited Nicosia, Chrysanthos could not meet him, since he was ‘confined to the house by extreme old age and gouty pains’, and sent ‘his bishop in partibus [Spyridon of Trimythous] who acts in his stead’. When he finally met the Archbishop, Ali Bey described him as ‘a venerable old man’ whose legs ‘were terribly swollen’. In the meeting, Chrysanthos complained to Ali Bey



80 Kokkinoftas, «ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ», 254-5; Hill, History, 111; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 196. 81 Michael, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 285.

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about ‘the terrible vexations which he had suffered last year (1804) at the hands of the Turkish rebels’, and the latter tried to console him.82 The fact that he twice attempted to resign reinforces this idea, and in 1791, twenty years before his dismissal, he attempted to resign due to his infirmity. This was pointed out in a letter the clergy and laity of Cyprus sent to the Ecumenical Patriarch, Ieremias IV (1809-13), in 1810, in support of Chrysanthos’ successor, Kyprianos: ‘in the past twenty years, due to his deep old age and the great and many ailments, our Archbishop Mr. Chrysanthos of Cyprus did not perform the ecclesiastical offices. Many times he asked the Synod to resign and be replaced by another worthy and able cleric. However, certain people did not let him do this in any way’.83 This latter statement insinuated that Chrysanthos acted as a cover for the interests of another group – his own family. In 1810, three of the four episcopal Thrones of the island were occupied by Chrysanthos and his nephews – an indication that the Church of Cyprus was administered by a single family, a fact that was bound to give rise to discontent in certain circles. For this reason, there was the widespread sense that his two resignations were rejected due to the influence of his nephews, Bishops Chrysanthos of Paphos and Chrysanthos of Kitium, who were reluctant to forfeit their control of the Archiepiscopal Throne. They had good reason to fear that, with Chrysanthos’ demise, the family would lose the Archbishopric, since by that time there had arisen an opposition faction that found its leader in the person of the rising star of the Church of Cyprus at that time, Kyprianos, Oikonomos of the Archbishopric.84 In June 1810, a firman arrived in Cyprus, ordering the exile of Chrysanthos and his nephew Chrysanthos I, Bishop of Kitium, to the island of Euboea. Together with the firman arrived berats designating their successors: Chrysanthos was replaced by Oikonomos Kyprianos (1810-21), while the Bishop of Kitium would be succeeded by the Archimandrite Meletios, who would administer his See as Meletios II (1810-21). Chrysanthos’ exile caused an ecclesiastical crisis on the island since it was considered uncanonical and no local prelate would consent to ordain his



Cobham, Excerpta Cypria, 394-5. Theoharis Stavrides, ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƼ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƥƟƯ ƪơƩ ƋƽưƱƯƲ: Ɣơ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƩƪƜ ŻƣƣƱơƶơ ƴƹƭ Ɔƴƾƭ 1600-1878 [The Ecumenical Patriarchate and Cyprus: The Patriarchal Documents of the Years 1600-1878], Kykkos Monastery Research Centre, Nicosia, 2001, 317-9. 84 Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 114; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 101-2; Hill, History, 359-60; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 132; Michael, EƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 222-4; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 674. 82 83

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successor, who was not elected canonically by a local Synod, according to the ecclesiastical rules. The crisis was resolved a few months later, when the deposed Archbishop conveniently died in the town of Chalkida on the island of Euboea in early October 1810.85 Chrysanthos’ long administration, spanning the better part of the second half of the 18th and the first decade of the 19th century, was an important period of consolidation of the authority of the Church of Cyprus, and the ups and downs of the Archbishop’s fortunes led several 19th and 20th century authors to waver between characterizing this period as a ‘dark age’ or a ‘golden age’. During his long tenure, Chrysanthos tried to keep the delicate balance between his, often contradictory, official roles as leader and protector of the island’s Orthodox community and as leader of the Church, which was probably the most important locus of power in late 18th century Cyprus. His efforts were further complicated by his attachment to his family and his attempt to establish an ecclesiastical ‘dynasty’ within the Church of Cyprus. His actions, like his cultural or fiscal activity, as well as his circle of associates, at various times he attempted to serve all three aims, with varying success. Coming in an important period of transition, the career of Archbishop Chrysanthos illustrates the tripartite power-sharing of the period between the Archbishop, the Dragoman and the MuhassÖl. Starting his tenure with a significant victory over the existing Ottoman Governor, Chrysanthos went on to struggle successfully with another, more powerful local magnate, Haci Baki. Victory over Haci Baki, however, led to the ascendancy of another local player, Dragoman Hadjigeorgakis, who, although initially acting in concert with Chrysanthos, eventually overshadowed him, enjoying for several years political supremacy on the island. The fall of Hadjigeorgakis in 1809 also signalled the beginning of the end of Chrysanthos’ authority. However, this concerned only the person of Chrysanthos and the fortunes of his family, while the Dragoman’s inability to retain his power and the subsequent decline of his office, once more left the field open for the Church. Thus, despite the vicissitudes of power, the Church of Cyprus managed to retain and even



Kokkinoftas, «ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ», 256-65; Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 114-5; Papadopoulos, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 104-5; Hill, History, 360-1; Philippou, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 136-8; Michael, EƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 139-40, 224-5; Michael, «ƍƯƵƷơƳƟƫƧƲ», 2378; Michael, ‘An Orthodox Institution’, 215-6; Mitsides, «ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ», 674-5; Stavrides, Studies, 58-63. On the widespread belief about the possible personal involvement of Kyprianos in the downfall of Chrysanthos, see Kokkinoftas, «ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ», 256-65, which argues convincingly in support of the idea. 85

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enhance its authority during this period, a fact which would become evident after the fall of Chrysanthos, in the personality of the young and dynamic cleric who replaced him.

Figure 1: Portrait of Archbishop Chrysanthos at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus.

CHAPTER THREE KYPRIANOS, 1810-21: AN ORTHODOX CLERIC ‘ADMINISTERING POLITICS’ IN AN OTTOMAN ISLAND MICHALIS N. MICHAEL Archbishop Kyprianos is considered one of the most important figures in the history of modern Cyprus. His advancement to the Archbishop’s throne of the Church of Cyprus, his work during his prelacy and also his tragic end in July 1821, reflect a complex period in Ottoman history, as well as for Cyprus and its Orthodox Christian community. Studying Archbishop Kyprianos’ life and career is, in essence, a study of the history of the Ottoman periphery, since Kyprianos, as an Orthodox high priest, can be seen as functioning simultaneously on two levels: as the spiritual leader of the Orthodox Cypriots and as a bearer of important Ottoman political power. Cypriot and Greek historiography have placed Archbishop Kyprianos in the pantheon of national martyrs (ethno-martyr), thus attempting to demonstrate the relationship between Kyprianos’ supposed ideas about the nation and his efforts to overthrow the Ottoman status quo, whilst also trying to preserve a Church that would maintain the powers formulated during the Ottoman period in a post-Ottoman Cyprus.1 This historiography essentially embraces the myth-making of nationalist discourses, so that Archbishop Kyprianos, in national terms, is placed by default in a position juxtaposing the Ottoman empire – both locally and centrally — despite the fact that he is a high priest representing an institution that had gradually been integrated into the mechanisms of the Ottoman administration and that, as a local

For the gradual formation of the Church of Cyprus into an institution of political power during the long Ottoman period, see Michalis N. Michael, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƯƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞ ưƥƱƟƯƤƯ: ƈ ƳƴơƤƩơƪƞ ƳƵƣƪƱƼƴƧƳƞ ƴƧƲ Ƴƥ ƨƥƳƬƼ ưƯƫƩƴƩƪƞƲ ƥƮƯƵƳƟơƲ (The Church of Cyprus during the Ottoman Period, 1571-1878. The Formation Process of an Institution of Political Power), Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia, 2005. 1

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power, he had never pursued the overthrow of the Ottoman status quo.2 The traditional historiography takes for granted that Archbishop Kyprianos was a supporter of the cause of the Filiki Etairia (the secret organization that initiated the Greek Struggle of Independence), and despite a lack of any documentation, it is reported that in Cyprus ‘it is certain that the national martyr Kyprianos was initiated to the Filiki Etairia’ and that ‘the missionaries of the Filiki Etairia visiting the island communicated their objectives to Archbishop Kyprianos’.3 The most recent book published about Kyprianos and his life, a collection of all of his texts and all the texts written for him, moves along the same lines as the existing bibliography.4 Kyprianos’s tragic end and that of other high priests and a selection of other Cypriot Orthodox notables aligned to Kyprianos, in July 1821, has resulted in the historiography identifying Kyprianos with the efforts of the Greek struggle for independence. However, in reality, Kyprianos’s life, his career, as well as his death could be more closely identified with the Ottoman framework of his era, that is, the end of the 18th century and the first decades of the 19th century. In historiography, Kyprianos’ tragic end dominates his life, and on the occasions where his life has been examined, the conclusion has been to categorize Kyprianos, as demonstrated by the title of the most For the use of myths in Cyprus historiography, see: Michalis N. Michael, ‘Myth and Nationalism: The Retrospective Force of National Roles through Mythical Past’, Ayhan Aktar, Niyazi KÖzÖlyürek and Umut ÖzkÖrÖmlÖ (eds.), Nationalism in the Troubled Triangle: Cyprus, Greece and Turkey, Palgrave Macmillan, London 2010, 149-59. 3 Spyridon Loucatos, ‘ƋƵưƱƩơƪơƟ ƳƥƫƟƤƥƲ ƴƧƲ ƥƫƫƧƭƩƪƞƲ ƥƨƭƥƣƥƱƳƟơƲ’ (Cypriot Pages of the Greek ethnegersia), Theodoros Papadopoullos and Menelaos Christodoulou (eds.), Proceedings of the First Cypriological Conference, III, 1, Nicosia, 1973, 198. For the traditional historiography on Kyprianos, see Filios Zannetos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƭƞƳƯƵ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, (History of the island of Cyprus), I, Larnaca 1910, 1147-70; G. I. Kipiadis, ƂưƯƬƭƧƬƯƭƥƽƬơƴơ ƴƹƭ ƪơƴƜ ƴƯ 1821 ƥƭ ƴƧ ƭƞƳƹ ƋƽưƱƹ ƴƱơƣƩƪƾƭ ƳƪƧƭƾƭ, (Memoirs on the Tragic Scenes in Cyprus during 1821), Alexandria 1888; John Koumoulides, Cyprus and the War of Greek Independence, 1821-1829, London 1974, 40-91; Andreas N. Mitsides, ‘ƈ ƥƨƭƩƪƞ ưƱƯƳƶƯƱƜ ƴƧƲ ƪƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƴƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƭ (1571-1878)’ (The National Contribution of the Church of Cyprus during the Ottoman period), Apostolos Varnavas, 32, 1975, 197-243; Emmanuel G. Protopsaltis, ƈ ƋƽưƱƯƲ ƥƩƲ ƴƯƭ ơƣƾƭơ ƴƯƵ 1821 (Cyprus during the Struggle of 1821), Athens 1971; Vasilis Sfiroeras, ƙƤƟƭƥƲ ƪơƩ ƯƤƽƭƧ ƬƩơƲ ƥươƭƜƳƴơƳƧƲ: ƔƯ 1821 ƳƴƧƭ ƋƽưƱƯ (Pain and Sorrow of a Revolution: The 1821 in Cyprus), Nicosia 1993; Andreas Mitsides, ‘ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥưƟ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ’ (The Church of Cyprus during the Tourkokrateia), Theodoros Papadopoullos (ed.), ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, (History of Cyprus), VI, ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơ (Tourkokrateia), Nicosia, 2011, 519-823. 4 Paraskevas Agathonos (ed.), ƂƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ: Ɛ ƬƜƱƴƵƱơƲ ƴƧƲ ưƟƳƴƥƹƲ ƪơƩ ƴƧƲ ươƴƱƟƤƯƲ (The Archbishop of Cyprus Kyprianos: The Martyr of Faith and Homeland), Machairas Monastery, Nicosia, 2009. 2

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recent book about him, as ‘a martyr of faith and nation’. Perhaps, however, it is worth studying Kyprianos’s life and actions on the basis of Benedict Egglezaki’s characterisation of him: ‘he entered history justified not by his life and action, but because of his sacrifice and death […] the cinnabar that justified him, it was his blood’.5 This study argues that Kyprianos was an excellent example of the emergence and the activity of an Orthodox Ottoman official that appeared in the empire during the second half of the 18th century.

The road to the Archbishopric throne of Cyprus Kyprianos was born in 1756 in Strovolos, Nicosia, and at a very young age entered the order of the brotherhood of Machairas Monastery. After a probationary period, he became a deacon in 1783, and he followed his uncle, an archimandrite at Machairas Monastery, to Wallachia.6 There they conducted a ziteia as travellers for the economic reinforcement of the monastery.7 During their stay, Kyprianos met the ruler Michael Soutsos, who took care of the advancement of Kyprianos to priesthood and appointed him as chaplain at the church with the right to free schooling at the local school.8 Despite the fact that there is not much information on the rather long period of Kyprianos’s stay in Wallachia – a period of about 20 years – it is possible to conclude that he came in contact with the spirit of the actions of the Phanariot rulers. His education was the result of their interest in opening

Venedictos Egglezakis, ‘ƔƯ ƬƥƫơƭƯƤƯƷƥƟƯƭ ƴƯƵ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƋƵưƱƩơƭƯƽ’ (The Ink Pot of Archbishop Kyprianos), ƋƵưƱƩơƪơƟ ƓưƯƵƤơƟ, 45, 1981, 159. 6 For biographical notes of Kyprianos, see Konstantinos Christofidou (ed.), ƑơƭƧƣƵƱƩƪƼƭ ƫƥƽƪƹƬơ ƥưƟ ƴƧ ƴƥƫƥƴƞ ƴƹƭ ơưƯƪơƫƵưƴƧƱƟƹƭ ƴƧƲ ưƱƯƴƯƬƞƲ ƴƯƵ ƥƨƭƯƬƜƱƴƵƱƯƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƭƯƽ (Festive Book on the Ceremony of Unveiling the Bust of the Ethnomartyr Kyprianos), Nicosia, 1929 (reprint: Nicosia 1988); Charilaos Papaioannou, ‘Ɛ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ’ (The Kyprianos of Cyprus), Fos, I, 1911, 3-16, 33-9 & 65-72; Ioannis Tsiknopoulos, ‘Ɛ ƥƨƭƯƬƜƱƴƵƲ ƂƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ’ (The Ethnomartyr Archbishop of Cyprus Kyprianos), Apostolos Varnavas, 32, 1971, 245-311. 7 Ziteia was an ecclesiastical practice during which monks, clerics, but sometimes laypersons too, traveled around the villages or abroad asking for contributions for a monastery or a bishopric. This was one of the most frequent practices of the ecclesiastical institutions (Archbishopric, bishoprics and the monasteries). During the 18th and 19th centuries, it was performed two or three times a year. Whilst this support was initially voluntary, gradually it became an obligatory Church tax for the Orthodox people. See Michael, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 194-6. 8 This is the Greek school of Jassy, which, with the Greek school in Bucharest, were the two most important schools in the Danubian principalities in the 18th century. 5

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schools and colleges.9 Apart from the legislative work that was central to the Phanariot, who were appointed as rulers there, they appear to have shown a special interest in education; they opened colleges and financially supported schools. It is important to note for Kyprianos’s later career that the Phanariot rulers projected an image of themselves as the successors of the Byzantine tradition, and especially the Byzantine rulers as protectors of the Orthodox faith and the race of the Rum. That is, they sought to appear as rulers that, on one hand, enhanced the Ottoman status quo – where their own power came from – while, on the other hand, they spread the Greek language and the development of Greek civilization. Their objective appears to have been the spread of an ecumenical Greek-speaking civilization within the borders of the Ottoman Empire, combined with the Orthodox faith.10 They were not bearers of Greek nationalism; rather, they were bearers of an OttomanOrthodox reality, where they could hold their political privileges and combine the existence and continuance of the Ottoman state with an Ottoman-Orthodox administrative elite. The Phanariot rulers believed in the need to cooperate with the Ottoman power, without which they could not have existed.11 Within this environment, Kyprianos lived under the protection of the Phanariot Soutsos family and came in contact with various members of the upper class, mainly traders. His education meant he was informed on international developments, such as the French Revolution in 1789. As will be discussed later, during his primacy in Cyprus, this atmosphere affected Kyprianos. His primacy is closely related with the bourgeoisie traders and the development of civilization, an ‘enlightened new spirit’.12 Briefly, Kyprianos must have been influenced by the work of the Phanariot rulers in Moldavia and Wallachia. His long stay in these areas gave him the impression that the Ottoman periphery could be ruled, as the Phanariot did, by an Orthodox; that is, an officer who would be appointed by the Ottoman administration and would ensure the reinforcement of Ottoman power in a region with an Orthodox population. The ecclesiastic nature of Kyprianos – he was an educated priest – facilitated the use of Byzantine symbols, which could be

9 Vasilis Sfiroeras, ‘ƐƩ ƖơƭơƱƩƾƴƥƲ’ (The Phanariots), ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƯƵ ƎƝƯƵ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƳƬƯƽ, 1770-2000, II, Athens, 2003, 300. 10 Nicolae Iorga, Byzance apres Byzance: continuation de l' Histoire de la Vie Byzantine, Bucarest, 1971 (Greek edition, Athens 1989), 226. 11 H. G. Patrinelis, ‘ƐƩ ƖơƭơƱƩƾƴƥƲ ưƱƩƭ ƴƯ 1821’ (The Phanariots before 1821), Proceedings of the one day conference, ƒƹƬƩƯƟ ƳƴƧƭ ƵưƧƱƥƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƕƸƧƫƞƲ ƑƽƫƧƲ, Athens, 2002, 25. 12 Egglezakis, ‘ƍƥƫơƭƯƤƯƷƥƟƯƭ’, 156.

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seen as references to secular authority, exactly as the Phanariot rulers used them. In 1802, Kyprianos returned to Cyprus from Wallachia as a highly educated clergyman. He had lived for a long period in a different periphery of the empire, one that was under a different administrative system, where the Phanariots ruled. However, Kyprianos returned to an uneducated Cyprus after having lived in a place of spiritual flourishing, the cultivation of letters, and an atmosphere of educating the clergy and the common people. According to his biographers, Kyprianos stood out after returning to Cyprus in 1802 because of his excellent education and his diplomatic and political skills, qualifications he had acquired through his long acquaintance with the ruler of Wallachia. Moreover, his initial purpose in Wallachia was successful, since he brought back a significant amount of money that paid off various debts of the monastery. He also brought with him three portraits, one of himself, in which, as his biographers note, he appears ‘profound’ and of ‘strong will’, one of his uncle Charalambos, and one of the Phanariot ruler Michael Soutsos.13 With his appointment at the annex (ƬƥƴƼƷƩƯ) of the Machairas monastery in Nicosia soon after his return to the island, Kyprianos was but a step away from the centre of political power on the island, the Archbishop’s throne of Cyprus. His course until his appointment as steward (ƯƩƪƯƭƼƬƯƲ) of the Archbishopric palace demonstrates his strong will to become involved with politics within the framework of the clergy’s activities, whilst his relatively easy appointment to the position of steward must have been due to his education and his diplomatic skills. In addition, Kyprianos appears to have had a network of people in Nicosia, the administrative centre of the island and location of the Archbishop’s throne, who helped him advance closer to the centre of the ecclesiastical hierarchy. Furthermore, he returned to Cyprus in a period when the elderly Archbishop Chrysanthos (1767-1810) could no longer successfully perform his duties and many supported his replacement, which has led many to conjecture about the timing of Kyprianos’s arrival. It is characteristic that his biographers write that ‘he aspired to higher posts and actions, seeing that the boundaries of his village where limited, he was successful in imposing himself in the social circles of Nicosia and to be hired by the Archbishop, being appointed by the already old and crippled Archbishop Chrysanthos as steward of the Archbishopric palace’.14 Tsiknopoulos, ‘Ethnomartyr’, 247. I. K. Peristianis, ‘Ɛ ƥƨƭƯƬƜƱƴƵƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ’ (The Ethnomartyr Kyprianos), Christofidou (ed.), ƑơƭƧƣƵƱƩƪƼƭ, 30. See also John Hackett, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƐƱƨƯƤƼƮƯƵ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ (History of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus), I, Athens, 1923, 13 14

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Kyprianos’s first actions after his return were related to networking with the traditional centre of power on the island, Nicosia, where the seats of the Ottoman governor (muhassÖl) and of the Archbishopric were located. As a clergyman, he was aware that his advancement could only be achieved through the Church. At the same time, he was aware that this would also require the will and the support of the Sublime Porte, since the document (berat) of his appointment to the Archbishop’s throne on the island could only come from Istanbul. Given this reality, and perhaps having perceived the bigger picture of his time, Kyrpianos considered networking beyond Nicosia; that is, gaining support from people within the palace in Istanbul, as the greatest supplement to his connections within Cyprus. This was demonstrated a few years later when he was appointed as Archbishop directly from the Sublime Porte whilst Archbishop Chrysanthos was still alive. Before that, however, in 1804, Kyprianos was steward of the Archbishopric palace and manager of the financial and political business, since Archbishop Chrysanthos was sick and elderly. He was, therefore, to play a very important role in the revolt in Nicosia.15 After the attack at the house of Dragomanos (divan tercümanÖ) Hatzigeorgakis Kornesios, the Muslim rebels of Nicosia were about to attack the Archbishop’s palace. Kyprianos managed to remove the rebels from the Archbishopric, thus demonstrating his diplomatic skills.16 With his successful mediation and negotiation, he managed to increase the prestige of the Archbishop’s throne. It is also mentioned that after his contribution to settling the situation in 1804, he basically took over the management of the Archbishopric due to the advanced age of Archbishop Chrysanthos (1766-1810).17 Therefore, six years before his appointment to the Archbishop’s throne, Kyprianos is inside the Archbishopric, managing the finances and creating the necessary conditions for his advancement to the Archbishop’s throne. Kornesios’s forced departure to Istanbul left Kyprianos in sole command of the management of the political and especially the financial issues during a period when, as the French consul notes in June 1806, ‘the Porte is little interested for the decline and desolation of the provinces under the

306 ; Loizos Philippou, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥưƟ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ (The Church of Cyprus during the Tourkokrateia), Athens, 1975, 118. 15 For the 1804 revolt, see Michalis N. Michael, ‘Local Authorities and Conflict in an Ottoman Island at the Beginning of the Nineteenth Century’, Turkish Historical Review, 2, 2011, 57-77. 16 George Hill, A History of Cyprus, IV, Cambridge 1952, 107. 17 Papaioannou, ‘ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ’, 5.

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administration of the Archbishop or the pasha’.18 It is also noteworthy that more recent research has demonstrated that the result of this revolt and the intervention of the Sublime Porte’s troops was the displacement of the local Ottoman power in favour of the Church of Cyprus. The 32-year challenge to the bishop’s authority on the island by the politically and economically powerful Orthodox divan tercümanÖ finally ended at the conclusion of the revolt with the inability of Kornesios to return to the island as a powerful divan tercümanÖ and his eventual execution in Istanbul. After the execution of Kornesios, the taxation and administrative responsibilities returned to the hands of the high clergy, whilst the newly appointed divan tercümanÖ had neither the authority nor the prestige that had been enjoyed by Kornesios during the last two decades of the eighteenth century.19 Therefore, the most noteworthy achievement in Kyprianos’s career since his return to Cyprus in 1802 was his direct appointment to the Archbishop’s throne of the Church of Cyprus by the Sublime Porte whilst Archbishop Chrysanthos was still living. The efforts to remove the old and helpless Chryanthos from the throne had begun at the end of the 18th century. However, they were unsuccessful, and the matter had reached Istanbul. Zannetos claimed that the scheming at the Sublime Porte to remove Chrysanthos was constant. In a letter from Kyprianos’ supporters to the Sublime Porte, they mention that Chrysanthos had not been in a position to perform his duties for the past twenty years, and appointing Kyprianos appears to be necessary.20 However, it seems that Chrysanthos also had supporters that wished him to remain on the throne. The relevant bibliography notes that in 1791 and in 1801, his close relatives and especially his bishop nephews tried to keep him on the throne, perhaps foreseeing that one day they could succeed him themselves.21 These facts demonstrate that there were two factions around the Archbishop’s throne due to the political 18 For the letter from the French consul in Larnaca to the Minister of Foreign Affairs dated 30 June 1806, see Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘ƈ ƳƴƜƳƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƌƥƵƪƹƳƟơƲ’ (The Nicosia Revolt), Kypriaka Hronika, 7, 1930, 211. 19 Michael, ‘Local’, 76. 20 For the letter from clerics and seculars to the Ecumenical Patriarch Ieremias dated 28 June 1810, see: Theoharis Stavrides, ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƼ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƥƟƯ ƪơƩ ƋƽưƱƯƲ. Ɣơ ươƴƱƩơƱƷƩƪƜ ƝƣƣƱơƶơ ƴƹƭ ƥƴƾƭ 1600-1878 (The Ecumenical Patriarchate and Cyprus. The Patriarchical Documents, 1600-1878), Nicosia 2001, 317-319. 21 Kostis Kokkinoftas, ‘Ɛ ƑƜƶƯƵ ƗƱƽƳơƭƨƯƲ (1805-1821) ƪơƩ Ƨ ƥƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴƩƪƞ ƪƱƟƳƧ ƴƯƵ 1810’ (The Bishop of Paphos Chrisanthos and the Ecclesiastical Crisis in 1810), ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƤơ ƋƝƭƴƱƯƵ ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƾƭ ƆƱƥƵƭƾƭ, XXIII, 1997, 257. This is also mentioned in the previous letter to the Ecumenical Patriarch. See: Stavrides, ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƼ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƥƟƯ, 317.

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and financial power that accompanied it. These factions contained both clergymen and secular elites who promoted their own candidates. In the end, Kyprianos and his supporters appear to have prevailed both on a local and a central level. In May 1810, after the decree of Sultan Mahmud II (1808-39), Archbishop Chrysanthos and the Metropolitan of Kitium Chrysanthos (1797-1810) were exiled to the island of Euboia. At the same time, the Sublime Porte sent to the island the documents (berat) of appointment of their replacement, Kyprianos to the Archbishop’s throne and Meletios II (1810-1821) to the throne of the Metropolis of Kitium. Kyprianos’s direct appointment from the Sublime Porte whilst Archbishop Chrysanthos was still alive justified suspicions that Kyprianos and his support network at the centre of the empire were behind the exiling of Chrysanthos. Philippos Georgiou writes that the Sultan’s decree was issued as a result of the actions of the supporters of Kyprianos,22 whilst Charilaos Papaioannou adds that Kyprianos’s supporters in Nicosia were active in Istanbul and succeeded in issuing the decree for the appointment of Kyprianos.23 With the Sultan’s decree, Kyprianos, who had been the steward of the Archbishopric for about six years, was appointed to the Archbishop’s throne and took over what was perhaps the most important political and religious position on the island. His quick appointment demonstrates the direct involvement of the Sublime Porte in the appointment of high priests in the 19th century and also the importance of a network such as Kyprianos’s, both on a local and central level. 24 The Ecumenical Patriarch, Meletios, without interfering in the procedure of election or appointment of Archbishop Kyprianos and the Metropolitan of Kitium, was called to ecclesiastically ratify the Sublime Porte’s action. This happened whilst the two exiled high priests were still alive despite the fact that Church rules forbid the ordination of new high priests to posts where their predecessor was still alive. After Chrysanthos’s exile, the rest of the high priests of the Church of Cyprus would not ordain Kyprianos, and they invited the Archbishop of Mount Sinai Konstantios (1805-30), who had been in Cyprus, to decide on the matter. Konstantios of Sinai denied ordaining him due to the abnormality of his appointment and set as a condition for the 22 Philippos Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƩƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ ưƥƱƟ ƴƧƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ (Historical Affairs on the Church of Cyprus), Athens 1875 (reprint: Nicosia 1975), 115. 23 Papaioannou, ‘ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ’, 6. 24 Michalis N. Michael, ‘Ɛ ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƼƲ ƑơƴƱƩƜƱƷƧƲ, Ƨ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƩ Ư ƓƯƵƫƴƜƭƯƲ: ƯƩ ƂƱƷƩƥƱƥƟƲ ƹƲ ƬƝƳƯ ƥƫƝƣƷƯƵ ƴƧƲ ƯƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞƲ ưƥƱƩƶƝƱƥƩơƲ’ (The Ecumenical Patriarch, the Church of Cyprus and the Sultan: The High Priests as a Means to Control the Ottoman Periphery), ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƜ, 22/42, 2005, 131.

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ordaining of Kyprianos the resignation of the still living Chrysanthos from the throne or the issue of a special permit from the Ecumenical Patriarchate. In his letter, he added that the Cypriot clergymen will agree with him and that they will have no other claims. He also wrote that he hoped that the Cypriot clergymen would not use ‘secular violence’, in order to force him to ordain Kyprianos. 25 After the request of the Cypriots in their letter to the Patriarch26, the Ecumenical Patriarchate, in a letter to Archbishop Konstantios, accepted the Sublime Porte’s request and agreed that the exile of the high priests would be followed by the appointment of replacements and the issue of the related documents (berats). In the same letter, Konstantios was asked to go forward with the ordination of Kyprianos to the throne of Archbishop of Cyprus.27 However, due to the noncompliance with the Church rules, Konstantios did not proceed with the ordination and the Ecumenical Patriarch was forced to send a second letter in September in which he urged him to proceed to the ordination.28 The matter remained unresolved, and whilst, according to Church rules, Chrysanthos was still the Archbishop of Cyprus, Kyprianos was the Archbishop where the Sublime Porte, who had appointed him, was concerned, but not for the Church itself. In the end, however, the exiled Chrysanthos died after the summer of 1810, and thus Konstantios ordained Kyprianos on 30 October.29 On the one hand, the acceptance of the appointment by the Ecumenical Patriarchate demonstrates its weakness to resist the will of the Sublime Porte even if that will contravened canonical laws, whilst, on the other hand, it also demonstrates the loss of control of the Patriarchate over the Church of Cyprus. Moreover, these circumstances are another example of successful peripheral leadership.

25 For the letter from the Archbishop of Sinai to the Cypriots, 2 July 1810, see Agathonos, ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ, 159-62. 26 For the letter from clerics and seculars to the Ecumenical Patriarch Ieremias, 28 June 1810, see Stavrides, ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƼ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƥƟƯ, 317-9. 27 For the letter from the Ecumenical Patriarch Ieremias to the Archbishop of Sinai Constantios, 15 July 1810, see Agathonos, ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ, 167-70. 28 For the letter from the Ecumenical Patriarch Ieremias to the Archbishop of Sinai Constantios, 27 September 1810, see Agathonos, ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ, 171-2. 29 For the ordination note regarding Kyprianos, see Agathonos, ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ, 173-4.

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A Cypriot Archbishop as Phanariot ruler As mentioned earlier, the Phanariot rulers in the Danubian principalities were portrayed as the successors of the Byzantine emperors in their role as protectors of the Orthodox faith. Many of them had established a special coronation ceremony at the Patriarchate and they appropriated royal titles, which they combined with the Byzantine framework. Some also discovered that they were related to royal Byzantine families.30 Their hegemony in areas where they were sent, their broad responsibilities and their image as exclusive rulers in their peripheries are known in the historiography as an imperium in imperio.31 Kyprianos’ and his predecessor’s wish to be seen as rulers within the Phanariots’ tradition was so apparent that the French consul on the island writes in a letter to the French embassy in Istanbul in June 1806 – even before Kyprianos became Archbishop of Cyprus – that the bishops in Cyprus had ‘hopes to perhaps become princes like the ones of Wallachia and Moldavia’.32 In this framework, the transfer of the ‘policy’ of the Phanariots in Cyprus, the use of Byzantine symbols and the effort to promote a Greek-speaking civilization within the Ottoman state by the high clergy of the Church of Cyprus after the second half of the 18th century reveal an effort to differentiate yet not eliminate the Ottoman character of the high clergy’s political power.33 The use of these symbols should be analysed as directly linked to the political power that the Sultan gave to the Archbishop of Patrinelis, ‘ƖơƭơƱƩƾƴƥƲ’, 28. Radu Florescu, ‘The Fanariot Regime in the Danubian Principalities’, Balkan Studies, 9/2 (1968) 303. 32 Kyriazis, ‘ƈ ƳƴƜƳƩƲ’, 211. 33 According to tradition rather than historical sources, in 470, the Byzantine Emperor Zeno gave to the Archbishop of Cyprus, Anthemius, and his successors, three important privileges that distinguish the Archbishop of Cyprus and, consequently, the Church of Cyprus from other Orthodox Churches. According to these privileges, the Archbishop of Cyprus was allowed to sign with red ink, wear an imperial purple cloak and carry an imperial scepter instead of a pastoral rod. Benedict Englezakis, a Cypriot historian and clergyman, notes that the ancient sources do not mention anything about the ‘legend’ of the privileges given by the Emperor Zeno to the Archbishop of Cyprus. See Egglezakis, ‘ƔƯ ƬƥƫơƭƯƤƯƷƥƟƯƭ’, 150. The first written record regarding the privileges from the Byzantine Emperor Zeno was in 1676, nearly a century after the conquest of Cyprus by the Ottomans, at the act of election and ordination of the Bishop of Paphos, Nektarios. See K. Delikanis, Ɣơ ƥƭ ƴƯƩƲ ƋƾƤƩƮƩ ƴƯƵ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƩƪƯƽ ƂƱƷƥƩƯƶƵƫơƪƟƯƵ ƳƹƦƼƬƥƭơ ƥưƟƳƧƬơ ƥƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴƩƪƜ ƝƣƣƱơƶơ… (The Official Church Documents Kept in the Codex of the Patriarchate Archive), Constantinople, 1904, 633. See also Stavrides, ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƼ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƥƟƯ, 274. 30 31

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Cyprus and not his spiritual power. That is, these were symbols that were related to the Byzantine past; however, they were also symbols of power within the Ottoman present, thus making them Byzantine symbols of Ottoman political power.34 As opposed to the classical period of the Ottoman state (14th-16th centuries), in this period of change, and especially after the middle of the 18th century, the character of Ottoman political power or, rather, the composition of this character was not only defined by the imperial centre but also by local power, which is now given a chance to contribute to its reconstruction. It was in this framework that the image of the Archbishop of Cyprus as a successor of the Byzantine tradition – always within the Ottoman framework and without any efforts to overthrow the Ottoman status quo — was developed as well as his identification as a bearer of Ottoman political power with Byzantine roots. It is characteristic that in 1815, wishing perhaps to show his autonomy from the Orthodox Patriarchates, Archbishop Kyprianos told a foreign traveller that he was independent from other Patriarchs due to the fact that he was using Byzantine imperial privileges.35 This reference immediately linked him to a Byzantine imperial tradition, of which he was the successor. Signing with red ink, a privilege held only by the Archbishop of Cyprus, became more distinct and permanent only after the beginning of the 17th century.36 This linked the Archbishops of Cyprus to Byzantium. This practise became entrenched by the 19th century. In the Archive of the Late Archbishops of Cyprus documents show that the archbishop signed with red ink, whilst his seal with his title in the Ottoman script was also red. It was also characteristic that Archbishop Kyprianos often appeared with his imperial robes, as one traveller noted.37 Moreover, this development was further revealed through an analysis of the symbols that Kyprianos put in his golden inkpot. Aside from the twoheaded eagle, the privileges that the Archbishop of Cyprus has in the presentations of such symbols was demonstrated when the ‘episcopal topped by a cross mitre’ was parallelised with the hoods of Byzantine rulers.38 Aside from these symbols, all such presentations reveal Kyprianos’s will to project himself as a secular ruler of Cyprus with privileges and symbols that 34 Michalis N. Michael, ‘ƃƵƦơƭƴƩƭƜ ƳƽƬƢƯƫơ ƐƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞƲ ưƯƫƩƴƩƪƞƲ ƥƮƯƵƳƟơƲ’ (Byzantine Symbols of Ottoman Political Power), ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƜ, 51, 2009, 315-32. 35 Claude Delaval Cobham, Excerpta Cypria: Materials for a History of Cyprus, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1908, 437. 36 Egglezakis, ‘ƔƯ ƬƥƫơƭƯƤƯƷƥƟƯƭ’, 151. 37 Ibid., 152. 38 Ibid., 146.

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established him as a successor of Byzantine tradition within the Ottoman state. The archbishop was depicted as raising a ‘fallen daughter wearing the Cypriot attire of poor women’, a symbol of Cyprus, and holding the imperial sceptre without wearing his vestments, thus demonstrating his secular nature, that is, his political power.39 In the framework of the archbishop-ethnarch, the ‘hegemonic luxury’40 that Kyprianos made sure of demonstrating must be understood within the context of the Phanariot power in their Danubian principalities. After his enthronement, Archbishop Kyprianos, understanding himself as ethnarch of Cyprus and affected by his long stay in Danubian principalities, promoted the opening of schools that would contribute to spreading Greek letters. In 1812, only two years after his rise to the Archbishop’s throne, the Greek School in Nicosia opened, and it was intended that both clergymen and common people would receive enrolments. The school opened on 11 January 1812 and was dedicated to the Holy Trinity. In the memorandum that Kyprianos recorded, after noting that the Archbishopric was responsible for the ecclesiastical and political responsibilities of the flock of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus, he added that ‘the state of our island lacks education and Greek lessons, which are the only jewels of the human mind’.41 Archbishop Kyprianos saw the opening of the school as necessary due to the general ignorance that existed among the Cypriots, a fact which caused great disapproval both inside and outside the island, and because similar schools existed elsewhere in the Ottoman Empire. A few years later, in 1819, he financially contributed to the opening of the Greek school in Limassol, whilst simultaneously opening a similar school in his birth-village of Strovolos. In his letter to the residents of Limassol on 18 August 1819, where he highlights his joy in having opened the school and notes the financial support that he was to give, he once again marked the necessity of educating

Ibid., 148. Otto Fon Richter, an Estonian traveller to Cyprus, met Kyprianos in Nicosia and wrote in his text that ‘his annual income are, as they say, up to 30,000 piasters, an amount quite enough for the hegemonic luxury in which he lives’. See Polychonis Enepekidis, ƋƽưƱƯƲ 1800-1878: Ɣơ ƴƥƫƥƵƴơƟơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ ƴƧƲ ƴƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ ƳƴƧ ƄƥƱƬơƭƩƪƞ ƝƱƥƵƭơ ƪơƩ ƪƱƩƴƩƪƞ (Cyprus, 1800-1878. The Last Years of the Tourkokrateia in the German Research and Critique), Athens, 2000, 59. 41 Tsiknopoulos, ‘Ethnomartyr’, 252. For publication of the letter, see: Agathonos, ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ, 181-6. 39 40

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the Cypriots. He mentioned examples from ancient Greek civilization, and he stated his belief that learning brings about a better society within the state.42 What is revealed by the contents of Archbishop Kyprianos’s letters is his strong will to open schools on the island and to educate the Cypriots. The importance that he gave to learning the Greek language and the history of ancient Greek civilization was also noteworthy, as was his belief in the necessity of raising the educational level of the people. The reference to Greek letters should be associated with the belief of the Phanariot that the Greek language must prevail in the Ottoman state, especially in administration. Furthermore, it was obvious from how the schools operated that Kyprianos saw himself as both the ecclesiastical and political leader of the Cypriot Eastern Orthodox, a role that enhanced his civilising activity. His understanding was the same as the Phanariot; that, as a ruler, he should promote culture and education.

The Greek Struggle of Independence and Archbishop Kyprianos In 1818, trader Stergios Hatzikostas and Demetrios Ipatros, representatives of the Filiki Eteria in the area of Egypt and Cyprus, visited Archbishop Kyprianos, who accommodated them in the Greek school during their stay. They were also promised financial support for their plans.43 Their visit came after a meeting between Kyprianos and a clergyman sent from the Filiki Eteria, who was also given a promise for financial support.44 Two years later, in a meeting of the members of the Filiki Eteria, Archbishop Kyprianos’ promise to provide monetary support was recorded, and it was decided that a representative would be sent to receive it. Therefore, Alexandros Ipsilantis sent a letter to Archbishop Kyprianos via Antonios Pelopidas, whereby he asked for the fulfilment of his previous promise. However, Archbishop Kyprianos’ reluctance to give financial help to the members of the society was evident in the note made in relation to the style of the text in the proceedings of their meeting. The members mention that the point of sending Antonios Pelopidas and the letter was ‘hortatory, to make the situation known in order for Kyprianos to feel that he should help them’45. 42 Tsiknopoulos, ‘Ethnomartyr’, 256. For publication of the letter, see: Agathonos, ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ, 261-2. 43 Papaioannou, ‘ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ’, 67. 44 Hill, History, 123. 45 Ioannis Philimon, ƅƯƪƟƬƩƯƭ ƩƳƴƯƱƩƪƼƭ ƴƧƲ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƞƲ ƆươƭơƳƴƜƳƥƹƲ (A Historical Text for the Greek Revolution), I, Athens 1859, 53.

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This phrase, according to Hill,46 demonstrated their doubts about Kyprianos’ financial contribution. Moreover, there were serious doubts about the initiation and acceptance of the true plans of the Filiki Eteria by Archbishop Kyprianos because of the circular condemning freemasonry (members of the Filiki Eteria were freemasons) in Cyprus.47 In the circular dated 2 February 1815, Kyprianos warned his flock not to be influenced by these circles, which, according to him were anti-Christian, and he excommunicated those who accepted freemasonry. He noted how dangerous freemasons were, because they acted against the Eastern Orthodox faith and also against the Sultan’s orders. In his circular, he added that these circles ‘come against the laws of the King and for what they preach and practice are worthy of death…[and] in front of this illegal act or better in front of this newly fount heresy, we are so angry and upset, that we can move the power against them, to seize them from assemblies and meetings and to punish them harshly, so that they will not spread the evil and their infection to us the chosen ones’.48 As Rolandos Katsiaounis noted, in Kyprianos’ efforts to weaken freemasonry on the island, he does not only focus on the evil character of its followers, nor merely on their heresy, but he also in their disobedience to the Sultan, since, as he says, they refuse to follow the Sultan’s laws.49 Kyprianos condemned any act that threatened the Ottoman status quo or questioned the Sultan’s orders, thus making the basic principle of all the faithful the acceptance of the current situation. In addition, he called for the support of the Ottoman power in his effort to clamp down on all those participating in this activity. With this circular, Kyprianos showed that devotion to the Ottoman state was a religious tenet for the Orthodox people, whilst he also politicised their religious faith.

The End in a Changing Empire The violence, insecurity and constant efforts to undermine the power of every officer by anyone that also had influence and was struggling to become more powerful were the basic characteristics of the career of an Ottoman officer. The insecurity accompanied every position; each officer was aware of 46 Hill, History, 124. See also Rolandos Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus during the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century, Nicosia 1996, 20. 47 See also Andrekos Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915: The Inconsequential Possession, Manchester University Press, 2009, 153-4. 48 For publication of this circular, see Agathonos, ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ, 228-32. 49 Katsiaounis, Labour, 18.

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the fact that power was directly linked to the Sultan’s will and also to the situation surrounding his name in the Sublime Porte. Any officer could be revoked at any given moment; he could lose his position and even his life, either because of legitimate reasons or because of undermining of his power by rivals and rival factions in the metropole or the periphery. In this atmosphere of intrigue and corruption, the effort to develop a network of people within the palace and thus become closer to the Sultan or the grand vizier characterized the career and the personal course of every officer with power in the Ottoman Empire. Archbishop Kyprianos gave his views concerning this climate in a meeting he had with a traveller in Nicosia. According to the traveller, William Turner, Kyprianos mentioned that ‘his enemies in Constantinople having declared that his tyranny and rapacity rendered his name odious to the Cypriotes’, and the Sublime Porte sent two representatives to investigate the matter. Kyprianos also told him that ‘he has escaped from the snare by procuring a declaration from the Greeks that they are content with him, and by giving presents […] to the messengers’.50 This clearly shows how Kyprianos was being threatened by rivals from within the island with strong support in the centre because of how he had altered the role of the archbishop-ethnarch into a pre-eminent position of power on the island. Moreover, apart from the climate of violence in the Ottoman state, the events of July 1821 in Cyprus must be understood within the Ottoman political context of the empire at the beginning of the 19th century and less with the Greek struggle for independence.51 They are related to the birth of a new status quo, especially in areas with an increased Orthodox population, such as Cyprus, where the local Orthodox power, integrated into the Ottoman framework, expressed Ottoman power in the region and undermined, to some degree, the Muslim administrative and political elite. At the same time, the appearance of an Orthodox administrative and political elite, accompanied by the actions of a wealthy Ottoman-Orthodox class (traders, educated and active within their community), appears to overthrow the previous status quo, especially for the Muslims. An eyewitness observed that since 1804, when a major revolt of mainly Muslims living in Nicosia occurred due to the centralisation of economic and political power into the Orthodox elite, the divan tercümanÖ, many wealthy people of the community ‘by having him [the divan tercümanÖ] as master and commander, these Cobham, Excerpta Cypria, 437. For a new interpretation of the 1821 events in Cyprus, see Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 153-6 and Michalis N. Michael, ‘The Loss of an Ottoman Traditional Order and the Reactions to a Changing Ottoman World: A New Interpretation of the 1821 Executions in Cyprus’, forthcoming. 50 51

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indiscreet people, or rather we should say atheists, have gone too far, doing everything sacrilegious and all kinds of injustices: insolence against the Turks, luxurious dresses, high houses (higher than the houses of the Turks), horses, money, wearing green clothes, not just the men but the weaker sex also (the asses)’.52 These developments could be included in the more general framework of the emergence of wealthy Orthodox merchants and bankers in the big urban centres of the Ottoman Empire. By the end of the 18th century, these new Orthodox carriers of mainly economic power dominated the trade of the empire.53 There was a significant European presence on the island, which consisted of consuls and their families. Also, there were a significant number of merchants from the Ionian Islands, who had in fact been assimilated by the Orthodox community.54 According to new research on Ottoman Cyprus, the relationship between the clergy and this newly emerged group of Orthodox seculars, who aspired to gain political power, was not static but continually changing.55 Within this context, the events on 9 July 1821 are the culmination of a process that had become quite notable from the late 18th century and was already more intensely distinct at the great revolt of 1804, which had lasted for almost a year and brought severe disruption to the island.56 During the primacy of Kyprianos, it appears that the power of the Archbishop of Cyprus had turned him into the dominant political power on the island. A part of the traditional historiography mentions that Küçük Mehmed was sent as a governor of the island with the purpose of undermining the political power of the Archbishop of Cyprus. G. Kipiadis writes that Küçük Mehmed was chosen by Kapudan Paûa in order to ‘destroy the influence of the superior ecclesiastical lord, who…possessed almost 52 This is the personal account of a contemporary of the 1804 events, the painter Ioannis Kornaros. His text was found on the back of St Nicholas’s icon. See Efrosyni Rizopoulou-Egoumenidou, Kostas Gerasimou and Hristodoulos Hadjihristodoulou, ƎƝơ ƥƩƪƼƭơ ƪơƩ ƩƳƴƯƱƩƪƞ ƬơƱƴƵƱƟơ ƴƯƵ ƊƹƜƭƭƯƵ ƋƯƱƭƜƱƯƵ ƴƯƵ ƋƱƧƴƼƲ (A New Icon and Historical Testimony by Ioannis Kornaros the Cretan), Pafos 2000, 20. 53 Bruce Masters, ‘Christians in a Changing World’, Suraiya Faroqhi (ed.), The Cambridge History of Turkey, III, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2006, 273. 54 Theoharis Stavrides, ‘The settlement of Heptanesian Venetian Subjects in Cyprus in the middle of the 18th century and the Local Reactions’, Theoharis Stavrides, Studies on the History of Cyprus under Ottoman Rule, 168. 55 Antonis Hadjikyriacou, Society and Economy on an Ottoman Island: Cyprus in the Eighteenth Century, PhD dissertation, University of London, 2011, 168. 56 Michael, ‘Local Authorities’, 57-77.

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entirely the administrative power, he was not only independent from the sent here governors of the island but he also decided on their election or their revoke.’57 John Hackett mentions that a year before the beginning of the Greek struggle for independence, Küçük Mehmed was appointed to the island as the best person to reduce the power of the Archbishop of Cyprus, with the agreement of the Muslim aøas of the capital.58 When Theofilos Theseus, a member of the Filiki Eteria,59 arrived in Larnaca, spreading revolutionary flyers, these reached the hands of Küçük Mehmed, who tried to arrest Theseus.60 Theseus escaped to Syros and then to the Peloponnese where he met with his brother Nicolaos Theseus.61 According to Kepiadis, Küçük Mehmed used the false testimony of Dimitrios from the village of St John of Malountas, forced through blackmail, whilst the witness himself was executed in July, to inform the Sublime Porte that there were plans to spread the Greek revolt to Cyprus, and so troops were needed to combat the revolt. He also suggested the issuing of a permit to execute all the leading figures of the Orthodox community.62 The Sublime Porte satisfied the first request of müsellim Küçük Mehmed and sent troops to the island from neighbouring Syria. The troops arrived in Larnaca at the beginning of May 1821. The Ottoman government doubled the troops responsible for internal security on various islands of the eastern Mediterranean in September 1821, and a few months later in 1822, sultan Kipiadis, ƂưƯƬƭƧƬƯƭƥƽƬơƴơ, 7. John Hackett, A History of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus, New York 1901, 320 (Greek edition: Athens 1923). 59 Theophilos Theseus was born in Cyprus at the end of the eighteenth century. He studied in Switzerland and participated in the Greek struggle for independence. He worked for the liberation of Cyprus and, after the end of the Greek struggle for independence, joined the clergy of the Patriarchate of Jerusalem. He returned to Cyprus in 1832 as exarches of the Patriarchate in Cyprus. See Paschalis Kitromelides, ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƌƯƣƩƯƳƽƭƧ (Cyprus Intellectuals), Nicosia 2002, 145-6; Loizos Philippou, ‘ƎƩƪƼƫơƯƲ ƪơƩ ƉƥƼƶƩƫƯƲ ƉƧƳƥƟƲ’ (Nicolaos and Theophilus Theseus), Paphos, 1/3, 1935, 81-5. 60 Kipiadis, ƂưƯƬƭƧƬƯƭƥƽƬơƴơ, 8. 61 Nicolaos Theseus was born in Cyprus during the last quarter of the eighteenth century, studied in the AyvalÖk Academy and worked in Italy. Later on he became a member of the Filiki Etaireia and participated in the Greek struggle for independence. See Kitromelides, ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƌƯƣƩƯƳƽƭƧ, 146-8; Philippou, ‘ƎƩƪƼƫơƯƲ ƪơƩ ƉƥƼƶƩƫƯƲ’, 815; Hill, History, 157. For his role in the 1833 revolts in Cyprus, see Michael, ‘Local Authorities’, 57-77. 62 Kipiadis, ƂưƯƬƭƧƬƯƭƥƽƬơƴơ, 14. 57 58

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Mahmud II (1808-1839) assigned the protection of Cyprus to the troops of Muhammad Ali of Egypt. On the basis of this agreement, in April 1822, Egyptian troops arrived on the island.63 These troops resided on the island until the end of 1829, and during the period of their residence, the soldiers seemed to have caused much commotion, frequently stopping locals without authorization, attacking them and plundering their possessions. According to Méchain, the French consul on the island, the troops committed various criminal acts, such as stealing from shops and insulting and threatening the European residents of Larnaca.64 Among the most serious problems that the troops caused in Larnaca was shooting at the flag of the French consulate, an event that infuriated the French consul, who did not fail to inform the other European consuls and the French community of Larnaca during a gathering at his residence on 27 May. During this gathering the French consul presented the destroyed French flag, stated that the episode had taken place in the presence of the governor of the island and asked for immediate redress. He also asked the attendees, about thirty people, to sign a document outlining the proceedings of their meeting.65 He then asked the French consul in Acre to negotiate with the Ottoman officer responsible for the troops on the island in order to put an end to the episodes against the French and other Europeans in Cyprus.66 At the same time, he informed the French consul in Smyrna about the situation.67 The fact that, immediately after their arrival on the island, the Ottoman troops – with the support of Küçük Mehmed – moved against all the Europeans in Larnaca, demonstrated their anti-European and anti-Christian Hill, History, 146. For the letter of the French consul Méchain to the President of Terra Santa in Jerusalem, dated 28 May 1821, see Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘ƈ ƪƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƴƱơƣƹƤƟơ ƴƯƵ 1821’ (The Cyprus Tragedy), ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, VII, 1930, 49. 65 For minutes of the meeting in the residence of the French consul Méchain on 27 May 1821, see Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘ƂƣƹƭƩƾƤƥƩƲ ƧƬƝƱơƩ ƴƧƲ ƥƭ ƌƜƱƭơƪƩ ƥƵƱƹươƺƪƞƲ ươƱƯƩƪƟơƲ’ (Agonizing Days for the European Community in Larnaca), ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, XIII, 1937, 211-3. 66 See the letters from the French consul in Larnaca Méchain to the French consul in Acre Ruffin dated 28 May 1821 and 1 June 1821, Kyriazis, ‘ƂƣƹƭƩƾƤƥƩƲ ƧƬƝƱơƩ’, 213-6. Regarding the anti-European and especially anti-French mentality of the troops and also the local Ottoman governor as well, Méchain writes that the governor ‘‘behaves to us as if it was the French king who was the enemy who fought against Turkey’. See French consul Mechain to the Minister of the Colonies, 4 July 1821, Kyriazis, ‘ƈ ƪƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƴƱơƣƹƤƟơ’, 52. 67 For the letter of the French consul Mechain to David, the French consul in Izmir, dated 2 June 1821, see Kyriazis, ‘ƂƣƹƭƩƾƤƥƩƲ ƧƬƝƱơƩ’, 216-8. 63 64

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attitude, which must have also been present in other regions of the empire. The French ambassador writes in his reports that ‘the soldiers say loudly that the Pasha has sent them to do ya[ø]ma [pillage] to rob and butcher the French’68. In a similar report, he added that ‘the island is in commotion since the large number of troops have arrived, which have demonstrated that they have come to fight the French. Our governor and garrison commander is reinforcing this idea’.69 Nevertheless, in another report, the French consul notes that the troops appear to have confused the Orthodox and the Europeans, since the Pasha of Acre, where the troops had come from, had promised them that they were to be allowed some sacking in order to entice recruits.70 In relation to the second suggestion of Küçük Mehmed for the execution of all the leading figures of the Orthodox community on the island, the Sublime Porte did not approve. Instead, in April 1821, it sent a decree for the general disarmament of the non-Muslim population of the island, which was in the framework of a general decree for the disarmament of other regions of the Ottoman Empire. Characteristically, the Sublime Porte mentioned that since Cyprus had been conquered, the Orthodox people of the island had not committed any criminal acts against the administration; on the contrary, they had joined the victorious troops of the state in the subjection of enemies whenever there had been a revolt against the government.71 In his circular for the decree dated 22 April 1821, Kyprianos reported to the Orthodox people of Cyprus that the Sultan recorded his gratitude towards them. Furthermore, he urged the Cypriot Orthodox to submit to the decree and to not worry.72 A similar tone was taken in the letter of the French consul a few weeks after these events. In this letter, the consul noted that ‘the poor residents of Cyprus, who do not even have the honour of being Greek, do not even consider the revolution that is shaking the rest of the empire. On the contrary, they have submitted to the Grand Efendi and their submission is guaranteed by the aøas and the other important Turks of 68 For the letter of the French consul Mechain to the French consul in Acre dated 28 May 1821, see Kyriazis, ‘ƂƣƹƭƩƾƤƥƩƲ ƧƬƝƱơƩ’, 212. 69 For the letter of the French consul Mechain to David, the French consul in Izmir, dated 2 June 1821, see Kyriazis, ‘ƂƣƹƭƩƾƤƥƩƲ ƧƬƝƱơƩ’, 216. 70 For the letter of the French consul Mechain to the Minister of Colonies dated 4 July 1821, see: Kyriazis, ‘ƈ ƪƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƴƱơƣƹƤƟơ’, 52. 71 For this translated part of the firman, see Kipiadis, ƂưƯƬƭƧƬƯƭƥƽƬơƴơ, 9; Also, Zannetos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ, 1151. 72 For publication of this circular, see: Tsiknopoulos, ‘Ɛ ƥƨƭƯƬƜƱƴƵƲ’, 281-4.

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The decree was put into action on 5 May, and immediately after, despite the fact that the Sublime Porte had not approved executions, Küçük Mehmed, in order to intimidate the population and become all-powerful and rich, began executing the Orthodox that had previously complained.74 The English traveller John Carne, who was on the island before 9 July, reported that during his stay, widows and children of ‘a rich Greek boyar’ kept arriving at the English consulate very often asking for the protection of the consular which demonstrates that Küçük Mehmed’s target was the rich people of the community.75 Meanwhile, Küçük Mehmed informed the Sublime Porte that the island was ready to revolt, and this time he suggested the execution of leading figures among the non-Muslims of the island. Regarding the number of executed, the historiography does not agree despite the fact that the traditional historiography appears to have adopted the number that Ioannis Filimonas recorded in his catalogue of 486 names. Charilaos Trikoupis, whose work was published in 1853, refers to a large number but does not actually give a precise count.76 The first report of a specific number was in Ioannis Filimonas’s work, published in 1860, which mentioned that Küçük Mehmed had sent to the Sublime Porte a catalogue with 486 names for execution.77 Filippos Georgiou gives no number in his work published in 1875, in which he claimed that Filimonas’s number was exaggerated, and it could be that it was twice as much as the actual number.78 In his work published in 1888, Georgios Kepiadis reported that he had collected evidence and information from eyewitnesses, and he records 68 executed and 19 who had escaped.79 In the letters of the French consul on the island, no number is reported. Ioannis P. Theocharidis, who published the Ottoman catalogue located at the Archive of the National Library in Sofia with the items confiscated 73 For the letter from the French consul Mechain to the French consul in Izmir dated 6 August 1821, see Kyriazis, ‘ƈ ƪƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƴƱơƣƹƤƟơ’, 55. 74 For the letter from the French consul Mechain to the French consul in Izmir dated 2 June 1821, see Kyriazis, ‘ƈ ƪƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƴƱơƣƹƤƟơ’, 51. 75 John Carne, Letters from the East, London 1826, 438. 76 Spiridonas Trikoupis, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƞƲ ƆươƭơƳƴƜƳƥƹƲ (History of the Greek Revolution), III, London 1853, 293. 77 Philimon, ƅƯƪƟƬƩƯƭ ƩƳƴƯƱƩƪƼƭ, 259. 78 Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƩƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 120. 79 Kipiadis, ƂưƯƬƭƧƬƯƭƥƽƬơƴơ.

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from the executed and escaped, records 74 names of those executed and 22 names of those who escaped.80 Sultan Mahmud II (1808-39) had given his approval for the executions, according to the catalogue of people that Küçük Mehmed had sent. Additionally, he ordered the confiscation of their assets.81 The Sultan’s approval the second time around suggests the executions were connected with the developments of the ‘Greek revolt’. Moreover, this approval should be included in the more general framework of executions that had begun, such as the execution of the Ecumenical Patriarch Gregorios VI, who had been executed on 10 April 1821.82 In June, Küçük Mehmed gathered the people in his catalogue and imprisoned them in Nicosia, whilst the newly arrived troops made some kind of apostasy due to the way that they were treated by the governor. According to the reports of the French consul, the troops attempted to execute the governor on the night of 2 July.83 In a gathering of the Muslim officers of the administration and other leading figures, Küçük Mehmed read the decree of the Sultan and the decision for the executions.84 According to Zannetos, who was a Greek national and firebrand nationalist leader in Cyprus at the turn of the 19th century, the prominent Muslim figures of the community insisted on the execution of all the people mentioned in the catalogue without any exceptions, but there is no concrete evidence to support this assertion.85 On 9 July, Küçük Mehmed began the executions with the three Orthodox bishops and the archbishop. Archbishop Kyprianos was hung outside the palace of the governor, whilst the other three high priests were beheaded. According to the testimony of the consul of the Netherlands on the island, Lorenzo-Giovanni Santi, ‘all the rich, traders, craftsmen and 80 Ioannis Theoharides, ‘ƐƩ ƋƽưƱƩƯƩ ưƱƯƣƱơƶƝƭƴƥƲ ƴƯ 1821 ƳƽƬƶƹƭơ Ƭƥ ƜƣƭƹƳƴƧ ƯƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞ ưƧƣƞ’ (The executed Cypriots according to an Unpublished Ottoman Source) ƅƹƤƾƭƧ, 24/1, 1995, 67-109. In this article, see also all the data on the traditional Greek historiography regarding the number of executed persons (67-8). 81 See the relevant document in Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘ƂƭƥƪƤƯƴơ ƝƣƣƱơƶơ’ (Unpublished Documents), Kypriaka Hronika, I, 1923, 98-100. 82 See also Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 153-4. 83 For the letter from the French consul Mechain to the French consul in Izmir dated 6 July 1821, see: Kyriazis, ‘ƈ ƪƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƴƱơƣƹƤƟơ’, 54. 84 Of course Zannettos had no evidence to support his claim. For the names of these Muslims, see Kipiadis, ƂưƯƬƭƧƬƯƭƥƽƬơƴơ, 13; Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1534. 85 Zannetos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ, 1152.

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farmers of every town were considered [by the pasha] worthy of death’.86 After the execution of Archbishop Kyprianos and the other high priests of the Church of Cyprus, the Ottoman governor took care of filling the empty seats. Küçük Mehmed had selected the replacements of those executed before the executions, whilst after the executions, the governor gave them their caftans87 along with a company of janissaries. These were monk Ioakim II (1821-4), who became Archbishop of Cyprus; Archdeacon Panaretos II (1821-7), who took the seat of the Metropolis of Paphos; Dean Leontios II (1821-37), who took the Metropolis of Kitium; and finally, Legate Damaskinos (1821-4), who took the seat of the Metropolis of Kyrenia. By 14 July,88 Küçük Mehmed had managed to execute many from his list from across the towns in Cyprus. According to the reports of the French consul, a few weeks after these events, the Ottoman governor was possessed by an anti-European hatred, and after supposedly legally executing the bishops of the Orthodox Church on the island, he also executed all those with money or those who were important figures in their community as well as threatening attacks against the European consulates and European trading houses.89 After the executions, Küçük Mehmed ordered the confiscation of the fortunes of the victims, selling many of these items, whilst he himself appears to have taken a large amount of the profits. At the same time, he ordered the demolition of the upper levels of the houses of non-Muslims, thus demonstrating that one of his goals was to destroy the rich Orthodox class living in Nicosia.90 Articles in various European newspapers mentioned that the governor even executed people that had committed insignificant misconducts and those that had ‘an attractive fortune’.91

For the letter from Lorenzo-Giovanni Santi to the ambassador in Istanbul dated 6 August 1821, see Sfiroeras, ƙƤƟƭƥƲ ƪơƩ ƯƤƽƭƧ, 15. 87 Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƩƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 121. 88 Zannetos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ, 1154. The letter of the French consul dated 17 August 1821, mentioned that the executions were still taking place until that day. See Kyriazis, ‘ƈ ƪƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƴƱơƣƹƤƟơ’, 57. 89 For the letter from the French consul Mechain to the Commander of the French Navy in the Levant dated 4 August 1821, see Kyriazis, ‘ƈ ƪƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƴƱơƣƹƤƟơ’, 55. 90 Kyriazis, ‘Excerpta Cypria’, ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, XIII, 1937, 257. 91 For the newspaper article in Granducato di Toscana dated 17 August 1821, see Agathonos, ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ, 324 & 328. 86

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Conclusion Archbishop Kyprianos was perhaps the most important high priest of the Ottoman period in the history of Cyprus. He was well educated, had a strong personality and a specific ideological framework that guided him during his prelacy. He was fully integrated into the Ottoman system of administration and the practices related to political power in an Ottoman region. He administered the Church of Cyprus at a time when significant changes were about to take place in the Empire, he tried to ensure his and the Church’s political hegemony, while his actions did not integrate him into a nationalist ideology. Post-Ottoman Cypriot and Greek historiography situates him into such a historiography, thanks to which, Kyprianos was transformed from a leader on an island of the Ottoman periphery, into a follower of the nationalist ideology of the 19th century, and finally, because of his execution, into an ethno-martyr.

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Figure 2: Portrait of Archbishop Kyprianos at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus.

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Figure 3: Portrait of the Ethno-Martyr, Archbishop Kyprianos. Source: Postcard, Toufexis, Series 2, no. 81, 1906: Courtesy of the Laiki Group Cultural Centre Photographic Archive.

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Figure 4: Memorial to the Ethno-Martyr, Archbishop Kyprianos. Postcard, Toufexis, Series 2, no. 89, 1906: Courtesy of the Laiki Group Cultural Centre Photographic Archive.

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Figure 5: Kyprianos’ statue at the Archbishopric. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2006.

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Figure 6: Inscription on Kyprianos’ statue at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2008.

CHAPTER FOUR PANARETOS, 1827-40: HIS STRUGGLE FOR ABSOLUTE POWER DURING THE ERA OF OTTOMAN ADMINISTRATIVE REFORMS MICHALIS N. MICHAEL

The period of Archbishop Panaretos’s primacy represents a difficult and complex time in the history of Cyprus. Numerous internal and external factors created new challenges, but also new realities on many levels. The head of the Church of Cyprus, an institution that, since the conquest of the island in 1571, had gradually became an important political institution within the Ottoman order, was forced to initiate intense diplomatic activity. During Panaretos’s time as archbishop a number of reforms occurred on the island because it coincided with administrative reforms both before and during the first year of the Tanzimat. These changes were holistic, at the political, economic and social levels.1 In these constantly evolving administrative and ideological frameworks, Archbishop Panaretos represents the traditional power on a changing Ottoman island. This power would be called to confront a great deal of changes that had already begun transforming, not only the traditional Ottoman society of Cyprus, but also the existing Ottoman order. A number of events happening in and outside the island make the period of Archbishop Panaretos’s primacy a transitional time. For example, the outbreak of the struggle for Greek independence in 1821 and the establishment of the Greek state in 1830 were events that would inevitably affect the Orthodox community of Cyprus. A new ideology of nationalism 1 For an overview of the nineteenth century, see Donald Quataert, ‘Overview of the Nineteenth Century’, S. Faroqhi, et al. (eds.), An Economic and Social History of the Ottoman Empire, II, Cambridge, 1994, 761-76.

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spread among a number of wealthy secular merchants and educated Orthodox Cypriots. A community of wealthy immigrant merchants from the Ionian Islands formed, mainly in Larnaca, and the local and central Ottoman administration reacted to the increasing number of Orthodox on the island with the citizenship of the Greek state. The Sublime Porte’s order for reform to the administration in Cyprus led to the creation of some representative administrative institutions. Thus, the rise of wealthy Orthodox Cypriots resulted in their efforts to penetrate the sphere of administration in Cyprus. The consequence of this was the loss, to some degree, of the Church’s absolute control, while the reforms of the Tanzimat, which were officially announced in 1839, a year before the removal of Panaretos from his position as archbishop of Cyprus, were going to change the administrative framework on the island. All these events contributed to the transitional character of the time. It was a period when all these factors emerged, or at least gained increasing importance and became catalytic agents for change to the framework of power on the island. The reforms and the more modern administrative framework, which was strongly promoted by the Sublime Porte, clashed with the interests of conservative groups in Ottoman society and with the interests of those that sought different reforms.2 Due to the fact that these changes appear to have had a direct relationship with the question of power in the Ottoman sphere, the reaction of the Archbishop of Cyprus was important. As the local representative of traditional Ottoman power who was to confront developments that forecast change on the island, Panaretos’s political behaviour is significant, and his acts can be seen to demonstrate his beliefs and his status during this period. Panaretos first emerged as the Bishopric of Paphos following the events of 1821. After the executions, Küçük Mehmet, the governor who orchestrated the bloodshed, filled the vacant thrones with clerics he had previously chosen and imprisoned, by giving these priests their kaftans3 and

Christoph K. Newmann, ‘Political and Diplomatic Developments’, Suraiya N. Faroqhi (ed.), The Cambridge History of Turkey. The Later Ottoman Empire, 1603-1839, III, Cambridge 2006, 60. 3 Philippos Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ ƑƝƱƩ ƴƧƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ (Historical Affairs on the Church of Cyprus), Athens, 1875 (repr., Nicosia, 1975), 121. For the 1821 events in Cyprus, see Michalis N. Michael, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƯƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞ ưƥƱƟƯƤƯ. ƈ ƳƴơƤƩơƪƞ ƳƵƣƪƱƼƴƧƳƞ ƴƧƲ Ƴƥ ƨƥƳƬƼ ưƯƫƩƴƩƪƞƲ ƥƮƯƵƳƟơƲ (The Church of Cyprus during the Ottoman Period, 1571-1878. The Formation Process of an Institution of Political Power), Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia 2005, 215-43; and Andrekos Varnava, British 2

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an escort of Janissaries. Those chosen were the monk Ioakim II, who became archbishop (1821-4), Panaretos II, who became Bishop of Paphos (1821-7),4 Leondios II, Bishop of Kitium (1821-37) and Exarch Damaskinos, who was made Bishop of Kyrenia (1821-4). In a time when the Sublime Porte had a significant role in the emergence and, occasionally, in the appointment of high priests to the thrones of the Church of Cyprus and especially to archbishop, 5 Panaretos emerged as archbishop in 1827 after the exile on behalf of the Sublime Porte of Archbishop Damaskinos. In his congratulatory letter to Panaretos in January 1828, the Ecumenical Patriarch, Agathangelos, notes that Panaretos’s predecessor was sacked ‘through a royal pilgrim order’.6 The historiography shows that Damaskinos was side-lined because of his conflict with the local governor, since his integrity did not conform to the governor’s crookedness.7 On the other hand, the berat of appointment of the Bishop of Paphos, Hariton, suggests that Damaskinos was exiled due to abuse of power, repression of the taxpaying people and his general behaviour, which often did not conform to what he preached. 8 Nevertheless, the replacement of an archbishop on the initiative of the Sublime Porte was not a rare event in the Ottoman Empire, 9 but most of these instances involved some activity on behalf of influential locals who favoured such a replacement. As will be

Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915: The Inconsequential Possession, Manchester University Press, Manchester, 2009, 152-7. 4Panaretos’s berat was published by Pavlos Hidiroglou. For this and other high priests’ berats, see Pavlos Hidiroglou, ‘ƓƯƵƫƴơƭƩƪƜƢƥƱƜƴƩơ’ (Sultan’s Berats), ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƤơ ƋƝƭƴƱƯƵ ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƾƭ ƆƱƥƵƭƾƭ, VII, 1973-75, 119-250. 5 Michalis N. Michael, ‘Ɛ ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƼƲ ƑơƴƱƩƜƱƷƧƲ, Ƨ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƩ Ư ƓƯƵƫƴƜƭƯƲ. ƐƩ ƂƱƷƩƥƱƥƟƲ ƹƲ ƬƝƳƯ ƥƫƝƣƷƯƵ ƴƧƲ ƯƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞƲ ưƥƱƩƶƝƱƥƩơƲ’, (The Ecumenical Patriarch, the Church of Cyprus and the Sultan. The High Priests as a means to Control the Ottoman Periphery), Ɣơ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƜ, 22/42, 2005, 113-38. 6 Theoharis Stavrides, ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƼ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƥƟƯ ƪơƩ ƋƽưƱƯƲ: Ɣơ ươƴƱƩơƱƷƩƪƜ ƝƣƣƱơƶơ ƴƹƭ ƥƴƾƭ 1600-1878 (The Ecumenical Patriarchate and Cyprus: The Patriarchical Documents, 1600-1878), Nicosia 2001, 376. 7 Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 123; John Hackett, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƐƱƨƯƤƼƮƯƵ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ (History of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus), I, Athens 1923, 326: Chrisostomos Papadopoulos, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥưƟ ƴƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ (The Church of Cyprus during the Tourkokrateia), Athens 1929, 118. 8 I. K. Peristianis, ‘ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴơ ƝƣƣƱơƶơ’ (Unpublished Documents), ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, V, 1927, 5. See also, Loizos Philippou, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥưƟ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ (The Church of Cyprus during the Tourkokrateia), Athens 1975, 146. 9 Michalis N. Michael, ‘Ɛ ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƼƲ ƑơƴƱƩƜƱƷƧƲ, Ƨ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƩ Ư ƓƯƵƫƴƜƭƯƲ, 127.

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analysed later, Panaretos almost suffered the same fate, since he was also replaced by another handpicked cleric on the orders of the Sublime Porte. A few years after succeeding Damaskinos, Panaretos came into conflict with some powerful and wealthy men of his community. They wrote to the Ecumenical Patriarch asking for Panaretos’s replacement. The letter was sent by A. Triantafillidis and Hadji Kirgenis Apegitos (Apegitos was part of the delegation that travelled to Istanbul in 1830), two persons mentioned by L. Philippou as the strong ‘opposition’ to Panaretos’ policies.10 Alongside these two, the local Ottoman governor also supported Panaretos’ removal. An Ottoman document dated July 1830 informed the local governor that the bishops and the elders of the island could only be suspended after they were proven guilty.11 Apparently, Panaretos had been accused without proof in an effort to remove him from the throne. The conflict between the secular Eastern Orthodox and Panaretos suggested the existence of some powerful and wealthy men in that community that were trying to penetrate the sphere of political power, hitherto the domain of the Church and for a short period 30 years earlier of the dragoman. The institutionalisation of their power, in parallel with the power of the high priests, formed the main focus of Panaretos’s primacy. These developments could be included in the more general framework of the emergence of wealthy Eastern Orthodox merchants and bankers in the big urban centres of the Ottoman Empire. By 1800, this rising wealthy class dominated the trade of the empire.12 The autocracy of the high priests of the Church of Cyprus and the power of such local institutions in the Ottoman state, before the Tanzimat, was such in Cyprus that on 17 October 1837, the French Consul in Larnaca wrote to the ambassador in Istanbul that ‘many people assure that the present governor Said Mehmet is a threat to lose his position because of intrigues on behalf of his strong enemies who want to gain his position. For this reason, he [Said Mehmet] is sending the high priests to the Porte in order to justify his governorship’.13

Philippou, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ,151. Pavlos Hidiroglou, ‘ƋơƴƜƫƯƣƯƲ ƴƹƭ ƥƭ ƴƹ ơƱƷƥƟƹ ƴƯƵ ƋƆƆ ƯƨƹƬơƭƩƪƾƭ ƥƣƣƱƜƶƹƭ’ (List of the Ottoman Documents in the Archive of the Cyprus Research Centre), ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƤơ ƋƝƭƴƱƯƵ ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƾƭ ƆƱƥƵƭƾƭ, V, 1971-72, 264. 12Bruce Masters, ‘Christians in a Changing World’, Faroqhi (ed.), The Cambridge History of Turkey, 273. 13 Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘Proksenika eggrafa’, [Consular Documents], Kypriaka Hronika, Z, 1930, 7. 10 11

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Three years after Panaretos became archbishop, the first and perhaps most important change in the administration of Cyprus, before the Tanzimat, occurred. These changes did not occur in other provinces before the official announcement of the Tanzimat. 14 An additional reason for the implementation of such changes on the island nine years before the Hatt-iúerif decree of 1839 might have been the emigration of Cypriots, a migration that had been increasing in the decade after 1821. Due to this emigration, it seems that in one of his letters to the Cypriots that had migrated to Egypt, Archbishop Panaretos calls on them to return to the island, mentioning the Ottoman governor’s promises for milder taxation.15 In a general assembly of the high priests and notables that was held in the Archbishopric in May 1830, a four-member committee was elected in order to travel to Istanbul and present the Sublime Porte with a report on the situation in Cyprus and to ask for tax relief. This committee consisted of Hadji Christodoulos Apegitos, Hadji Kirgenis Saripoglos, Hadji Zacharias Apostolidis and Hadji Georgios Constantinidis.16 As can be noted from the names, at least one of the members of the committee was part of the ‘opposition’ to Panaretos. This committee did not have any high priests, as was the case in previous deputations and a few days after the four-member committee left Cyprus, a fifth member joined them, Loizos Kramvis. Kramvis carried a letter from Panaretos for the Ecumenical Patriarch, highlighting how important it was to overcome any disagreements between the committee members. 17 This fact demonstrated that these laymen and wealthy Cypriots were in some kind of disagreement as to their demands for Cyprus. Apegitos, the one known opponent of Panaretos, was causing him distress. The committee members returned from Istanbul at the beginning of November 1830, carrying with them six Sultanic orders for Cyprus and its administration. In the framework of these orders, the intention of the Sublime Porte was to reform the administration of the Cypriot Orthodox community and establish a type of ‘parliamentary system’ (sistima kinovouleytikon, according to the Church Archive) 18 with a supervising role for the high priests of the 14 Marc Aymes, ‘Reform Talks: Applying the Tanzimat to Cyprus’, M. N. Michael, M. Kappler, E. Gavriel (eds.), Ottoman Cyprus: A Collection of Studies on History and Culture, Wiesbaden, 2009, 110. 15 George Hill, A History of Cyprus, IV, Cambridge, 1972, 153. 16 Archive of the Archbishopric of Cyprus [hereafter: AAC], AAC, Codex Aŷ, 199. 17 For the content of this letter, see Philippou, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 212. 18 ‘ƃơƫƯ૨Ƴơ ƫƯƩưઁƭ ਫ਼ư’ ੖ƸƩƭ ੖ƫơ ƴơ૨ƴơ ਲ ƓƵƭƝƫƥƵƳƩƲ ƪơ੿ ਥưƩƨƵƬƯ૨Ƴơ ƭ੹ ƪƜƬૉ Ƭƥƴơ૦૧ƽƨƬƧƳƩƭ ưƥƱƟ ƴ૵ƭ ƋƯƩƭ૵ƭ ưƱơƣƬƜƴƹƭ, ƪơ੿ ƭ੹ ƪƜƬૉ ƳƽƳƴƧƬơƭ

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Church of Cyprus and the participation of laymen in central and district boards. For the implementation of these reforms, a general assembly was held in the Archbishopric in Nicosia under the presidency of the archbishop. According to the minutes of this assembly, the assembly decided to establish a central dimogerontia and a committee of the public (epitropi tou koinou).19 It was also decided that the Archbishop of Cyprus had to convene a general assembly of the high priests and the best laymen20 of the community once a year in the Archbishopric. This general assembly would be responsible for the supervision of state tax matters and the functioning of the central and district boards. Additionally, the Church of Cyprus in collaboration with laymen from each district within the framework of the annual general assembly, were responsible for educational matters within the Cypriot Orthodox community.21 Similarly, this general assembly was also responsible for the establishment of a specific hospital for lepers outside Nicosia.22 This annual general assembly was required to elect the four-member central

ƋƯƩƭƯƢƯƵƫƥƵƴƩƪઁƭ…’ (The assembly took in its consideration all these issues and decided to make reforms and a parliamentary system). AAC, Codex Aŷ, 199. For the minutes of this assembly, see AAC, Codex Aŷ, 199-201. Also see Filios Zannetos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƭƞƳƯƵ ƋƽưƱƯƵ (History of the island of Cyprus), Larnaca, 1910, 1163-9. 19 For the contents of the Codex Aŷ of the AAC, see Charilaos Papaioannou, Charilaos, ‘ƋƾƤƩƮ Ƃŷ ƴƧƲ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƞƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ: ƑƟƭơƮ ƴƹƭ ƥƭ ơƵƴƾ ưƥƱƩƥƷƯƬƝƭƹƭ ƥƣƣƱƜƶƹƭ’, (The Codex A of the Archbishopric of Cyprus: List of its contents), ƖƹƲ, Ƃ /8, 1911, 225-44. 20 ‘Ƌơƴ’ ਩ƴƯƲ ƪơƴ’ ਕƱƷ੹Ʋ ƴƯ૨ ƍƯƵƷơƱƥƬƟƯƵ ੒ ƬơƪơƱƩƾƴơƴƯƲ ƤƥƳưƼƴƧƲ ƭ੹ ƳƵƣƪƱƯƴૌ ƣƥƭƩƪઁƭ ƳƵƬƢƯƽƫƩƯƭ ƳƵƭƩƳƴơƬƝƭƯƭ ਕưઁ ƴƯઃƲ ƴƱƥ૙Ʋ ƬƧƴƱƯưƯƫƟƴơƲ ƪơ੿ ƴƯઃƲ ƶƱƯƭƩƬƹƴƝƱƯƵƲ ƪơ੿ ưƱƯƪƱƩƪƹƴƝƱƯƵƲ ƪơƴƯƟƪƯƵƲ ƴોƲ ƭƞƳƯƵ’ (Every year, at the beginning of the Muharrem, His Beatitude must call a general assembly composed of the three bishops and the most notable residents of the island). AAC, Codex Aŷ, 199. 21 ‘Ɣઁ ƪƥƭƴƱƩƪઁƭ ƳƷƯƫƥ૙Ưƭ ƴોƲ ਦƫƫƧƭƩƪોƲ ươƩƤƥƟơƲ ƭ੹ ƳƵƳƴƧƨૌ ươƭƴƯƴƥƩƭઁƭ ƥੁƲ ƌƥƵƪƹƳƟơƭ ƥੁƲ ươƟƤƥƵƳƩƭ ƴોƲ ƭƥƯƫơƟơƲ·੒ƬƯƟƹƲ ƪơ੿ ੪Ʋ ƪƫƜƤƯƩ ƭ੹ ƳƵƳƴơƟƭƹƭƴơƩ ƥੁƲ ƴ੹Ʋ ưƯƫƩƴƥƟơƲ ƌƜƱƭơƪƯƲ ƪơ੿ ƌƥƬƬƧƳƯ૨ ƪơ੿ ੒ ਥƴƞƳƩƯƲ ƴƯ૨ ƤƩƤơƳƪƜƫƯƵ ƪơ੿ ƴ૵ƭ ƳƷƯƫƥƟƹƭ ƴƯƽƴƹƭ ƴ૵ƭ ưƯƫƩƴƥƩ૵ƭ ƬƩƳƨઁƲ ƭ੹ ưƯƱƥƽƧƴơƩ ਕưઁ ƴ੽ƭ ƪƯƩƭ੽ƭ ƳƵƭƤƱƯƬƞƭ’ (The central school of the Greek education must be in Nicosia. Accordingly branches must be created in Larnaca and Limassol and the annual salary of the teacher must come out of the common contribution). AAC, Codex Aŷ, 200. 22 ‘Ɔਫ਼ƱƝƨƧ ƥ੢ƫƯƣƯƭ ਲ ƳƽƳƴơƳƩƲ ƴƯ૨ ƭƯƳƯƪƯƬƥƟƯƵ ƴ૵ƭ ƫƥưƱ૵ƭ ਩Ʈƹƨƥƭ ƴોƲ ƌƥƵƪƹƳƟơƲ ƥੁƲ ƬƝƱƯƲ ੁƤƩơƟƴƥƱƯƭ, ƪơ੿ ƴ੽ƭ ƣƥƭƩƪ੽ƭ ơ੝ƴ૵ƭ ƳƵƭƜƨƱƯƩƳƩƭ ਥưƥƶƯƱƴƟƳƨƧƳơƭ ਲ ƬơƪơƱƩƼƴƧƲ ƴƯƵ ƪơ੿ Ưੂ ƤƧƬƯƣƝƱƯƭƴƥƲ, ƴ૵ƭ ੒ưƯƟƹƭ ƴ੹ ਕƭơƣƪơƟơ ਩ƮƯƤơ ƭ੹ ƣƟƭƹƭƴơƩ ਕưઁ ƴ੽ƭ ƪƯƩƭ੽ƭ ƳƵƭƤƱƯƬƞƭ’ (A hospital for the lepers will be created at a special place outside Nicosia. His Beatitude and the dimogerontes are responsible for this matter and all their expenses will come out of the common contribution). AAC, Codex Aŷ, 200.

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dimogerontia 23 and the twenty-member committee of the public (epitropi tou koinou). 24 Regarding the district dimogeronties, it was decided that their members had to be elected by the general assembly, but the opinion of the residents in each major town of every district also had to be taken into consideration.25 However, it seems that the content of the documents in the Archbishopric archive does not clarify the procedure for electing these laymen. These reforms did not last for long, since there were no registrations based on the 1830 decisions after 1834, when it seems that the system collapsed.26 The new administrative structures, as they were decided in Istanbul and transferred to the island by the committee, were highly important. For the first time since the Ottoman conquest in 1571, laymen institutionally entered the administration of the community. Thus, the high priests of the Church of Cyprus lost their absolute authority in representing and managing the Orthodox community. All the decisions relating to the administration, taxation and education of the Cypriot Orthodox community were now made jointly by the high priests and the laymen who were members of the various administrative bodies. This was an effort to modernize the system of a society that had grown used to the status quo as it had been maintained for centuries. As a result, the existing state of affairs had become inconsistent with changes in the political framework that had occurred over time. Thus 23 ‘Ǝơ ƳƵƳƴƧƨૌ ƴƥƴƱơƬƥƫ੽Ʋ ƤƧƬƯƣƥƱƯƭƴƟơ ƥੁƲ ƴઁ ƓơƱƜƺƯƭ, ਥươƣƱƵưƭƯ૨Ƴơ ƤƩ੹ ƴ੹ ƪƯƩƭ੹ ƳƵƬƶƝƱƯƭƴơ, ƴ੽ƭ ƪƯƩƭ੽ƭ ਲƳƵƷƟơƭ ƪơ੿ ਫ਼ưƥƱƜƳưƩƳƩƭ ƴ૵ƭ ੒ƬƯƣƥƭ૵ƭ ƱơƣƩƜƤƹƭ ƪơ੿ ưƱƯƳƴơƴƥƽƯƵƳơ ơ੝ƴ૵ƭ ƴ੹ ƤƟƪơƩơ, ƪơƴ੹ ƴ੹Ʋ ੒ưƯƟơƲ ƴઁ ਫ਼ƸƧƫઁƭ ƪơ੿ ƪƱơƴơƩઁƭ ƅƥƢƫƝƴƩ ƤƩ੹ ਫ਼ƸƧƫ૵ƭ ơ੝ƴƯ૨ ੒ƱƩƳƬ૵ƭ ਥƮƝƤƹƳƥ ưƱƯƳƴơƣƜƲ’ (According to the orders of the high Devlet, a four member dimogerontia must be created in the saray. It will take care of all public interests, such as public safety, and the protection of the reaya and their rights). AAC, Codex Aŷ, 199. 24 ‘Ǝ੹ ƳƵƳƴƧƨૌ ਥưƩƴƱƯư੽ ƴƯ૨ ƪƯƩƭƯ૨…Ư੆ƴƩƭƥƲ ƭ੹ ƥੇƭơƩ ਩ƶƯƱƯƩ ƪơ੿ ƴોƲ ƪƥƭƴƱƩƪોƲ ƤƧƬƯƣƥƱƯƭƴƟơƲ ƪơ੿ ƴ૵ƭ ƪơƴ੹ ƬƝƱƯƲ ƤƧƬƯƣƥƱƯƭƴƩ૵ƭ’ (A committee of the public must be created…its members will be inspectors of the central and district dimogerontias). AAC, Codex Aŷ, 199. 25 ‘ਝưઁ ƴ੽ƭ ƣƥƭƩƪ੽ƭ ƳƵƭƝƫƥƵƳƩƭ ƭ੹ ਥƪƫƝƣƹƭƴơƩ ƪơ੿ Ưੂ ƤƧƬƯƣƝƱƯƭƴƥƲ ƴ૵ƭ ਥươƱƷƩ૵ƭ ƥੁƲ ƴ੹Ʋ ưƯƫƩƴƥƟơƲ ƥੁƲ ƴ੽ƭ ਥƪƫƯƣ੽ƭ ੖ƬƹƲ ƴƯƽƴƹƭ ƭ੹ ੁƳƷƽૉ ƪơ੿ ਲ ƣƭƾƬƧ ƴોƲ ưƯƫƩƴƥƟơƲ ƥੁƲ ƴ੽ƭ ੒ưƯƟơƭ ƤƩƯƱƟƦƯƭƴơƩ ƪơ੿ ਲ ƳƵƭƝƫƥƵƳƩƲ ƴ૵ƭ ਥươƱƷƩƹƴ૵ƭ (The dimogerontes of the districts will be elected by the general assembly. In their election the opinion of the district in which they are placed and of the district assembly will be taken into consideration)’. AAC, Codex Aŷ, 199-200. 26 The last registration in the framework of this administrative system in the Codex Aŷ is in 1834. See AAC, Codex Aŷ, 200. Hill also mentions that the system collapsed a few years after its establishment. Hill, A History of Cyprus, IV, 155; See also, Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 154-5.

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Panaretos’ primacy coincided with a transitional period regarding administration.27 The fact that the new system collapsed within four years of its implementation suggested that the laymen were not yet a strong and united enough political group. The implementation of the new system and its conservation could have worked to their benefit and strengthened them; however, it allowed the high priests to re-establish their absolute authority. A similar administrative system was again established on the island in 1838, only one year before the proclamation of the Hatt-iúerif. Meanwhile, another problem that came about during the primacy of Panaretos was that many Orthodox had procured citizenship from the Greek state and had returned to the island as subjects of another state, thus evading the status of reaya. These Cypriots eluded certain Ottoman taxes, whilst their foreign citizenship also protected them from any abuse of power on the island. 28 This situation, which had also been noted in other areas of the Ottoman Empire inhabited by Eastern Orthodox Christians, was acute between 1830 and 1833, and mobilised the Sublime Porte.29 The Ottoman administration in Cyprus was concerned with this issue after 1831, when quite a large number of people with Greek citizenship immigrated to the island, while some Cypriots went to Greece and obtained citizenship of that country. In a note of 1831, in the Chronicle record that N. Kyriazis published, it is mentioned that ‘many went (to Greece) and brought back with them passports that made them Greek’.30 Indicative of this situation is the fact that, of the 800 passports issued by the passport centre of Nafplion from December 1830 to October 1831, the holders of 123 passports stated Cyprus as their place of residence.31 Through Archbishop Panaretos, the Ottoman governor of the island informed those who had acquired Greek citizenship that they should abandon their foreign passports and return to their previous status, that is, as reayas of the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman authorities threatened confiscation of their property, even if their permanent residence was not

Paschalis Kitromelides, ‘ƂưƼ ƴƧ ƤƱƜƳƧ ƴƯƵ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƑơƭơƱƝƴƯƵ’ (Activities of Archbishop Panaretos), ƋƵưƱƩơƪơƟ ƓưƯƵƤơƟ, XXXII, 1972, 54. 28 Giorgos Georgis, ƓƴƩƲ ơươƱƷƝƲ ƴƧƲ ƥƫƫƧƭƩƪƞƲ ƥƮƹƴƥƱƩƪƞƲ ưƯƫƩƴƩƪƞƲ (The Beginnings of the Greek Foreign Policy), Athens 1995, 59. 29 Giorgos Georgis, ƈ ưƱƾƴƧ ƬơƪƱƯƷƱƼƭƩơ ƥƫƫƧƭƯƴƯƵƱƪƩƪƞ ƤƩƝƭƥƮƧ (The First Long GreekTurkish Dispute), Athens 1996, 134. 30 Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘ƗƱƯƭƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƳƧƬƥƟƹƬơ’, (Chronicle), ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, VIII, 1931, 86. 31 Georgis, ƈ ưƱƾƴƧ ƬơƪƱƯƷƱƼƭƩơ, 123. 27

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Cyprus, but the territory of the Greek state. 32 By the early 1830s, this displacement was to such an extent that in December 1831, the British consul in Larnaca, Antonios Vondizianos, wrote to the British embassy in Istanbul that ‘...the measure of acquisition of citizenship has been adopted by farmers and people of all disciplines to such an extent that if it continues, very soon the island will become a Greek colony and the Sultan will have nothing but the empty title of a sovereign’.33 Additionally, the Cypriot high priests were increasingly concerned by Cypriots (even if a tiny minority) taking out Greek citizenship, since they had power over the Cypriot reaya, but not those taking out Greek citizenship who would be under the jurisdiction of the Greek consul. Additionally, the Church of Cyprus, as with the Ecumenical Patriarchate, did not recognise the Church of Greece, which was founded in 1833. This recognition only came two decades later in 1850. On 3 December 1831, a group of Orthodox in Cyprus, who had acquired Greek citizenship, sent a letter to Constantinos Peristianis,34 the consul of Russia in Larnaca, asking for his protection. The authors claimed that Archbishop Panaretos urged all the holders of Greek citizenship in Cyprus to abandon their new citizenship and return to their previous status as Cypriot Orthodox reaya. Harry Luke published this letter in his work on the archives of the British consulate in Cyprus, and according to the authors of this letter, ‘His beatitude the Archbishop [of Cyprus] having summoned all Greek subjects in Nicosia in accordance with the instructions of the Governor of the island, made use of the most terrible threats in order to induce them to abandon their right to Hellenic protection and to remain in Cyprus in the condition of reayas. This method [the authors are writing] having failed, for

Philippou, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 125. Harry Luke, Cyprus under the Turks, 1571-1878, London 1989 [first published: 1921], 169. 34 Constantinos Peristianis (1759-1842) was one of the most prominent figures in Cyprus during the first half of the 19th century. His father, Evangelis Peristianis, was born in Cephalonia and was the first member of his family to migrate to Cyprus. Constantinos Peristianis served as consul of the Kingdom of Sweden and Norway and vice consul of Russia in Cyprus. For the Peristianis family, see L. Aristeidis ‘ƈ ƯƩƪƯƣƝƭƥƩơ ƪơƩ ƴƯ ƝƱƣƯ ƴƯƵ ƊƥƱƾƭƵƬƯƵ ƑƥƱƩƳƴƩƜƭƧ’ (The Family and the Work of Ieronimos Peristianis), Kypriakai Spoudai, XXXVII, 1973, 75-8 and Theoharis Stavrides, ‘Ɛ ƆƵơƣƣƝƫƧƲ ƑƥƱƩƳƴƩƜƭƧƲ ƳƴƧ ƓƪƜƫơ ƌƜƱƭơƪƯƲ (1757-1781)’ (Evaggelis Peristianis in Skala Larnaca), Epetirida Kentrou Epistimonikon Erevnon, XXV, 1999, 183218. 32 33

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The above episode foremost indicated one of the effects that the establishment of the Greek state had among the Cypriot Orthodox, whilst it also showed the Ottoman administration and the archbishop’s concern about the increasing number of Cypriots holding Greek citizenship. Arguably, it was the Ottoman administration’s pressure on the Church to address this issue that led Panaretos to make strong demands from these Cypriots. Nevertheless, these demands also appear to have been made because of the Church’s reaction to emerging movements, especially in Larnaca, which demonstrated that Greek nationalism had begun to touch the wealthy professional and merchant Cypriot Orthodox class. In contrast with traditional historiography that identifies the Church of Cyprus, and especially the archbishop, with the spread of nationalism in Cyprus earlier on, it would appear that the first reaction from the Church in relation to the Greek state was to remain on the side of Ottoman legality and also the Ecumenical Patriarch. The conflicts that arose between the high priests and those promoting this Greek national conscience were grounded on the high priests’ conformity to the Sublime Porte and the treatment of any new ideological reference as subversive. Two letters sent from the high priests and laymen (amongst them was Hadji Christodoulos Apegitos) to Ioannis Kapodistrias on 19 August 1928, a year after Panaretos had become archbishop, cannot be assumed to refute the Church’s position previously mentioned.36 One of the two letters was signed from the high priests as well, and it contained their plea to Kapodistrias to help them, but it was the letter signed by one layman alone that mentioned his wish for the liberation of Cyprus. Since one of the two letters was signed by the high priests as well, it suggests a different stance by the Church of Cyprus. Yet the actions of the Cypriot high priests until the end of the Ottoman period do not include any such demands. Additionally, the layman who signed the second letter wrote that ‘he himself had tried to take the high priests on his side’, revealing that he had failed to garner their support. Furthermore, after 1821 and before the reforms of 1830, the high priests looked for solutions to the problems of the island and had no ethnic-national awareness. It would also seem that the high priests were aware of the Luke, Cyprus under the Turks, 168. For the content of the letter, see Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘ƑƱƯƮƥƭƩƪƜ ƝƣƣƱơƶơ’, (Consular Documents), ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, XIII, 1937, 198-9. 36 For the content of these two letters, see N. Karapatakis, ‘ƅƽƯ ƥưƩƳƴƯƫơƟ ƴƹƭ ƥƪưƱƯƳƾưƹƭ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ưƱƯƲ ƴƯƭ ƊƹƜƭƭƧƭ ƋơưƯƤƟƳƴƱƩơƭ’ (Two Letters by the Cyprus Representatives to Ioannis Kapodistrias), ƑƭƥƵƬơƴƩƪƞ ƋƽưƱƯƲ, IX, 1969, 263-8. 35

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precarious situation that the Ottoman state was in, and they were certain that the Ottoman framework, which they had known for so long, could not survive. Panaretos’s stance of conformity of the Church to the Ottoman state can best be seen through his reaction during the upheaval on the island in 1833. During that year, three separate uprisings disturbed the peace on the island and were a source of great distress for the local elite, including Panaretos. The first uprising was led by Nikolaos Theseus,37 the second by Giaur (or Deli) Imam and the third by Kalogeros (monk) Ioannikios.38 The most severe uprising, in terms of the people’s participation, was that of Nikolaos Theseus, and an analysis of this particular uprising is indicative of the framework under which the Church of Cyprus functioned during that period. Nikolaos Theseus was born in Cyprus at the end of the 18th century and had worked in Trieste. He had also been initiated into the Filiki Eteria, and he had taken part in the ‘Greek revolt’. After the end of the struggle and after he had been unsuccessful in finding support for the liberation of Cyprus, he moved to Marseille. In 1832, returned to Cyprus in an effort to regain his fortune confiscated by the Ottoman authorities on the island.39 The year after his return, Theseus led an uprising that caused great concern to the Ottoman administration and the archbishop. The two main sources of information on this event are the letters of Panaretos to the Ecumenical Patriarch, Constantios I,40 and the letter of the French consul in Larnaca to his minister. 41 The occasion for this uprising was given by the imposition of a tax, which they had previously decided would not be collected. The Cypriot Orthodox and Muslims reacted strongly when the tax 37 Nicolaos Theseus was the brother of Theofilos Theseus. Both had participated in the Greek ‘struggle for independence’. See Loizos Philippou, ‘ƎƩƪƼƫơƯƲ ƪơƩ ƉƥƼƶƩƫƯƲ ƉƧƳƥƟƲ’ (Nicolaos and Theofilos Theseus), ƑƜƶƯƲ, 1/3, 1935, 81-5. 38 For these three revolts, see Hill, A History of Cyprus, 157-67. For the Gavur Imam revolt, see Loizos Philippou, ‘ƈ ƥươƭƜƳƴơƳƧ ƴƯƵ ƊƬƜƬƧ’ (The Imam’s Revolution), ƑƜƶƯƲ, 4/5, 1939, 164-7; Loizos Philippou, ‘ƈ ƥươƭƜƳƴơƳƧ ƴƯƵ ƪơƫƯƣƞƱƯƵ’ (The Monk’s Revolution), ƑƜƶƯƲ, 4/9, 1939, 387-92; Loizos Philippou, ‘ƐƩ ƥươƭơƳƴƜƳƥƩƲ ƴƯƵ 1833’ (The 1833 Revolutions), ƑƜƶƯƲ, 4/10, 1939, 448-50; See also Michalis N. Michael, ‘Revolts and Uncertainty in the Ottoman Periphery: The Three Revolts of 1833 in Cyprus’, forthcoming. 39 Paschalis Kitromelidis, ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƌƯƣƩƯƳƽƭƧ, 1571-1878 (Cypriot Intellectuals), Nicosia 2002, 146-148; Hill, A History of Cyprus, 157. 40 Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘Ǝ. ƉƧƳƥƽƲ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƳƴƜƳƩƲ ƴƯƵ 1833’ (N. Theseus and the Revolt of 1833), ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, XI, 1935, 160-5. 41 Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘Ɛ ƎƩƪƼƫơƯƲ ƉƧƳƥƽƲ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƳƴƜƳƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƌƜƱƭơƪƯƲ’ (Nikolaos Theseas and the Larnaca Revolt), ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, VII, 1930, 213-6.

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started to be collected. On 4 March 1833, a large number of people, threatening to destroy the bishopric, demanded that the Bishop of Kitium, Leontios II (1821-1837), take matters into his hands and ask for the cancellation of the tax. A note referring to the event stated that in 1833 ‘there was an apostasy of the reayas and Turks and Franks’.42 On 8 March 1833, a similar protest was made outside the Archbishopric, and Panaretos fled to the palace of the Ottoman governor. At the same time, according to the information of the French consul on the island, the peasants refused to pay the tax and chased the tax collectors away.43 On 11 March, hundreds of Cypriot Orthodox and Muslims gathered outside the French consul’s house asking him to mediate to have the tax stopped, whilst soon after, Theseus took matters into his own hands by putting himself at the head of an uprising. He visited the consuls and the Bishop of Kitium, calling for the cancelation of the tax, and taking the rest of the demonstrators with him, he went to the church of St George in Larnaca. Following this, on 14 March, Theseus and about three thousand demonstrators retreated to Stavrovouni for protection from a possible attack from the army forces. Through the mediation of the consul and Leontios II,44 the tax collection was cancelled. Nevertheless, Theseus and the crowds that had followed him refused to stop the uprising because there was no guarantee for the protection of those that had participated in the revolt. After the promise that there would be no retaliation or prosecution, Theseus terminated the uprising, and peace was restored. The uprising led by Theseus and two other uprisings of the same year appear to have been made under a more general framework of disturbance in the Ottoman territories due to economic recession. Also, it could be claimed that the uprisings were the result of an effort to change the administration of the island. The fact that the insurgents, Christians and Muslims 45 , turned against the traditional powers on the island, that is, the Ottoman administration and the Church, suggest that the uprising’s purpose was to challenge these traditional sources of power. Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘ƗƱƯƭƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƳƧƬƥƟƹƬơ’, (Chronicle), ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, VIII, 1931, 86. 43 Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘Ɛ ƎƩƪƼƫơƯƲ ƉƧƳƥƽƲ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƳƴƜƳƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƌƜƱƭơƪƯƲ’ (Nikolaos Theseus and the Larnaca Revolt), ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, VII, 1930, 214. 44 Sophronios Michaelides, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƪơƴƜ ƋƟƴƩƯƭ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ (History of the Kitium Church), Larnaca 1992, 196. 45 In all the 1833 revolts, Christians and Muslims participated. For example, the missionary Lorenzo Warriner mentions that in Paphos, ‘Imames…. collected a band of both Greeks and Turks in the province of Paphos…’. See: Rita C. Severis, The Diaries of Lorenzo Warriner Pease (1834-1839), II, Ashgate, London 2002, 771. 42

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Panaretos’ view of Theseus and his stance on the uprising was telling. In his letter to the Ecumenical Patriarch on 14 March 1833, Panaretos recounted the events and directly accused Theseus of being the one that incited the riots and the resistance to paying the tax. Even more noteworthy was his claim that Theseus had been deceived and provoked by ‘certain malevolent people that wished harm upon my race’. His use of the word ‘my’ indicates that he did not consider that he belonged to the same race as the Ecumenical Patriarch; otherwise he would have used the word ‘our’. These accusations were made against ‘filthy’, as he characterised them, subjects of Larnaca and Europeans that resided on the island.46 Then in another letter to the Ecumenical Patriarch in August 1833, Panaretos, referring to the parallel uprising of Ioanikios in the Karpass, claimed that that uprising was related to the activity of some ‘supposed liberals and European friendly people’ and also to Theofilos Theseus (Nikolas’ brother) ‘whom with and along with other Europeans were discussing and taught the mysteries of the apostasy for thirty days in Larnaca’.47 Panaretos’ view on the 1833 uprisings illustrated his conformity to the Ottoman system. It was characteristic that in his letter to the Patriarch, he noted that a tax had been imposed and that the residents had begun to pay without any opposition. Panaretos’s description also noted the existence of a group of people, mainly in Larnaca, who appeared to react against him and the Ottoman governor. This coincided with the fact that since the early 19th century, there had emerged in Larnaca a group of laymen that pushed to enter the sphere of power that was held by the Church, and who often came into conflict with the local bishop and the archbishop.48 Moreover, the reactions of this group from Larnaca had also been noted early on by Archbishop Kyprianos himself (1810-21). In a circular dated 2 February 1815 condemning freemasonry in Cyprus, a movement that had appeared in Larnaca, he wrote that in Larnaca and Scala, assemblies of supporters of freemasonry were being held. These supporters not only tried to influence the Orthodox, but they also tried to gain supporters within the wealthy Ottomans. Furthermore, he wrote that one of the reasons that the condemnation of the freemasons was obligatory was because they ‘are against 46 Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘Ǝ. ƉƧƳƥƽƲ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƳƴƜƳƩƲ ƴƯƵ 1833’ (N. Theseus and the Revolt of 1833), ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, XI, 1935, 164. 47 Loizos Philippou, ‘ƐƩ ƥươƭơƳƴƜƳƥƩƲ ƴƯƵ 1833’ (The 1833 Revolutions), ƑƜƶƯƲ, 4/10, 1939, 449. 48 For the changes in Larnaca’s society and the differences with Nicosia, see Michalis N. Michael, ‘Cities and Ideologies in 19th Century Cyprus. A Traditional Capital and a Modern Port-City’, Chronos, XXII, 2010, 85-106.

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the orders of the king and in any case, they deserve death for all the bad things that they have and they preach’. 49 The episode with those holding Greek citizenship and its description by Kostantinos Peristianis, who has been mentioned above, indicated that the archbishop was not in agreement with the new ideological movements that appeared, mainly in Larnaca. Supporters of these new ideological movements were mostly people who dealt with trade, who were in contact with the consuls of European nations in their city and who had shaped a rather particular image for Larnaca on both a political and a cultural level. Rolandos Katsiaounis noted that this was another particularity of Cypriot history, since all these were happening in Larnaca and not in Nicosia, the capital. 50 Panaretos clearly conformed to the Ottoman administration and this often put him in opposition to the educated classes of Larnaca, the port city where a number of new ideological movements had appeared. Since Larnaca, as a port city, was the centre of the trade on the island and the residence of all the European consuls, inevitably it was the place that all the foreigners first landed and usually the place that they settled. Wealthy laymen strongly wanted to enter the sphere of administrative power, which was responsible for more than just the Orthodox community and which, until then, was held by the Church alone. The current system did not suit their interests, and so they demanded changes to the administration and in to tax policy. 51 The ‘Kitium Question’, which erupted two decades later after the primacy of Panaretos, clarified these trends and caused a major disagreement between the archbishop on one hand and some wealthy subjects of Larnaca and the Bishop of Kitium on the other.52 Shortly after, in 1838, another effort to change the administrative structure of Cyprus took place when orders were once again brought to Cyprus by a delegation of Cypriots who had gone to the imperial centre. This time two of the four-member committee were high priests, the bishops of

49 For the complete text of this circular, see Ioannis Tsiknopoulos, ‘O ƥƨƭƯƬƜƱƴƵƲ ƂƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƋƵưƱƩơƭƼƲ’ (The Ethnomartyr Archbishop of Cyprus Kyprianos), ƂưƼƳƴƯƫƯƲ ƃơƱƭƜƢơƲ, XXXII, 1971, 269-71; Theodore Papadopoullos, ‘ƑƱƯƥươƭơƳƴơƴƩƪƞ ươƱƯƵƳƟơ ƴƯƵ ƴƥƪƴƯƭƩƳƬƯƽ ƥƭ ƴƹ ƥƫƫƧƭƩƪƾ ƷƾƱƹ’ (Pre-revolutionary Presence of Freemasonry in the Greek Lands), ƓƴơƳƟƭƯƲ, III, 1966-7, 47-65. 50 Rolandos Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus during the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century, Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia 1996, 18. 51 Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics, 20. 52 For the Kitium question, see Michael, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƯƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞ ưƥƱƟƯƤƯ, 286-94.

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Kitium and Kyrenia.53 According to the reforms of 1838, after the general assembly, which was once again held in the Archbishopric and lasted one week, 54 the high priests of the Church of Cyprus were recognised as the protectors of the Cypriot Orthodox population.55 It was again decided that a general assembly would be held at the beginning of each year under the presidency of the archbishop, whilst, once again, central and district dimogeronties and a committee of the public (epitropi tou koinou) were established. According to the minutes of the 1838 assembly, the members of the district dimogeronties had to be elected directly by the people of the principal towns of every district, but the approval of the local bishop was also required. 56 The fact that these members had to be approved by the local Orthodox bishop confirms the power of the Church and the willingness of the high priests to control the election of laymen into the administrative bodies of the community. This may be explained by the fact that two bishops were members of the second delegation that brought the orders from Istanbul to the island, whilst the first delegation that brought the orders in 1830 consisted of only seculars. Panaretos’s primacy ended soon after the official announcement of the Tanzimat. In 1839, the Ecumenical Patriarch, Gregory VI, sent to the Church of Cyprus a translation of the imperial decree of Hatt-i úerifand, which included a copy of a report by Gregory VI on the importance of this The members of this delegation were the Bishop of Kitium Damaskenos (18371846), the Bishop of Kyreneia Charalampos (1824-1844) and the laymen Hadji Kyrgenis Saripolos (member of the 1830 delegation) and Hadji Ioannis Vikis. AAC, Codex Aŷ, 243. 54 For the minutes of this assembly, see AAC, Codex Aŷ, 243-7; Also, Filios Zannetos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƭƞƳƯƵ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 1910, 1171-8. 55 ‘੘ ƬơƪơƱƩƾƴơƴƯƲ ươƴ੽Ʊ ਲƬ૵ƭ ਕƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơ੿ Ưੂ ƳƥƢơƳƬƩƾƴơƴƯƩ ƬƧƴƱƯưƯƫ૙ƴơƩ ƪơƴ੹ ƴ੹ ƢơƳƩƫƩƪ੹ ưƱƯƭƼƬƩƜ ƴƹƭ ƨƝƫƯƵƭ ƥੈƳƨơƩ Ưੂ ƤƩ੹ ƢƟƯƵ ưƱƯƳƴƜƴơƩ ƴ૵ƭ ƱơƣƩƜƤƹƭ ƴોƲ ƭƞƳƯƵ. ƆੁƲ ơ੝ƴƯઃƲ ƫƯƩưƼƭ ਕƶƩƥƱƯ૨ƴơƩ ưƱઁ ưƜƭƴƹƲ ਲ ưƱƯƳƴơƳƟơ ƴ૵ƭ ưƴƹƷ૵ƭ ੪Ʋ ੑƶƥƟƫƯƭƴơƲ ƭ੹ ਩ƷƯƵƳƩ ươƴƱƩƪƞƲ ਫ਼ư੻Ʊ ơ੝ƴ૵ƭ ưƱƼƭƯƩơƭ’ (According to their royal privileges, our father, his beatitude the Archbishop of Cyprus and the metropolitans shall be the protectors of the reayas of the island for life. They are responsible for the protection of the poor people, as they should be and they shall have a paternal care for them). See AAC, Codex Aŷ, 243. 56 ‘Ƃੂ ਥươƱƷƩơƪơ੿ ƤƧƬƯƣƥƱƯƭƴƟơƩ ƭ੹ ਥƪƫƝƣƹƭƴơƩ ਕưઁ ƴƯઃƲ ƪơƴƯƟƪƯƵƲ ƴોƲ ưƱƹƴƥƵƯƽƳƧƲ ƴોƲ ਥươƱƷƟơƲ ƴૌ ƳƵƭơƩƭƝƳƥƩ ƪơ੿ ƴƯ૨ ਕƱƷƩƥƱƝƹƲ ƴƹƭ ƪơ੿ ƤƩ’ ਕƭơƶƯƱ઼Ʋ ơ੝ƴ૵ƭ (ƴ૵ƭ ưƯƫƩƴ૵ƭ ƪơ੿ ƴƯ૨ ਕƱƷƩƥƱƝƹƲ) ưƱઁƲ ƴƧƭ ƋƥƭƴƱƩƪƞƭ ƅƧƬƯƣƥƱƯƭƴƟơƭ ƭ੹ ਥƶƯƤƩƜƦƹƭƴơƩ Ƭ੻ ƴઁ ƳƽƭƧƨƥƲ ƤƟưƫƹƬơ…’ (The district dimogeronties shall be elected by the residents of the district’s capital and with the consent of their high priest. They shall be provided with the usual document after the report of the residents and the high priest). AAC, Codex Aŷ, 246. 53

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decree. 57 Concrete provincial administrative reforms with representative institutions began after the proclamation of the Hatt-iúerif in 1839 and the Hatt-i Hümayun in 1856. According to an imperial firman issued on 7 February 1840,58 central and district councils (meclis) were to be established in all the empire. This system of district councils was different from the existing local council (divan), since the latter did not always include representatives of the non-Muslim communities. 59 This had little administrative and political significance. 60 In the new councils, administrative officials, notables and representatives of the non-Muslim communities were included in an effort by the Sublime Porte to promote its commitment to Ottomanism (osmanlÖlÖk),61 an ideology that was not against ‘localisation’ but, in many ways, took place simultaneously.62 In Cyprus, the reforms were very often not implemented after 1840, at least not with success. For example, an Ottoman firman dated 7 October 1840 63 orders the appointment of a new governor in Cyprus after confirmation that the orders given in the framework of the Hatt-i úerif were not implemented or, rather, not fully implemented in Cyprus. More specifically, the firman mentioned that the local element of political power belonging to the old system tried to achieve the continuation of its role by delaying or controlling new institutions: ‘some people in one way or another, managed to become members of the council, like the two Dimogerontes of

57 For these documents, see Theoharis Stavrides, ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƼ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƥƟƯ ƪơƩ ƋƽưƱƯƲ: Ɣơ ươƴƱƩơƱƷƩƪƜ ƝƣƣƱơƶơ ƴƹƭ ƥƴƾƭ 1600-1878 (The Ecumenical Patriarchate and Cyprus: The Patriarchical Documents, 1600-1878), Nicosia 2001, 407-13. 58 Reûat Kaynar, Mustafa Reûit Paûa ve Tanzimat, Türk Tarih Kurumu BasÖmevi, Ankara 1954, 254. 59 As Moshe Ma‘oz mentions, the participation of non-Muslim notables in the local councils was not obligatory but not uncommon. Moshe Ma‫ލ‬oz, Ottoman Reform in Syria and Palestine, 1840-1861: The Impact of the Tanzimat on Politics and Society, Oxford University Press, Oxford 1968, 90. For example, in the case of Cyprus, the archbishop or the dragoman (tercüman) was participating in the Nicosia divan. 60 Ma‫ލ‬oz, Ottoman Reform, 90. 61 úükrü Hanioølu, A Brief History of the Late Ottoman Empire, Princeton University Press, Princeton 2008, 76. 62 Jens Hanssen, ‘Practices of Integration – Centre-Periphery Relations in the Ottoman Empire’, Hanssen J., Philipp T., Weber S. (eds.), The Empire in the City: Arab Provincial Capitals in the Late Ottoman Empire, Ergon Verlag Würzburg, Beirut 2002, 51. 63 From the firman issued by Abdul Mecid on 7 October 1840, see Ioannis Theoharides, ‘ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴƯ ƶƩƱƬƜƭƩ ƣƩơ ƴƧƭ ƥƶơƱƬƯƣƞ ƴƯƵ ƔơƭƦƩƬƜƴ ƳƴƧƭ ƋƽưƱƯ’, (Unpublished Firman on the Tanzimat Implementation in Cyprus), ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƤơ ƋƝƭƴƱƯƵ ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƾƭ ƆƱƥƵƭƾƭ, XIII-XV, 1984-1987, 447-58.

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the island, Hadjikyrgenis and Apegitos…who were appointed illegally’.64 It can be argued that the high priests of the Church of Cyprus and especially the Archbishop must have felt that the implementation of the new institutions threatened their political power.65 In the same document, the kadÖ of Nicosia and Panaretos were accused that ‘with their behaviour they caused nameless works’,66 and for this reason, a firman for their removal was issued. This was not something new for the Sublime Porte, since in many areas of the empire, the established councils worked poorly, and their members used their positions for private gain. Also, in many places of the empire, especially in small districts and cities, the newly established councils had fallen into the hands of the local notables and the aøas. 67 Very often the elected representatives belonged to the same old dominant groups of ayan or Christian kocabaûis who pursued their individual and class interests.68 As a French traveller, quoted by Inalcik, mentions in 1867, ‘…the Turkish council members selected by the Pasha…members representing the other communities are appointed by the religious heads of their communities…’.69 As for the reforms within the framework of the new provincial law of 1864, it seems that in Cyprus, these came into force from 1868 onwards.70 Archbishop Panaretos’ end and his eviction from the archbishop’s throne were related to the reaction against him from a number of wealthy secular elites in Larnaca and in Limassol,71 amidst accusations of abuse of power. Theoharides, ‘ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴƯ ƶƩƱƬƜƭƩ’, 454. The names of Hadjikyrgenis and Apegitos are also mentioned in the minutes of the 1830 assembly in the Archbishopric, since they were two of the four-member delegation that went to Istanbul and brought orders for the reform of the community administration. See AAC, Codex Aŷ, 199. 65 See Michalis N. Michael, ‘Allies against the State Reorganization: Reactions to the Gülhâne Imperial Rescript in Ottoman Cyprus’, Archivum Ottomanicum, 26, 2009, 14353. 66 Theoharides, ‘ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴƯƶƩƱƬƜƭƩ’, 454. 67 Halil Inalcik, ‘Application of the Tanzimat and its Social Effects’, The Ottoman Empire: Conquest, Organization, Economy. Collected Studies, Variorum Reprints, London 1978, 16. 68 Roderic H. Davison, ‘The Advent of the Principle of Representation in the Government of the Ottoman Empire’, Roderic H. Davison, (ed.) Essays in Ottoman and Turkish History, 1774-1923, University of Texas 1990, 100. 69 Inalcik, ‘Application of the Tanzimat’, 15. 70 Aymes, ‘Reform Talks’, 110. 71 ‘1840 ƥƳƧƪƾƨƧƪơƭ ƌƥƬƥƳƩơƭƯƟ ƪơƩ ƌơƱƭơƪƩƾƴƥƲ ƪơƩ ưƞƣơƭ ƳƴƧƭ ƑƼƫƩƭ ƪơƩ ƝƢƣơƫơƭ ƴƯƵƲ ƪƯƴƳơƬưƜƳƧƤƥƲ ƪơƩ ƴƯƭ ƑơƭƜƱƥƴƯƭ ƪơƩ ƥƢƜƫơƭ ƜƫƫƯƵƲ’, see Neoklis Kyriazis, ‘ƗƱƯƭƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƳƧƬƥƟƹƬơ’, (Chronicle), ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ, VIII, 1931, 89. 64

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According to all available testimonies, Panaretos’s eviction was caused by those wealthy people that were interested in promoting the emergence of Ioannikios to the throne of the Archbishop. Ioannikios had escaped the island in 1821 and had thus evaded the mass executions. He travelled to Paris where he lived for almost eight years on an allowance provided to him by the French government. In Paris, he met powerful men of the Ottoman administration, Mustafa Reûid Paûa and Fethi Ahmed Paûa, who invited him to Istanbul and advised the grand vizier to send him to Cyprus, which he did. According to information provided by Loizos Philippou, with the help of these two powerful men, Ioannikios was provided with a monthly allowance of a thousand guruû from the treasury of Cyprus. On May 1840, Fethi Ahmed Paûa, who was the minister of trade in Istanbul, invited Ioannikios to his wedding when he married the sister of the Sultan.72 The opposition group of rich laymen, amongst them Hadjikyrgenis, Apegitos and Triantafillidis, succeeded in promoting him to the archbishop’s throne in Cyprus to replace Panaretos by convincing him to use his contacts with the Sublime Porte for this purpose. Ioannikios returned from Istanbul where he had been escorted by representatives of this group of laymen opposing Panaretos. 73 He had with him a letter ordering the removal of Panaretos from archbishop and his replacement with himself. After the Ottoman governor of the island was informed that Ioannikios was the new archbishop, he was called to arrest Panaretos. 74 Following this, Ioannikios became archbishop and Panaretos resigned. In his resignation note, he wrote that he had resigned following royal statute after thirteen years of ecclesiastical and political rule.75 After his resignation, Panaretos retreated to the monastery of St Irakleidios and, later on, to the monastery of Timios Stavros in Omodos, where he died soon after. In the meantime, in a thankyou report to the Sultan, the Cypriot Orthodox noted that Panaretos had abused his powers and that his exclusion and replacement with Ioannikios had pleased the faithful on the island. 76

Philippou, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 151. Hackett, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƐƱƨƯƤƼƮƯƵ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ, 327. 74 Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƩƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ, 126. 75 Note dated 13 October 1840, see AAC, CodexAŷ, 259. 76 ƑơƽƫƯƲ ƗƩƤƟƱƯƣƫƯƵ, ‘ƋơƴƜƫƯƣƯƲ ƴƹƭ ƥƭ ƴƹ ơƱƷƥƟƹ ƴƯƵ ƋƆƆ ƯƨƹƬơƭƩƪƾƭ ƥƣƣƱƜƶƹƭ’ (List of the Ottoman Documents in the Archive of the Cyprus Research Centre), ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƤơ ƋƝƭƴƱƯƵ ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƾƭ ƆƱƥƵƭƾƭ, V, 1971-72, 326. 72 73

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Conclusion The end of Panaretos’ primacy was almost identical to that of his predecessor; that is, with the intercession of the Sublime Porte after a series of accusations from those sharing his faith and the ascendance to the throne of a new ecclesiastical persona that had collaborated with the Palace to reach this end. In the Ottoman state of the 19th century, there was nothing unusual about these events. The bishops of the Cypriot Orthodox Church were always concerned for their positions and career advancement, even at the expense of their archbishop. Panaretos was archbishop during a period of significant transition in Ottoman history during the Tanzimat, a period which changed the role of the archbishop. Panaretos represented the old Ottoman order, in which he and the Church of Cyprus more generally functioned as part of the Ottoman paternalistic framework and were thus the only Ottoman Orthodox Christian centre of political power on the island. The administrative reforms in Cyprus during Panaretos’ time forced him to coexist in political equality with secular Orthodox Christian elites who became members of the administrative institutions of the island. Panaretos tried to control these inevitable changes in his effort to maintain the old Ottoman order in which the Archbishop and the Church were the absolute Ottoman Orthodox Christian political power. But the proclamation of the Hatt-iúerif decree in 1839 started a new era in Ottoman history one year before the end of Panaretos’ primacy.

CHAPTER FIVE MAKARIOS I, 1854-65: THE TANZIMAT AND THE ROLE OF THE ARCHBISHOP-ETHNARCH KYPRIANOS D. LOUIS

This chapter explores the hitherto under-examined role played by Archbishop Makarios I (1854-65) as head of the Cypriot Orthodox Church and millet during the last decades of Ottoman rule. It will focus on situating Makarios’ impact in the historical context of his era, his style of leadership, the conditions under which he acted, and the changes he brought about. Exploring transitions from pre-modernity to modernity must focus on the creation and establishment of institutions, as well as the advancement of values and practices of modernity across the spectrum of society. In so doing, a better understanding of the conditions in which modernity emerged in Cyprus during the middle of the 19th century will emerge. During the period under consideration, the Eastern Mediterranean was defined by the European commercial and political presence, the gradual integration of the Ottoman Empire into the capitalist world, and the effort of the Great Powers to balance the conflicting Balkan nationalisms with their own hegemonic and imperial ambitions without the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. The Eastern Mediterranean acquired great political and economic significance for the European powers and was the connecting link between Europe and the Indian Ocean and beyond into the Pacific. The Napoleonic Wars implicated the Ottoman Empire in European politics and diplomacy and, for the first time, the revolutionary ideologies of nationalism and liberalism reached the East. The economic integration of the Ottoman Empire in the global capitalist system had advanced significantly in the late 18th century and the first half of the 19th century. The Ottoman economic context of the 19th century was characterized mainly by the transformation of whole regions of Ottoman territory into colonial or semi-colonial

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networks of lands based on agricultural production that provided raw materials for industrialized countries.1 A network of commercial activities was developed not only by the British and the French, but also by the ‘Greeks’. The latter, having Smyrna as the centre of a network that extended from the Dardanelles to Syria with stations in Chios, Samos, Rhodes and Cyprus, gained a significant proportion of the international Ottoman trade.2 Greek merchants and ship-owners emerged as a key factor in the gradual economic integration of the Balkan provinces.3 During this period, there was a much greater involvement of British and Russian policy in the Ottoman Empire and the first appearance of nationalist movements. The British had secured their domination in the Ottoman seas not only through their victory in the Napoleonic wars, but also through the control of strategically located territories in the Mediterranean, namely Malta and the Ionian Islands. Greek, Russian and Egyptian threats to the Ottoman Empire kept the Mediterranean in the forefront of the interests of European Powers. Despite the fact that successive British governments did not want the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, it significantly contributed to the formation of the independent Greek kingdom with France as a counter to Russian ambitions (centred on controlling an outlet on the warm seas). Additionally, when Muhammad Ali of Egypt nearly defeated the Ottoman Empire in 1840, the British and Russians together defeated him in respective military campaigns. Then in 1854 the Crimean War broke-out, and again the West was motivated to prevent the weakening and potentially the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. The hostilities ended in January 1856 and on 30 March the belligerents signed the Treaty of Paris. 4 With this treaty the

1 Erik Jan Zürcher, ƔƯƵƱƪƟơ: ƍƩơ ƓƽƣƷƱƯƭƧ ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ (Turkey: A Modern History), Alexandria, Athens, 2004, 45; Andrekos Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 18781915: The Inconsequential Possession, Manchester University Press, 2009, 14-22, 49-60. 2 Vassilis Kremmydas, ‘ƔƯ ƥƬưƼƱƩƯ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƭơƵƴƩƫƟơ, 1775-1835’ (Trade and Shipping 1775-1835), Introduction to Modern Greek Economic History (18th-20th century), Typothito Dardanos, Athens, 1999, 24-42; Domna Visvizi-Donda, ‘ƑƯƫƩƴƩƪƞ ƪơƩ ƯƩƪƯƭƯƬƩƪƞ ƳƧƬơƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƣƩơ ƴƧƭ ƪƵƱƩơƱƷƟơ ƳƴƧƭ ƂƭơƴƯƫƩƪƞ ƍƥƳƼƣƥƩƯ, 1815-1878’ (Political and economic importance of Cyprus for supremacy in the Eastern Mediterranean, 1815-1878), Proceedings of the IV International Cyprological Congress, III, 1, Nicosia, 2012, 151. 3 úevket Pamuk, The Ottoman Empire and European Capitalism (1820-1913): Trade, investment and production, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1987, 8. 4 Serge Berstein & Pierre Milza, History of Europe, II, The European Agreement and the Europe of Nations, 1815-1919, Alexandria, Athens, 1997, 113-4.

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Sublime Porte secured its right to participate in the Concert of Europe alongside the other powers, the Black Sea became a neutral sea free of warships, the estuary of the Danube was again given to the Ottomans, and the autonomy of the Danubian Principalities was reasserted under the protection of the Great Powers. The Crimean War, which ended with the defeat and humiliation of Russia, contributed to the acceptance of the Ottoman Empire to the club of the great powers of Europe. At the same time, Russia turned towards pan-Slavism and the Ottoman Empire committed to more reforms, specifically in relation to its Christian subjects. The ideology of the Cypriot Orthodox ‘elite’ of Cyprus, as part of collective life and consciousness,5 determined the degree of assimilation and the orientation of the dominant social, political and economic groups on the island, namely, the church hierarchy, the members of the bureaucracy and a nascent bourgeoisie. One of the two dominant ideological currents of the ‘Greek world’ in the 19th century was the ideology of romantic nationalism.6 This was based on the imagination and worship of the historical past, accompanied by the universality of order and rationality, and translated into ideas of Greek irredentism. The main carrier of these ideas was the Greek state, which sought the integration of all Greeks into its national borders. In this sense, the state was identified here with the nation. 7 During the 19th century multinational empires were threatened by the emergence of nationalism as an ideology through the establishment of systems of public education and the institutionalisation of official state languages to create national cohesion. The second ideological current of the period in relation to the Ottoman Empire was championed by the Ecumenical Patriarchate which, until the proclamation of the Greek state, was, to a large extent, the point of reference and spiritual guidance of all Orthodox Christians. Apart from Istanbul and Athens, throughout the 19th century Cyprus had sustained commercial and cultural interactions in the form of the movement of people, goods, and ideas with other major centres where Eastern Orthodox populations had flourished: Egypt, Jerusalem, Asia Minor, the Ionian Islands, and communities in the Italian City States and Eastern Europe. 8 These 5 Pantelis Lekkas E., ƆƨƭƩƪƩƳƴƩƪƞ ƩƤƥƯƫƯƣƟơ: ưƝƭƴƥ ƵưƯƨƝƳƥƩƲ ƳƴƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƞ ƋƯƩƭƹƭƩƯƫƯƣƟơ (Nationalist Ideology: Five Assumptions on Historical Sociology), Katarti, Athens, 1996), 27. 6 Paschalis Kitromilidis, ‘The Greek state as a national centre’, D. C. Tsaousis (ed.), Hellenism and Greekness Athens, 1983, 150; For the emergence of ethnic conflict and nationalism in Europe see Berstein & Milza, History of Europe, 107-46. 7 Paschalis M. Kitromilidis, Cypriot Logiosyni (1571-1878), Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia, 2002), 59. 8 Paschalis M. Kitromilidis, ‘Cyprus’, History of the Greek Nation: Modern Hellenism from 1833 to 1881, Athens Publishing, Athens, 1977, 445.

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centres contributed to the demographic and cultural regeneration and reproduction of Cyprus. Contrasted to the nationalist ideology of the Greek state, the ecumenical ideology of the Church emphasised the Eastern Orthodox religion, and at the same time gave Orthodox Christians a special place within the Ottoman social context. 9 This was encapsulated by the concept of genos, often used in juxtaposition or as a competing notion to that of the nation (ethnos). Despite the difficulties in providing an accurate definition to this concept, it would suffice here to point out the emphasis was on Eastern Orthodox religion and its cultural and intellectual manifestations. The Greek state and the Patriarchate competed over who had the leadership of, and authority over, the Eastern Orthodox Christians who used the Greek language in church. ‘During the restructuring of the spiritual forces of Hellenism, Istanbul never ceased to function as the cradle of national traditions, and remained as the spiritual centre of established and familiar forms of collective identity’. 10 This role was fulfilled, for example, by the Megali tou Genous Sholi (Great School of the Genos) and the Greek Philological Association of Istanbul.

The personality of Archbishop Makarios I (1854-1865) Makarios I (his surname was Christodoulides) was born in Prodromos a village in the Marathasas valley at the beginning of the 19th century. At the age of ten he was enrolled as a novice monk at the Trooditissa Monastery. He was a talented chanter and completed his studies in music at the Kykkos Monastery. He served as Deacon to three Archbishops (Panaretos, Ioannikios and Kyrillos I) in various departments of the Archbishopric, acquiring rich administrative and religious experience for a period of 27 years.11 He became archbishop in 1854. He dealt with his political functions with prudence and great discretion. Through his amiable and respectful character he was able to successfully negotiate several issues with the Ottoman governors of Cyprus, and he enjoyed their appreciation and respect. He was generally characterized as ‘an educated man, wise, prudent, priestly, with all the required qualifications for

Thanos Veremis, ‘State and Nation in Greece: 1821-1912’, in Tsaousis (eds.), Hellenism and Greekness, 59-68. 10 Kitromilidis, Cypriot Logiosyni, 60. 11 Philippos Georgiou, Historical News on the Church of Cyprus (Eidiseis istorikai peri tis ekklisias tis Kyprou), Kypriologiki Library, No. 4, Nicosia, 1975, 130. 9

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the throne of St Barnabas’. 12 His death was tragic. Despite several recommendations made to leave a cholera-stricken Nicosia, he chose to remain in the city and be close to his compatriots. He died of the disease on 4 August 1865.

The Ottoman reforms and their impact on Cypriot society The first attempts towards reform and westernisation of the Ottoman Empire, began before the nineteenth century.13 The Ottoman state attempted to modernise through administrative change in order to centralise power.14 These reforms were a conscious political choice and applied in a top-down fashion. Their main objective was the preservation of the cohesion of the Ottoman Empire through strong central control over regional forces. 15 In achieving the above objective, while at the same time ensure a strong army and a robust treasury, the Ottoman state resorted to a comprehensive reform program,16 exerted pressure to, and brought transformations over, communal structures at the local level. At the same time, these transformations were not a unilateral, but an interactive process, 17 and were also the result of internal political developments within the communities themselves. A network of political power holders came to question and challenge the authority of the Church of Cyprus, as a result of diverse factors such as: the foundation of the Greek State; the mismanagement of Cypriot finances; a trend towards migration; the rise of collective groups through the accumulation of economic power; and the new conditions in an era of reform both with the Ottoman government, Archive of the Archbishopric of Cyprus (A.A.C.) (Archeion Archiepiskopis Kyprou), Synodic Code A' (Synodikos Kodikas A'), 303-5. 13 Zürcher, Modern History of Turkey, 45. 14 Halil Inalcܻk, ‘Application of the Tanzimat and its social Effects’, Archivum Ottomanum, V (1973), 8. 15 Kostas Kostis, ‘Communities, Church and Millet in the Greek regions of the Ottoman Empire during the period of reforms’, Mnemon, XIII, 1991, 57. 16 Generally for the period of reforms by Mahmud II see Zurcher, Modern history of Turkey, 85-97; Bernard Lewis, The Emergence of Modern Turkey, Oxford University Press, 1968, 76-106; Kemal Karpat, ‘The Transformation of the Ottoman State, 1789-1908’, International Journal of Middle East Studies, III, 1972, 253-6; Aimilia Themopoulou, ‘Reforms in the Ottoman Empire’, Historical (Istorika), VI, 59, Newspaper Eleftherotypia 30/11/2000, 6-11. 17 Marc Aymes, ‘Reform talks: Applying the Tanzimat to Cyprus’, Ottoman Cyprus: a Collection of Studies on History and Culture, Michalis N. Michael, Matthias Kappler and Eftichios Gavriel (eds), Harrassowitz Verlag, Wiesbaden, 2009, 107-16. 12

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as well as at the Ecumenical Patriarchate. 18 As part of the structures of representation that were established, a body charged with the administration of the communal affairs of the Cypriot Orthodox was formed, known as the Koinon ton Kyprion (Communal Board of the Cypriots). 19 This institution functioned within the Ottoman political and legal structures, and was a collective body that managed the financial obligations of the Cypriot Orthodox community of Cyprus. The aim of the Ottoman government was to attribute an institutionalised political role to the high Cypriot Orthodox clergy. This was not the case in the pre-Tanzimat period, when the granting of a Sultanic berat to the prelates legally signified a personal, but not a corporate, relationship.20 The prelates acted under the authority of the Sultan, to whom they had direct access and a right to appeal to on issues concerning the affairs of the faithful. The position of the archbishops included obligations as well as rights. ‘Loyalty to the state, the collection and payment of Christian taxes and the obligation of government officials not to interfere in matters of jurisdiction of the prelates (ecclesiastical administration, management of church property and inheritance law regulating matters of Christians) and facilitating the prelates to deal with the aforementioned projects and collection of his rights.’21 The above features were key attributes that defined the relations of the Ottoman state with the Archbishops of Cyprus on a personal level. This means that the jurisdiction of the prelates was not institutionalized: …if a period existed when a Church-led communal administration had…a clearly delineated jurisdiction as a corporate institution, this was probably after the 1830s, and especially during the Tanzimat reforms. Previously, the fiscal and administrative functions of the community did not exclusively involve the clerical hierarchy, and entailed a great deal of experimentation, the stretching of the meanings of titles and bureaucratic terminology, arbitrary 18 Kyprianos D. Louis, ‘The Management of tax accounts of Cypriots from the Central Elders (1830-1839/40)’(I diacheirisi ton forologikon logariasmon tou Koinou tis Kyprou apo tin Kentriki Dimogerontia, 1830-1839/40), Epeterida Kentrou Epistimonikon Erevnon, XXVIII, 2002, 186. 19 On the structure, function and the hierarchical structure of the bodies of the ‘Public of Cyprus’ (Koinon Kyprion) see Louis, ‘The Management of tax bills’, 189-193, 207-208, 211. 20 Paraskevas Konortas, Ottoman visas for the Ecumenical Patriarchate: Berats for the Primates of the Great Church (17th - early 20th century), Alexandria, Athens, 1998, 46-9; Paul Chidiroglou, ‘Sultans Berat’, Epeterida, VII, 1973-5, 119-250, especially 121-5, 130-8, 141-5, 197-215. 21 Kitromilidis, ‘Cyprus’, 442.

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While during the nineteenth century the fiscal and administrative functions of the community went under the leadership of the Church, and indeed in an institutionalised fashion, these mechanisms gradually took a more collective form through the Communal Board. In other words, the institutionalisation of the role of the prelates was only possible through the creation of more collective and inclusive bodies, and it was this new element introduced by the Tanzimat reforms that permitted the transition from the personal to the corporate identity of communal leadership. In this context, during the mid-19th century, the regional central Council of Cyprus had a system of proportional representation which included non-clerical participants. The Communal Board of the Cypriots had mixed civic characteristics, both with regards to the representation of its members, as well as the separation of powers of its bodies. The gradual evolution of communal institutions in Cyprus was expressed in an indirect representative system which established at the central level four corporate bodies: the higher clergy, the central elders’ committee (Dimogerontia), the committee of the Board, and the general assembly. The latter was composed of the members of the first three bodies. At the local level of districts, committees of local elders were led by the local bishop, and additionally included the elders, the commissioners, and the provincial tax agents (secretary and parish officials (mahalledjides)). Maintaining a supervisory role, the prelates had responsibilities both at the central and district level. They remained accountable to the Sublime Porte and were committed to the protection of the Christian subjects. 23 The central elders’ committee exercised executive authority, appointing bodies that carried out tax collection (secretaries at central and provincial level and distributors), and were primarily responsible for managing taxation. The elders were supervised by the prelates on issues such as performance and control of accounts, decisions on the needs of the country and taxation policy. In addition, alongside the archbishop, they appointed the bodies responsible for assessing the ability of inhabitants to

22 Antonis Hadjikyriacou, Society and Economy on an Ottoman Island: Cyprus in the Eighteenth Century, Ph.D. Thesis, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 2011, 165. 23 Louis, ‘The Management of tax bills’, 190; A.A.C., Synodic Code A' (Synodikos Kodikas A'): Minutes of the General Assembly (24/7-1/8/1838), chapter 1st: About High Priests and Meetings Articles 1-2nd, 243-4; Kitromilidis, ‘Cyprus’, 441-2.

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pay tax (distributors) as well as supervising tax collection (district secretaries).24 In 1839, the Hatt-Ö úerif of Gülhane inaugurated a long period of reforms, and in 1856 a second imperial command (Hatt-Ö Hümayun) reformulated the provisions of the preceding order on the equality of Ottoman subjects in all areas of political life regardless of religion. 25 These were enacted by the Sultan during the period 1839-78 upon internal needs; thus, there was an inner Ottoman dimension to these reforms alongside the external pressures of the European powers. With the decrees of 1839 and 1856, new administrative reforms and governmental power structures were introduced in Cyprus in line with the general reforms. The result was a more effective control of the central government over the island through its local representatives, whose powers were formalised by these reforms.26 These changes took place immediately before and also during the period when Makarios I was archbishop. Additionally, an important administrative change took place when Cyprus was under the authority of the Vali of Rhodes, as part of the province of the Archipelago Islands as a separate sanjak (sancak) attached to pashalik (paûalÖk) of Rhodes.27 The new governor of the island called mutasarrif was paid a salary from the public purse and chaired the Great Council28 (Meclis-i ùdare or Meclis-i Kebir or Divan), which was based in Nicosia and met once a week. Apart from the governor who presided over the council, the other participants were the mufti, the mulla, the treasurer (muhasebeci), the Director of Lands (araz-i memuru), the Director of Pious Foundations (evkaf-i nazir), the archbishop, and six secular members A.A.C., Synodic Code A' (Synodikos Kodikas A'): Minutes of the General Assembly (11/04/1830) Articles H-IA, 200; A.A.C., Synodic Code A' (Synodikos Kodikas A'): Minutes of the General Assembly (24/7-1/8/1838), Chapter C: About Central Elders, Article 6th-9th, 245. 25 Carter Vaughn Findley, ‘The Tanzimat’, The Cambridge History of Turkey, IV, Turkey in the Modern World, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2008, 11-37; Dimitrios Stamatopoulos, ‘The Church as Politeia: Representations of the Orthodox millet and the model of constitutional monarchy (the second half of the 19th century), Mnemon, XXXIII, 2011, 182-220. 26 John P. Theocharidis, ‘Unpublished edict (firman) for the implementation of the Tanzimat in Cyprus’ (Adimosiefto fermani gia tin efarmogi tou Tazimat stin Kypro), Epeterida, XIII-XVI, 1, 1984-7, 447-58. 27 George Dionysiou, ‘A report of Archbishop Sophronios to the Sublime Porte (1872)’, Epeterida, XIX, 1992, 344-5. 28 Michalis N. Michael, The Church of Cyprus during the Ottoman period (1571-1878), Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia, 2005, 265-6; George Dionysiou, ‘The Ottoman Administration of Cyprus and the Tanzimat Reforms’, Epeterida, XX, 1994, 597. 24

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elected by the communities of the capital, three of whom were Christians and three Muslims.29 At the district level, the District Councils were created involving the local kaymakkam who presided, the local judge (kadÖ), local directors of lands, pious foundations (evkaf) and monastery property, the bishop, the local Christian treasurer of the community, and four members, two Christians and two Muslims, who were elected by the tax-paying Christian and Muslim members respectively in the region. Aside from these administrative councils, a Judicial Council chaired by the kadÖ was also established. At the level of local village, town, or parish administration, small councils were elected presided by the muhbir, in the case of the Christian communities, and the muhtar for the Muslim communities. Through these administrative changes and the creation of a more collective governance at the provincial level, there was a clear intention of the central government for more effective tax collection and a formal representation of religious groups in collective bodies with specific responsibilities. The participation of Archbishop Makarios I and other clerical and lay representatives of Cypriot Orthodox in collective bodies established in the context of the Tanzimat differed to the arrangements of the past. In this context, the Church functioned institutionally and at a corporate level, i.e. any delegation of authority was not a personal privilege conceded to the senior prelates on the sole basis of a berat, as was the case in the past. Within the spirit of equality, general conscription was established and reforms to the justice system were announced. These reforms would be based on the equality of all Ottoman subjects. At the same time, the new administrative arrangements, as well as the transformation of existing ones, promoted a centralization of state power. At the economic level a growing liberalization created greater opportunities for capital holders. The reforms of the Ottoman Empire aimed to encourage the Cypriot Orthodox elite to more actively develop commercial activities, to improve the economy of the island, and to spread the modern values of progress and development by turning towards the outside world, especially Europe. To achieve this, reforms attempted to weld even more closely the state and the Church, yet also allow for the involvement of secular elites. These processes constituted an attempt to establish equality among the subjects of the empire regardless of religion and to reinforce Ottoman 29

Dionysiou, ‘The Ottoman Administration’, 597.

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religious diversity. This enabled the creation of a civic Ottoman identity (OsmanlÖlÖk) that was linked to the Ottoman state on the basis of the political organisation of the nation, 30 while the Ottoman realms were consolidated through centralisation. Within the framework of the Tanzimat, a key component of the modernization of the social and political structures of the Ottoman state was the establishment of the millet system as an institutionalised way to organise communities along religious lines in order to further integrate them into political processes. 31 Since religion remained the main criterion for the differentiation of millets,32 this precluded the separation of religion from the state and its administrative system. At the same time, the institutionalisation of the participation of laymen in governance widened participation, which limited the powers of the clergy in the internal civil affairs of the millet.33 This was also a form of control through the satisfaction of the demands of the merchants and financiers of the rising bourgeoisie. The immediate priority of the Ottoman administration, however, was finding a reliable administrative scheme for the non-Muslim communities, incorporating the church apparatus into the administrative functions of the state. This enhanced the authority of the prelates since the institutionalising of their relationship to the state gave them more prestige and official authority.34 In this sense, the rearticulation of relations between state and religion in the Ottoman Empire imposed certain limits on the process of secularisation of the millet from the outset. This, of course, depended to a great extent on the power held by the clergy in each millet.

Findley, ‘The Tanzimat’, 28. Recognized by the state religious community which is under the spiritual authority of a religious leader. See Paraskevas Konortas, Ottoman Reforms, the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the 17th-early 20th century, Athens, 1998, 295-8, 318-35; Paraskevas Konortas, ‘From Tâ'ife to Millet: Ottoman terms for the Ottoman Greek Orthodox Community’, in (eds.) D. Gondigas and C, Issawi, Ottoman Greeks in the Age of Nationalism: Politics, Economy, and Society in the Nineteenth Century, The Darwin Press, Princeton, 1999, 171; B. Braude, ‘Foundation Myths of the Millet system’, in B. Braude, B. Lewis (eds.), Christians and Jews in the Ottoman Empire. The functioning of a plural society, II, Holmes & Meier Publishers, New York, 1982, 69-88. 32 Harris Exertzoglou, ‘The Orthodox community of Istanbul: From Tanzimat until the Great War’, Contemporary Issues (Sychrona Themata), 74-5, 2000, 115; Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 152-7. 33 Stamatopoulos, ‘The Church as Politeia’ (I Ekklisia os Politeia), Mnemon, XXXIII, 2011, 184. 34 Michael, The Church of Cyprus, 267-73. 30 31

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This reform effort was not restricted to the level of the constitution of the millets, but included other areas such as governance, law, and education. The participation of laymen in the administration of the Cypriot Orthodox community became more organised and consistent after 1830. 35 This representation contributed decisively to the challenging of the supremacy of religion in the management of political issues that had a material basis, and led to the production of a new institutional civic framework circumscribing the interaction of the religious with the civic/secular domain. 36 The application of this policy resulted from the tensions between lay and clerical groups, regardless of the reforms emanating from Istanbul. This rivalry manifested itself on several levels: in political discourse; in the practices of resolving the internal problems of the Cypriot Orthodox community; in the interactions of the community with the Ottoman state; and the contest over the paternalistic leadership of the community. The period from 1854-65, when Makarios I was archbishop, was marked by the perfectly harmonious coexistence of Muslims and Christian Cypriots, both in the countryside and in the cities, when there were no particular political crises causing religious conflict. Relations between the Orthodox prelates and the Ottoman authorities were good and characterised by cooperation in resolving issues on the island. Indeed the Cypriot Church was to secure more rights on the behalf of the Cypriot Orthodox. For example, one of the Tanzimat regulations concerned the use of bells in churches, which until then was not allowed, and was now made possible through an order by the Grand Vizier. Indeed, the first bell that rang in Cyprus during the Ottoman period was at the Cathedral of St. John, at the Archbishopric in 1859. Another limitation that was made obsolete was the prohibition of renovating or rebuilding temples without permission from the Sublime Porte. The great flexibility manifested by the Ottoman government after the mid1850s in the exercise of religious rights of the non-Muslim subjects of the Empire was evidenced by the multitude of requests for renovation of temples.37 An example was when Archbishop Makarios I erected the Great Conciliar and the adjacent spacious reception rooms for the Bishops or foreign officials visiting the Archbishopric from 1862-3.38

Louis, ‘The Management of tax accounts’, 186. On the structure, function and the hierarchical structure of the bodies ‘Public of Cyprus’ see ibid., 189-193, 207-8, 211. 37 Theocharis Stavridis, Ecumenical Patriarchate and Cyprus: The Patriarchate documents for 1600-1878 (Oikoumenikon patriarcheion kai Kypros: Ta Patriarchika eggrafa ton eton 16001878), Nicosia, 2001, 216-7. 38 Georgiou, Historical News, 131-2. 35 36

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In terms of external relations and the positioning of the Cypriot Church in relation to the rest of the Eastern Orthodox world, Cypriot clergy were invited to be represented at the 1858 general assembly39 convened by the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Istanbul to examine and resolve the ecclesiastical and spiritual affairs of the Eastern Orthodox. During a meeting at the Archbishopric it was decided that Makario I, accompanied by a layman, the teacher Onoufrios Pavlidis, would represent Cyprus. Yet, the journey to Istanbul did not take place for unknown reasons. The joint representation of clerical and lay individuals was a long tradition that continued to represent the two poles of authority in Cypriot Orthodox society. During this period, the concept of political-religious collective responsibility was in order, and the actions of Makarios I were not addressed by the Ottoman Empire as isolated personal decisions. In the days of Makarios I, the autonomy of the millet was incorporated into the Ottoman structure of power with expanded responsibilities on multiple levels, such as: a)

the right of registration of property of deceased Cypriot Orthodox by their religious leaders rather than by representatives of the Ottoman authorities; b) testimonies of Christians to be accepted in court; c) and in 1856, with representations to the Ottoman authorities, Makarios I managed to ensure that Cypriot priests would not be obstructed in the execution of their duties. For example, priests were obliged to participate in the persecution of locusts that plagued Cyprus, abandoning sermons and locking the churches. These rights ameliorated the living conditions of Christian Orthodox. The exercise of such expanded jurisdiction over the internal issues of their millet was an archetypal version of constitutional monarchy based on patriarchal centralisation. This allowed Makarios to try to resolve several internal issues of discipline and governance in the Church of Cyprus. He addressed the issue of the Bishop of Paphos, Hariton, who faced intense opposition and accusations by the people in Paphos of showing indifference, and financial mismanagement.40 Tensions rose when people close to Hariton reacted. The matter ended with the death of Hariton in 1855 and the election of Laurentios, a fellow villager of Makarios I. Another issue arose in 1861, when tension developed after accusations by the monks of the monastery of Stavridis, Ecumenical Patriarchate and Cyprus, 190-2, 210-1. Loizos Philippou, The Church of Cyprus under Turkish rule (I Ekklisia tis Kyprou epi Tourkokratias), Nicosia, 1975, 156-8.

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St Panteleimon at Myrtou that the Bishop of Kyrenia, Meletios, intervened in the administration of the convent, including in its financial management. The matter was settled with the intervention of Makarios I. Another serious matter with Bishop Meletios was raised again in 1864, when he was at odds with the people of his bishopric, which resulted in a failed mediation by Makarios I, and his subsequent calling upon Meletios to resign. When the latter refused, the archbishop called a synod at the archbishopric, and Meletios was deposed. Financial embezzlement was however widespread. The phenomenon of embezzlement of church funds by people close to each prelate – often within the family environment – was a matter considered as given, both for the congregation and the church itself. This created a vicious cycle for indebtedness of ecclesiastical institutions – mainly of the Bishoprics – which often caused financial scandals in the management of communal funds, and had a direct impact on the congregation of the Church, and particularly the representatives of an elite class who were constantly asking for a more political role in representing the community.41

The absolute control of ecclesiastical authority in the political and economic management of church funds was strongly questioned around 1860 when the indebtedness of the Bishopric of Kitium became acute. Urban political forces bringing new ideas, with close connections to the consulates and the ideological developments of the time, challenged the dominant role of ecclesiastical authority and demanded to have a say and participate in the management of church funds. This conflict, while in other parts of the Ottoman Empire it took a different form, in Cyprus it fell within the Church itself, as was stated by the Bishop of Kitium, Kyprianos, in a circular to the inhabitants of Limassol in 1875, as the problem still existed. My Christians, in other environments in order to achieve such a reform [i.e. laymen taking over the finances of the Bishopric] these communities and this state are fighting a hopeless struggle. The word secularisation itself, wherever it was uttered by communities, roused storms. And yet, the measure I repeatedly propose is secularisation itself [...]42.

Also on 13 May 1864 a synod was held in Nicosia during which measures were taken to protect church property. The decision essentially prohibited any prelate to sell real estate, donations, expropriations, or borrow money on behalf of his throne without the consent of the Holy Synod.43 The measures Stavridis, Ecumenical Patriarchate and Cyprus, 396. Circular of Metropolitan Kyprianos of Kitium, 7 June 1875 see Michael, The Church of Cyprus, 201-10. 43 A.A.C., Synodic Code A' (Synodikos Kodikas A'), 333. 41 42

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were aimed at putting an end to arbitrary actions by Cypriot prelates, who often caused serious financial problems by abusing and taking advantage of their position. Concerned with the care and needs of the country, Archbishop Makarios I submitted a memorandum to the Grand Vizier in 1859. 44 Makarios secured the help of the Ecumenical Patriarch and the Grand Vizier, KÖbrÖslÖ Mehmet Pasha, who was a Cypriot. The intention was to submit the memorandum to Sultan Abdülmecid during a visit to the island, but this was cancelled. A year later, Makarios’ requests to the Grand Vizier secured the abolition of the pig tax.45

Education as a means of social progress and moulding virtuous citizens The social and political currents of modernity began to change traditional theocratic regimes in the Ottoman Empire. The blending of Muslim theocratic political power with European values in the Ottoman context had a long history and went through several variations. The diffusion of modern values in Cyprus was influenced by the political, cultural and economic context of the island. The Orthodox Church of Cyprus was the dominant moral, cultural, social, economic and political power on the island, despite the fact that traders and scholars came in contact with the social critique of the Enlightenment and the ideas of the French Revolution, initially in Larnaca, and later in Limassol. 46 In these conditions, a nascent bourgeoisie was gradually strengthening and was becoming conscious during the 19th century.47 The ideological framework of education in Cyprus divides into two distinct phases, each marked by the two inaugurations of the Pancyprian Gymnasium, first in 1812 and then in 1893. The survival of information on religious education can easily be explained if the profound effect that every religion had over culture in the pre-modern era, and even during the transition to modernity, was understood. In the case of the Cypriot Orthodox, religion was closely connected with culture and society. The founding of schools and establishment of educational institutions in any

Stavridis, Ecumenical Patriarchate and Cyprus, 189-90. Philippou, The Church of Cyprus during the Turkish period (1570-1878), Nicosia, 1975, 229. 46 Kitromilidis, Cyprus Logiosyni, 58. 47 See generally Rolandos Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus during the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century, Nicosia, 1996. 44 45

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given society was emblematic or a codification of the outcome of the struggle of competing political and social forces.48 Education was the field in which Archbishop Makarios I accomplished a great deal. Following his election, his primary concern was the spiritual development of Cypriot Orthodox millet, 49 while the Greek language was taught only because it was the language of the Church. His educational philosophy and desired policy can be seen in a circular letter to his bishops: Reflecting, on the one hand, on the great progress made by foreign countries who rejoice in having prosperity in their social life, and rightly attributing the first causes of their condition were the establishment of educational institutions, which increase and are brought to perfection daily through consistent zeal and willingness for the dissemination and propagation of education, capable of producing many commodities, which by truly educating the youth on a more ethical manner, distinguishes them as skilful individuals in society, living a wealthier, more ethical, and comfortable life, freeing them of all poverty and any habitual contempt as well as any weakness caused by anti-Christian ignorance which is reinforced by idleness, the mother of all evils[...] 50

In this instance, and throughout his time as archbishop, Makarios I attempted to infuse the more materialist values of modernity with an emphasis on spirituality. This was in line with the ideology championed by the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Istanbul in the context of an ideological competition with the Greek state over the leadership of, and authority over, the Greek-speaking Eastern Orthodox Christians. The latter emphasised a secular nationalist discourse, while the former stood for an ecumenical world view that tried to reconcile modernity with the spiritual values of religion. The combination of religious with secular education continued under Archbishop Makarios I, who foresaw the social and economic benefits of education. The main educational institutions introduced by the Cypriot Orthodox to promote modernity included the massive expansion of primary education, informal schools for dissemination of literacy, 51 and the

48 Panagiotis Persianis, Reference to Kyprianos (Anafora ston Kypriano), University of Nicosia, Nicosia, 2012, 17, 22. 49 Record list of schools by district, type of school, student types of courses, numbers of teachers and students see Philipou, The Greek Letters, 175-6. 50 A.A.C., Correspondence Archive of Cyprus Archbishops, 48. 51 For the practical importance of literacy in society see Persianis, Reference to Kyprianos, 89-90.

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establishment of the first girls’ schools in Nicosia and Limassol in 1859.52 He ‘stimulated dignity and zeal for education in many towns and villages which established many self-taught schools’.53 Indeed, the establishment of schools for the first time in many parts of Cyprus was due to him. Letters by the archbishop to the residents of several villages (e.g. Athienou) urged them to establish schools. He increased the resources of schools in Nicosia and appointed several teachers. In 1859, he founded the first school for girls at Phaneromeni in Nicosia,54 and in the same year he reorganised the Greek School in Nicosia, with the contribution of the Cypriot Director of the Holy Cross Jerusalem School, Dionysos Cleopas. 55 Girls’ schools were also founded in Larnaca and Limassol. There were also the first regulations of the Phaneromeni School which included (a) the jurisdiction and responsibilities of the members of the Committee and the way it was elected, (b) issues concerning the management of school resources, (c) the duties, responsibilities, teacher specialisations, and the curriculum of the school, (d) admission regulations, absences and studiousness of students, (e) the duration of the school year, exams and holidays, and (f) attendance, which was extended to five years. 56 The curriculum included, apart from ancient Greek texts, grammar, religious studies, and the teaching of Turkish and French, Geography, Mathematics, Physics, History, Sociology and Logic. According to the register, in 1860 the Cypriot School in Nicosia (also called the Gymnasium) had a staff of four teachers, later increasing to five. In the same year self-taught elementary schools operated in all major rural communities and monasteries, and schools were functioning in the three major cities (Nicosia, Limassol, Larnaca), in the Kykko Monastery and Omodos. In 1869 the school in Nicosia had 39 students and they were taught Greek, Turkish, French and mathematics. Makarios I also mobilised all prelates and monasteries in Cyprus for work and contributions to education and for scholarships. Future Archbishop Sophronios III, who was sent by Archbishop Makarios I to study Theology at the University of Athens (185761), returned to Cyprus in 1861, and was appointed preacher and headmaster of the Cypriot School in Nicosia until 1865, when he was elected archbishop of Cyprus. Among others who benefited from scholarships granted by Makarios I was also the later Bishop of Kitium, Kyprianos. Makarios I Philipou, The Greek Letters, 246-8. Georgiou, Historical News, 131. 54 The establishment of the Girls School was financially supported by Cypriot bishops of the Patriarchate of Jerusalem, Archbishop of Petra Meletios and the Archbishop of Gaza Philemon see ibid., 131. 55 Philipou, The Greek Letters, 190-1. 56 Ibid, 192-202. 52 53

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appointed Philip Georgiou, who had studied at the School of Theology in Jerusalem, as secretary. To enhance education in Cyprus, Makarios I appealed to many places outside the island, especially where prelates or abbots were of Cypriot origin. Several responded and sent financial assistance, including Ioannikios (of the Vatopedi Monastery, Mount Athos), Meletios (Bishop of Petra), and Philemon (Bishop of Gaza). At the same time, Makarios I increased the archbishopric grant to schools to 10,000 piastres, and also dedicated several types of revenue accrued by the Church. Apart from Nicosia, the towns of Limassol, Larnaca and Kyrenia had Greek and all-girl schools, supported by the contributions of the people and the relevant bishop. The establishment and operation of schools, albeit quite weak, in an era characterised by almost complete and universal illiteracy and ignorance, was a difficult task. By 1860 there were 23 schools and 945 students.57The composition of the Educational Committees in Nicosia, comprised of members of the nascent bourgeoisie, that is, traders, professionals, and intellectuals. The legacy of these individuals was long-lasting, and some of them ‘had a successful career as eminent political personalities during the British period’.58 Makarios I, building on the annual assemblies of bishops, abbots and elders, founded more schools and improved their maintenance, organisation, management and staffing. 59 By setting an annual sponsorship from each monastery, church and community, the immediate financial security of the schools was achieved.60 The church leadership legitimized, on the one hand, its interest in education and pressure exerted on religious institutions to contribute financially to the establishment and operation of schools, and, on the other, its consent to include secular education. The Orthodox Church believed that education was primarily the cultivation of the soul and mind and, by extension, the character of individuals, and which referred to the moral content of religious education. In this way, the sacred character of religious education was, to a certain extent, transferred to secular education. This was evident with the emphasis of Makarios I on teaching ethics. The focus of education was on good behaviour and morality. He supported his arguments for the value of education on the practical objective of teaching ethics, which was based on the empirical observation that there was a relationship between human morality and the happy or unhappy path in one’s life.61 As early as 1869, in a document relating to the donation of the Dionysiou, ‘The Ottoman Administration of Cyprus’, 594. Ibid. 59 Philipou, The Greek Letters, 192-202. 60 Ibid, 100-2, 191. 61 Persianis, Reference to Kyprianos (Anafora ston Kypriano), 111. 57 58

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Bishop of Paphos Neophytos to promote education, the donor stated that ‘the interests of the nation and the church’ were unbreakable, and he hoped that they would both ‘perpetually progress appropriately’, calling the schools ‘national educational shops’.62 The use of the word ‘nation’ was likely, as seen in the earlier chapters in this volume on Kyprianos and Panaretos, as well as the next chapter on Sophronios, to have referred not to the ‘Greek’ nation, but to the Eastern Orthodox nation in Cyprus. For Makarios I, as for his predecessors and successors, the modern idea of the ‘nation’ was adopted to suit the pre-modern religious identity of the Ottoman system.

Conclusion The political, economic and social context in which any modernisation efforts took place was determined by commercial European presence, conflicting Balkan nationalisms, the reform movements in the Ottoman Empire, but above all by the desire of the leadership of the Cypriot Orthodox Church to maintain and secure its powerful and privileged position in the Ottoman bureaucracy. In order to do this it was very willing to formalise its political role through the new legal mechanisms, even if this meant including secular elites. This gave it additional power and prestige, which it used in order to control the education system that the Ottomans now encouraged. In this way they were able to implement an education system that combined the new secular curriculum with their desire to create model Ottoman subjects, those being moral Christians who respected all their neighbours regardless of religion. It can thus be concluded that, overall, Archbishop Makarios I was a man emblematic of the Tanzimat reforms. While embracing secular modernity in a selective fashion, his political project was filtered through religion. He contributed to the consolidation of the role of the Cypriot Church in the Ottoman political system. His mark was left most visibly in the realm of education, where he undertook a leading role in promoting the fusion of spiritual and material values. At the intercommunal level, he was also able to secure the excellent relations between Christians and Muslims. Internally, he attempted to adapt to the new socio-political conditions created by the gradual rise of a nascent Christian Cypriot bourgeoisie, in order to further enshrine the power and prestige of the Cypriot Church.

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CHAPTER SIX SOPHRONIOS III, 1865-1900: THE LAST OF THE ‘OLD’ AND THE FIRST OF THE ‘NEW’ ARCHBISHOP-ETHNARCHS? ANDREKOS VARNAVA

Archbishop Sophronios III was undoubtedly one of the most important of the archbishops of Cyprus in the modern era. There are three reasons for this: 1) he was one of the longest serving archbishops, serving from October 1865 to May 1900; 2) he was archbishop during one of the most significant periods of transition for Cyprus and its people, the ending of Ottoman rule and the start of British rule; and 3) he was the last of the ‘old’ and first of the ‘new’ ethnarchs. This chapter uses British, Cypriot and Ottoman archives to place these three themes into their appropriate historical context in order to provide a meaningful analysis of Sophronios as archbishop, ethnarch and as a person. In Cypriot historiography and Cypriot national consciousness Archbishop Sophronios has been neglected because he was not a nationalist that championed enosis, or, conversely, he has been depicted as a nationalist and thus as someone who he was not. A third characterisation is that he was a ‘closet’ or ‘soft’ nationalist, that believed and supported enosis, but did not wish to upset the British, and thus lacked the courage of his convictions.1 This school of thought has him as the inspiration for the so called ‘moderates’ on the enosis question that were represented after 1910 by the Bishop of Kyrenia, who became Archbishop Kyrrilos III in 1916. Sophronios was born in Prodromos village in the Marathasas region (the same village as his predecessor) on 25 April 1825 and at an early age moved with his family to Foini village. At seven his father enrolled him in 1 Robert Holland and Diana Markides, The British and the Hellenes: Struggles for Mastery in the Eastern Mediterranean 1850-1960, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2006, 162-88.

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Trooditissa Monastery, where Sophronios’ uncle, Haralambos, was a monk. In 1843 Sophronios was ordained a deacon at Chrysoroyiatissa Monastery and two years later left Cyprus to study theology at Attaleia (modern Antalya), following in the footsteps of the Apostles St Barnabas, the patron saint of Cyprus, and St Paul of Tarsus. He moved to Smyrna (modern Izmir) in 1847, where he acted as deacon at the hospital and studied for four years at the Evangelical School. He then taught lower classes at the school for two years. In 1853 he went to Athens, and from 1854 to 1857 studied at the Rizarion Ecclesiastical School. Then from 1857 to 1861 Sophronios studied theology at the University of Athens, with his funds defrayed from the Church of Cyprus treasury. He returned to Cyprus and was made headmaster of the Cypriot Orthodox School in Nicosia from 1861 to 1865 when he was elected archbishop.2 Clearly, it was a quick rise, given that he became archbishop at the age of 40, compared to his immediate predecessors and successors who were all older (the exception is Makarios III nearly a century later, who was only marginally younger, at 37). This biographical sketch must be placed in its historical context so that meaning can be made of his early life before he became archbishop, and especially how his education and experiences influenced his subsequent career. The Evangelical School, where Sophronios studied from 1846 to 1851 and taught for two years from 1851 to 1853, was the most prominent school for the Eastern Orthodox Christians of Smyrna during the nineteenth century. Founded in 1723 as a church-approved institution, it was funded by wealthy members of the Orthodox community. In 1747 the Evangelical School acquired the protection of the British Levant Company, which was responsible for providing consular services to its citizens.3 Sultan Mahmud II formally recognised the British protected status over the Evangelical School in 1810. During Sophronios’ time there, the enrolments remained fairly stable, averaging around 250 a year, but they dramatically increased later in the century, reaching 1,500 by the start of the twentieth century.4 After the 1830s, the school slowly adopted more progressive and rational educational methods, including the teaching of modern mathematics and sciences in the ‘western’ tradition, which conservative circles at the Ecumenical Patriarchate

2 Aristedis Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƌƥƮƩƪƼƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ, 1800-1920 (Biographical Lexicon of Cypriots, 1800-1920), Nicosia, 2001, 362-3. 3 Lucia Patrizio Gunning, The British Consular Service in the Aegean and the Collection of Antiquities for the British Museum, Ashgate, 2009. 4 Gerasimos Augustinos, The Greeks of Asia Minor: Confession, Community, and Ethnicity in the Nineteenth Century, The Kent State University Press, Kent, Ohio, & London, 1992, 158-60.

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did not always support.5 Consequently, Sophronios’ period in Smyrna, a number of years after the establishment of the Greek kingdom, and the institutionalisation of ‘modern’ and ‘western’ traditions of education, meant that he would have been introduced to the Enlightenment ideas through the teaching of rational thinking in classes such as mathematics and physical sciences, and as to how these applied to contemporary society and politics, and thus he would have been introduced to the ideas of political equality and nationalism, especially ethnic nationalism, despite the fact that the Ecumenical Patriarchate may have opposed such teaching. Indeed because Sophronios was introduced to such Enlightenment ideas, it does not mean that he supported or rejected them. His tenure as archbishop in fact indicates that he accepted some Enlightenment ideas but not others. This conflict between the two types of education, the modern rational education of the Enlightenment, and the more religious education of the pre-modern period, was linked with the Tanzimat in the Ottoman Empire and mirrored the conflicts between Muslims of the Ottoman Empire who supported one or the other approach.6 His time in Athens, between 1853 and 1861, was undoubtedly one of the most tumultuous for the young Greek kingdom. In 1850 the British government blockaded Piraeus port because the Greek government ignored the claim of a Portuguese Jew, Pacifico, a British citizen by virtue of being born in Gibraltar, that the Greek state should compensate him for his shop being ransacked. Then in late 1853, the year Sophronios arrived in Athens, King Otto attempted to bring Greece into the Crimean War on the Russian side hoping to acquire Ottoman territory to realise the ‘Great Idea’ (ƍƥƣƜƫƧ ƊƤƝơ) – the expansion of the borders of the Greek kingdom – through using paramilitary bands, which included students from the University of Athens, to foment unrest in Thessaly, Epirus and Macedonia.7 In reply, the British and French governments ordered their fleets to occupy Piraeus in May 1854,

5 Snezana Lawrence, ‘A Balkan Trilogy: Mathematics in the Balkans before World War I’, in (eds.) Eleanor Robson, Jacqueline A. Stedall, The Oxford Handbook of the History of Mathematics, Oxford University Press, 2004, 177-96, 185. 6 Selçuk AkûÖn Somel, The Modernization of Public Education in the Ottoman Empire, 18391908, Leiden 2001; Benjamin Fortna, ‘Islamic Morality in Late Ottoman “SECULAR” Schools’, International Journal of Middle East Studies, XXXII, 3, 2000, 36993. 7 For a new interpretation of the ‘Great Idea’ see, Andrekos Varnava, ‘British and Greek Liberalism and Imperialism in the Long Nineteenth Century’, Matthew P. Fitzpatrick (ed.), Liberal Imperialism in Europe, Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2012, 21940.

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forcing Otto into neutrality. The occupation lasted until February 1857.8 Sophronios would have been aware of, perhaps even witnessed, the occupation of Piraeus during these years, and the debates for and against the British and French policy and that of Otto. It seems from his career as archbishop that Sophronios must have accepted the rationale of the British and French intervention and opposed the ‘Great Idea’, or at least the ‘Great Idea’ at all costs. This means that although he studied at the University of Athens, the first university in the Balkans and the national university of Greece, and therefore was introduced further to the ideas of ethnic nationalism and the ‘Great Idea’, Sophronios was capable of choosing whether to agree with or reject these ideas, rather than simply being swept up by them.

Teacher and Archbishop during Ottoman Period After sixteen years away from Cyprus, Sophronios returned and settled in Nicosia in 1861, where his education made him the best qualified person to take up the position of headmaster of the Nicosia High School. Because he was the only name put forward for archbishop, it is safe to assume that as headmaster he was liked and respected. It is probably also fair to assume that he tried to introduce some teaching methods that he had learned in Smyrna and Athens. What is clear is that, like the Nicosia Girls School, evident in the statement of its director in 1869, the primary aims of the Nicosia High School were also to mould leaders with a piety to God and a respect for their Orthodox and Muslim neighbours.9 There was clearly no effort to impart an ethnic national identity on the Christian students of either school, and indeed the aim was to continue to focus identity around religion in a way that did not lead to divisions and conflict with Cypriot Muslims. Also, as had been the case since the spread of Christianity to Cyprus and elsewhere, language was never associated with a political or ethnic identity. The Greek language was taught in Cypriot schools because it was the language of the church, not because it was the language of the people, who spoke a composite language, heavily influenced by various Greek idioms, as well as Frankish, Venetian, and Ottoman idioms. The Greek language of the church and the Cypriot

Richard Clogg, A Short History of Modern Greece, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2nd ed., 1986, 80-1. 9 Th. Papadopoullos, ƋƾƤƩƮ ƓƷƯƫƥƟƹƭ ƌƥƵƪƹƳƟơƲ (Codes of Schools Nicosia) Nicosia, 1991, 157. My translation. 8

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language of the people were completely distinct, with the latter also spoken by most Muslims.10 On 4 August 1865, Archbishop Makarios, in refusing medical advice to remove himself to the Troodos Mountains, died from the cholera that was gripping Nicosia. Owing to the cholera, three months passed (28 October) before his successor was elected.11 According to Hackett, Sophronios was the only name put forward.12 Quite obviously he stood out as one of a few clergy to have obtained a university degree, but also, as will be shown, he had many other qualities. Sophronios served as archbishop for thirteen years before the British occupation and administration of the island started. These years were interesting for Cyprus and its Orthodox Christian population for many reasons: internal problems, mainly associated with poor harvests and locust plagues, caused discontent and famine for the majority of the rural population across the religious divide; internationally, there was the Bulgarian Exarchate crisis that rocked the Eastern Orthodox Church, as well as the Russo-Ottoman War of 1877-8. To all these events, the rise of ethnic nationalism and the clash with the pre-modern Ottoman system must be contextualised when exploring Sophronios’ reactions and responses. In 1868 Sophronios had cause to send an autobiographical note – a narrative of his life and career achievements – to the Jerusalem Theological School. It is unclear as to why Sophronios did this. It may be related to the fact that the future archbishop of Cyprus and chief Greek Cypriot nationalist agitator under Sophronios’ tenure as archbishop during the 1890s, Kyrillos II, was studying at the Theological School of the Holy Cross in Jerusalem between 1866 and 1872.13 The reason may of course have nothing to do with this, and merely have been a way of introducing himself after his election as archbishop. 10 See Rebecca Bryant, Imagining the Modern: The Cultures of Nationalism in Cyprus, I. B. Tauris, London, 2004, 34, 276; and Andrekos Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915: The Inconsequential Possession, Manchester University Press, 2009, 157. 11 BaûbakanlÖk OsmanlÖ Arûivleri (BOA), HR.TO/447/83, six (unnamed) inhabitants of Cyprus to Grand Vizier, 28 October 1865; Philippou Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ ƑƝƱƩ ƴƧƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ (Historical Affairs on the Church of Cyprus), Athens, 1875 (repr., Nicosia, 1975), 133. 12 Rev. John Hackett, A History of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus: From the Coming of the Apostles Paul and Barnabas to the Commencement of the British Occupation (A.D. 45-A.D. 1878), Burt Franklin, New York, 1901 (rep. 1972), 235. 13 Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƌƥƮƩƪƼƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ, 166.

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The most important sentence in the entire document is the first: ‘my homeland is Cyprus and my parents are Orthodox Christians of the Eastern dogma’.14 Sophronios clearly characterised his collective identity according to his geographic space (shown by his reference to Cyprus as his homeland) and his religious beliefs (his Eastern Orthodox Christianity). In short, Sophronios considered himself a ‘Cypriot Romios’ or as the Ottomans would have put it, a ‘Cypriot Rum’. These determinants – geographical space and religion – were clearly a reflection of both Byzantine and Ottoman approaches to social structures and governance and therefore were pre-modern in inspiration. This, however, does not make them illegitimate, and quite clearly Sophronios had a collective identity within the ambit of Ottoman rule, that reflected the political (Ottoman), social (high clergy), cultural (Cypriot), and religious (Eastern Orthodox Christian) realities in the geographical space that was the island of Cyprus. This made him, on the one hand, an Ottoman citizen of some prominence as a member of the ruling class, and, on the other hand, a Cypriot of the Eastern Orthodox Christian Church. Neither Greece nor being Greek was mentioned in his entire biographical letter, despite, as previously established, the fact he would have been well aware of the rise of ethnic-nationalism and the ‘Great Idea’ from his years in Smyrna and Athens, where many Romyi (plural of Romios) had become Hellenised (gone from a religious collective identity to an ethnic national identity). Quite clearly Sophronios chose to remain devoted to the collective identity that reflected his homeland – Cyprus – rather than an imposed and imagined homeland – Greece.15 The Bulgarian struggle for a separate church during the 1860s and 1870s created space for the new ideas of ethnic nationalism and the older ideas of religious collective identity to clash, and Sophronios, as a participant at the August 1872 Holy and Great Pan-Orthodox Synod at Constantinople, was intimately involved. From the 1820s, Bulgarians wanting Bulgarian speakers appointed as Bishops in Bulgarian-speaking areas of the Balkans met with opposition from the Ecumenical Patriarchate, which continued to appoint Greek speakers. In the 1850s, Bulgarian elites initiated a campaign to replace Greek clerics in Bulgarian populated areas and to replace the Greek language in churches with Church Slavonic. Because the Ottoman social system organised society according to religion and therefore the Bulgarians belonged 14 Sophronios autobiographical note, 1868, Theodore Papadopoullos, «ƆƨƭơƱƷƩƪƼƲ ƒƼƫƯƲ ƴƧƲ ƐƱƨƯƤƼƮƯƵ ƊƥƱơƱƷƟơƲ», Kypriakai Spoudai, XXXV, 1971, 95-141, 115. 15 See Sia Anagnostopoulou, ƍƩƪƱƜ ƂƳƟơ 19ƯƲ ơƩ. -1919. ƐƩ ƥƫƫƧƭƯƱƨƼƤƯƮƥƲ ƪƯƩƭƼƴƧƴƥƲ. ƂưƼ ƴƯ ƬƩƫƫƝƴ ƴƹƭ ƒƹƬƩƾƭ ƳƴƯ ƥƫƫƧƭƩƪƼ ƝƨƭƯƲ [Asia Minor 19th Century to 1919: The Greek-Orthodox Communities: From the millets of the Romans to Greek nation], Athens, 1997.

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to the Orthodox Rum millet, and was thus based on religious not ethnic or linguistic affiliation, many Bulgarian religious elites realised that to achieve their aims they needed autonomy from the Ecumenical Patriarchate. The first breakthrough came in 1849 when the Ottoman government permitted the Bulgarians to build a church in Constantinople, which was to conduct services in Bulgarian, be run by a Bulgarian council, and be owned by the Bulgarian people. The church was still under the dogmatic and ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Patriarchate, but the church, St Stephen’s, became the centre of Bulgarian cultural and political activity until the 1870s. The struggle intensified in the 1860s as Greek clerics were removed from many Bulgarian bishoprics, resulting in Sultan Abdülaziz (1861-76) granting the Bulgarians the right to establish an autonomous Bulgarian Exarchate for the dioceses of Bulgaria, and those where two thirds of Orthodox Christians were willing to join it, through a firman on 28 February 1870. The Exarchate was broadly autonomous, but still under the supreme canonical authority of the Ecumenical See, and thus not autocephalous; nevertheless, it was the first time in church history that a separate diocese was established based on ethnic identity rather than principles of Orthodoxy and the territory of a nationstate.16 The first Bulgarian Exarch, Antim I, who was elected by the Holy Synod of the Exarchate on 16 February 1872, unilaterally declared the Bulgarian Church autocephalous. He was promptly defrocked by a Patriarchal Synod. Subsequently, in September 1872, the Holy and Great Pan-Orthodox Synod was held in Constantinople, chaired by Ecumenical Patriarch Anthimus VI, wherein the Patriarchs of Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem (the latter declined to sign the Council’s decisions), and the Archbishop of Cyprus, Sophronios, declared on 18 September the Bulgarian Exarchate schismatic and its adherents excommunicated. The Synod accused the Bulgarian Exarchate of surrendering Orthodoxy to ‘ethno-tribalism’ or ‘ethnophyletism’ (ƥƨƭƯƶƵƫƥƴƩƳƬƼƲ), which was deemed heretic. Phyletism, that is to say the distinction on account of differing racial descent and language and the assertion or exercise of exclusive rights by individuals or bodies of people, who are fellow-countrymen and aligned alike, whichever nature it may have in secular states, is alien to our disposition and beyond the present enquiry; but in the Christian church, being a spiritual community predetermined by its head and founder to embrace all nations in a single Christian order, phyletism is foreign and entirely incomprehensible…we abnegate, judging against and condemning phyletism, that is racial distinctions and ethnic strife and envies and divergence within the Church of Christ, as 16 R. J. Crampton, A Concise History of Bulgaria, Cambridge University Press, 2nd ed., Cambridge, 2005. For a more detailed albeit more partisan (in favour of the Bulgarians) exploration see Mercia MacDermott, A History of Bulgaria, 1393-1885, George Allen & Unwin, London, 1962, 143-68.

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opposing the teachings of the gospel and the sacred canons of our blessed fathers, which foster both the holy church and the entire Christian commonwealth, mustering them towards divine piety.17

That Sophronios denounced and condemned ethno-nationalism, reflected Orthodox Cypriot society at the time. Indeed, in 1876, Greece’s last viceconsul before the British arrival lamented to his superiors in Athens that ‘the spirit of Hellenism in some places is asleep and in others totally nonexistent’.18 This was obviously not because there was a lack of education, but because education did not aim to create ‘Greeks’ but Cypriot Romyi who would live harmoniously with their Muslim neighbours. Sophronios was a strong advocate of Christian-Muslim relations in Cyprus and, from the start of his tenure as archbishop, proved most capable of working with the local Muslim elites and with the Ottoman government in Constantinople. Generally, Cyprus during Ottoman rule was peaceful in relation to the lack of religious or ethnic/racial violence, with its two largest religious communities, the Eastern Orthodox Christian and Muslim, integrating at all social/class levels.19 Class, religion and geographical space determined social and collective identities. Leaders in the Eastern Orthodox Church gained much power after the Ottoman conquest as the Church became the only recognised Christian authority on the island (replacing the Catholic Church).20 The Cypriot Orthodox Church was autonomous of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Constantinople and the three Apostolic Patriarchates in Jerusalem, Antioch and Alexandria, and its archbishop was Declaration signed by the ecumenical patriarch, the patriarchs of Antioch, and Alexandria, and the Archbishop of Cyprus, quoted in Irene Pophaides, The Genesis of Greek Cypriot National Identity in British Cyprus, 1878-1931, forthcoming, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 2013; See also Paraskevas Matalas, ŻƨƭƯƲ ƪơƩ ƐƱƨƯƤƯƮƟơ: ƐƩ ƑƥƱƩưƝƴƥƩƥƲ ƬƩơƲ ƓƷƝƳƧƲ (Ethnicity and Orthodoxy: The Adventures of one Case), Heraklion: Panepistimiakes Ekdoseis Kritis, 2002, 327-37. 18 Rolandos Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus during the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century, Nicosia, 1996, 52, quoted from the archive of the Greek Foreign Ministry. 19 Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 152-7. 20 Costas Kyrris, ‘The Role of Greeks in the Ottoman Administration of Cyprus’, Proceedings of the First International Conference on Cypriot Studies, III, A, 1973, 149-179; Nicholas Coureas, ‘The Cypriot Reaction to the Establishment of the Latin Church: Resistance and Collaboration’, Sources Travaux Historiques, XXXXIII-IV, 1995, 75-84; Michalis N. Michael, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƯƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞ ưƥƱƟƯƤƯ, 1571-1878. ƈ ƳƴơƤƩơƪƞ ƳƵƣƪƱƼƴƧƳƞ ƴƧƲ Ƴƥ ƨƥƳƬƼ ưƯƫƩƴƩƪƞƲ ƥƮƯƵƳƟơƲ [The Church of Cyprus during the Ottoman Period, 1571-1878. Its Gradual Formation into an Institution of Political Power], Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia, 2005. 17

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recognised as the ethnarch of the Cypriot Orthodox community. The Ottoman millet system allowed for religious and communal autonomy so long as millet leaders ensured the cooperation and loyalty of their people (dhimmi) to the government. So, in short, the Eastern Orthodox elite were willingly co-opted into the ruling class (which of course also composed of Muslims) and their power was derived from the Ottomans. Within the contest of this ‘contract’ they received power in exchange for guaranteeing the loyalty of their people, even receiving an imperial berat from the Sultan that confirmed their various privileges.21 Ottoman Cypriots were thus divided along class lines, like in France before the Revolution, but instead of Three Estates, for most of Ottoman rule, Cypriot society was divided between a Muslim-Christian ruling elite and a Muslim-Christian peasantry, with a middle class appearing only in the second-half of the nineteenth century.22 The lower classes were also integrated, sharing economic and social hardships, language and folklore and there was even intermarriage, despite the religious obstacle.23 The increase in mixed villages exemplifies integration: the 1832 Ottoman census recorded 172 mixed villages;24 in 1858 the British consul estimated 239;25 in 1891, in the second British census, there were 346, out of a total of 702 villages.26 For most of Ottoman rule, the lower classes united against the oppressions of the ruling class and economic hardships. Sometimes, if they revolted, the ruling class would have it suppressed, especially if the revolt was against taxes, such as in 1804, but when in difficult times – during droughts, failed harvests, earthquakes and locust plagues – they received help from the paternalistic

21 ƑơƱơƳƪƥƵƜƲ ƋƯƭƼƱƴơƲ, ƐƨƹƬơƭƩƪƝƲ ƨƥƹƱƞƳƥƩƲ ƣƩơ ƴƯ ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƼ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƥƟƯ [Ottoman Theories on the Ecumenical Patriarch], Athens, 1998. 22 See Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus. 23 Achilles Aimilianides, «ƈ ƆƮƝƫƩƮƥƩ ƴƯƵ ƅƟƪơƩƯƵ ƴƹƭ ƍƩƪƴƾƭ ƄƜƬƹƭ ƥƭ ƋƽưƱƹ», Kypriakai Spoudai, II, 1938, 209; Kitromilides, ‘From Coexistence to Confrontation’, 37-8; Paul Sant Cassia, ‘Religion, Politics and Ethnicity in Cyprus During the Turkocratia (1571-1878)’, European Studies of Sociology, 1986, 3-28; Kemal Cicek, ‘Living Together: Muslim-Christian Relations in Eighteenth-Century Cyprus as Reflected by the Sharia Court Records’, Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations, IV, 1, 1993, 36-64; Theodore Papadopoullos, ƅƧƬƾƤƧ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ŹƳƬơƴơ ƥƮ ƂƭƥƪƤƼƴƹƭ ƓƵƫƫƯƣƾƭ ƴƯƵ ƊƉ’ ƂƩƾƭƯƲ, Nicosia, 1975, 63, 151-7, 213-6, 220-5, 239-41, 243-50; K. Giagoullis, «Ɛ ƗƱƩƳƴƯƶƞƲ ƴƦƥ Ƨ ƆƬƩƭƝ», Laographiki Kypros, XXIII, 1972, 15-21. 24 N. Kizilyurek, ‘The Turkish Cypriot Upper Class and Question of Identity’, Turkish Cypriot Identity in Literature, London, 1990, 21. 25 FO 198/13, consular report, 1858. 26 Richard A. Patrick, Political Geography and the Cyprus Conflict: 1963-1971, Uni of Waterloo, Ontario 1976, 12.

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hand of the imperial government upon the representation of a MuslimChristian deputation from the ranks of the ruling class.27 A good example of this was in 1870, when Sophronios led a deputation to Constantinople to seek relief for the population from the famine caused by the drought that was gripping the island, and the removal of Cyprus from the Vilayet of the Archipelago. The mission consisted of two Muslims and two Christians (including Sophronios), revealing again that religious differences did not hinder cooperation. That a Christian (Sophronios) led the mission reflects the fact that the Muslim elites were not threatened by the Christian elites, whom they clearly believed had the power to convince the imperial centre of the need for reform. Indeed the imperial government, led by Grand Vezir, Mehmed Ali Pasha (who was not of Cypriot heritage, as claimed by Hill), agreed to the removal of Cyprus from the Vilayet of the Archipelago and its constitution as an independent Mutesarriflik. He also authorised drawing the necessary seed for sowing in 1871 from the state granaries. Although, as Hill reveals, Cyprus was again placed under the jurisdiction of the Vilayet of the Archipelago shortly after Mehmed Ali Pasha died in 1871, in October 1870, plenty of seed began arriving: 50,000 kg of grain; 60,000 of barley; and 5,000 of pomegranate.28 Important also is that in 1871 the National Assembly of the Patriarchate in Constantinople nominated Sophronios amongst the candidates for the Oecumenical See, but the Porte removed him from the list.29 This perhaps reveals that Sophronios was considered too powerful and successful over his 1870 mission to Constantinople, and out of favour in the post Mehmed Ali Pasha period. On the other hand, it simply may be that the Sultan wanted Anthimus IV, who had previously served as patriarch. Further reflecting his strong interest in the welfare of the Cypriot peasantry was his long report in September 1872 to the Grand Vizier, at the time Midhat Pasha, pleading for tax and judiciary reform. Sophronios started by emphasising that Cyprus was the most important of the Ottoman islands because it was the largest and most populous. Yet he claimed it was suffering because there was a lack of capital, high taxes and little encouragement of agriculture, evidenced by the inadequate number of animals. He argued that 27 Sir George Francis Hill, A History of Cyprus, IV, (ed.) Sir Harry Luke, London, 1952, 80-110, 157-66, 355-8; P.M. Kitromilides, ‘Repression and Protest in Traditional Society: Cyprus 1764’, Kypriakai Spoudai, 1984, 91-101. 28 Georgiou, ƆƩƤƞƳƥƩƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪơƟ ƑƝƱƩ ƴƧƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 133-5. Hackett, A History of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus, 236; Hill, A History of Cyprus, IV, 250. 29 Hill, A History of Cyprus, IV, 378.

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the tax on animals (Anam tax) was worked out differently in Cyprus compared to other parts of the Ottoman Empire to the disadvantage of the Cypriot farmer. Sophronios also detailed how Cypriot farmers in general were forced to sign very unfavourable loans from unscrupulous moneylenders and could not keep up with payments because of the general economic situation. The population appealed to Aziz Pasha, the former administrator, but he failed to act. Peasants could not afford to pay the Oeshuer tax (which collects 10% of assets) every year. He also claimed that the cost of purchasing property was beyond the reach of the vast majority of Cypriots, meaning that they were unable to set up a home and plant in their own fields. This was made worse by the exorbitant fees of the Land and Registry Office, with countless Cypriot farmers failing to pay the land tax and many being imprisoned, while others were forced to abandon new fields to return to their former villages. The suffering was evidenced by the increase in the number of people leaving the island, as well as more and more people openly discussing that they felt more and more compelled to leave. Sophronios also related a case of a dispute over the selling of animals in a Christian village. When the matter went to court, the judge wanted to hear Muslim testimony, but there were no Muslims living in that village. This was only one example leading the Christian peasantry to be increasingly disillusioned by the actions of the government and the legal system. Finally, after imploring the Ottoman government to implement structural reform to the economy and legal system, Sophronios stresses that he was faithful to the state, to the Sultan’s authority and to all millets, and that he was sending this report to the Grand Vizier to inform him of the current situation of the peasantry because this was his holy and secular duty.30 Clearly this final statement shows Sophronios’ devotion to the Ottoman state, as well as his appreciation of his political and moral role as an archbishop-ethnarch to champion the causes of the peasantry.

British arrival In April 1878 the British government of Lord Beaconsfield decided that in order to balance Russian gains arising out of the Russo-Ottoman War of 1877-8, which threatened British financial, economic and strategic interests in the Ottoman Empire, Egypt and India, and in return for a pledge to aid the Ottoman Empire if Russia ever threatened it again, it would demand the right to occupy and administer Cyprus. This it did, and Sultan Abdul Hamid II, despite reservations, agreed to the Anglo-Turkish Convention in June.31 A 30 31

BOA, A. MKT.MHM/442/33, 22 September 1872. Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915, 75-87.

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number of sources reveal that one of the justifications used in selecting Cyprus over other, in some cases more strategically developed, places, such as Stampalia or Crete, was the right mix of Christian and Muslim inhabitants that were docile. A year before Cyprus was officially selected, John Simmons, the Inspector-General of Fortifications, recommended the island of Stampalia, because neither Cyprus nor Crete had suitable ports: Crete was too long, needed harbour fortifications and the agitation for union with Greece would make governing unviable.32 Viscount Sandon, who had been brought into the cabinet after Lord Derby’s resignation (over Beaconsfield and Lord Salisbury, at the time India Secretary, favouring a military seizure of Cyprus and Lemnos) as the President of the Board of Trade, revealed in his diary that he had set his ‘heart on that island (Cyprus) for England, as the key of the East’ because it ‘was free from all the complications of Egypt and Crete’.33 In justifying the selection of Cyprus, Colonel Robert Home of the Intelligence Branch of the War Office, made the valid point that the place to be occupied must be ‘inhabited by such races of people…to allow the experiment of what good government will do’.34 The political requirements of a docile and mixed population related to the other requirement placed on the government of Sultan Abdul Hamid II in the Anglo-Turkish Convention, that it would implement reforms in its Asiatic provinces where there were substantial Christian inhabitants, namely, the so-called six Armenian vilayets. The primary motivation in imposing this requirement on the Sultan was to ensure that the Russians did not take up the Armenian cause, which the British feared given the proximity of the Russian Empire, after the British government allowed it to retain Ardahan, Kars and Batum, to Ottoman Armenian populated areas.35 The political justifications underlying the occupation of Cyprus clearly meant that the British Conservative government and various departments involved in justifying the choice of Cyprus believed that the Christian and Muslim population of Cyprus were no threat to Ottoman rule and therefore would not threaten British rule. By ‘threat’, the British obviously meant ‘nationalist threat’, especially given the comparisons with Crete. In this respect, although not in many others, the British were correct.

FO 358/3, Simmons Memorandum, 27 April 1877. Viscount Sandon, The Cabinet Journal of Dudley Ryder, Viscount Sandon, (eds) C. Howard & P. Gordon, London, 1974, 11 May 1878, 4-5. 34 FO 358/1 Home Memorandum, 8 June 1878. 35 See for further Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915, 75-87. 32 33

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Sophronios welcomes Wolseley In the traditional and anachronistic (sometimes stubbornly so) historiography, Sophronios or the Bishop of Kitium, Kyprianos, welcomed Major-General Sir Garnet Wolseley, the first high commissioner, with the following words: ‘we accept the change of Government inasmuch as we trust that Great Britain will help Cyprus, as it did the Ionian Islands, to be united with Mother Greece, with which it is nationally connected’.36 Clearly, the person uttering these words accepted British rule on the condition that in the future Britain would cede Cyprus to Greece (enosis) and therefore that the person identified Cyprus as belonging to the Greek nation. The power of these words is obvious: at the start of British rule the leader of the Cypriot Orthodox Church and of the Cypriot Orthodox people had a Greek national identity and desired enosis. It is undoubtedly one of the most pivotal of the cardinal points on the script of the Greek nation of Cyprus. This historiography begins in 1918 with Charles Orr,37 who had just been invalided from being the Chief Secretary of the government of Cyprus, and ranges from other British government officers,38 and Greek and Turkish Cypriot authors,39 and continues to this day in the works of historians40 despite works using more thorough archival research and more neutral (i.e. non-nationalist) analysis methods that draw on wider European experiences that disprove that these words were said.41 There are three examples of this scholarship: the first by Evanthis Hatzivassiliou when he claimed that regardless of who (Sophronios or Kyprianos) welcomed Wolseley with 36 Sir Charles W. J. Orr, Cyprus Under British Rule, Robert Scott Roxburghe House, London, 1918 (reprinted, Zeno, London, 1972), 60. 37 Orr, Cyprus Under British Rule, 160. 38 Hill, A History of Cyprus, IV, 297. Sir Harry Luke, who edited Volume IV of Hill’s monumental study, was an officer in the Cyprus government from 1911 to 1920. 39 Papadopoullos, «ƆƨƭơƱƷƩƪƼƲ ƒƼƫƯƲ ƴƧƲ ƐƱƨƯƤƼƮƯƵ ƊƥƱơƱƷƟơƲ», 95-141; Zenon Stavrinides, The Cyprus Conflict, England 1976, 17-29; H.I. Salih, The Impact of Diverse Nationalism on a State, Tuscaloosa, 1978, 5; George Georghallides, A Political and Administrative History of Cyprus 1918-26, Nicosia, 1979, 39, 81-82; P. Oberling, The Road to Bellapais, New York, 1982, 9-21; Stefanos Papageorgiou, ‘The Genesis of the Greek and Turkish Nationalism in Cyprus, 1878-1914: A Common March at a Different Pace’, The Cyprus Review, IX, 1, 1997, 56-65; Stavros Panteli, A History of Cyprus, London, 2000, 57-59; Katia Hadjidemetriou, A History of Cyprus, Nicosia, 2002, 336, 362-369. 40 William Mallinson, Cyprus: A Modern History, London, 2005, 10; Andrekos Varnava, ‘Book Review of William Mallinson, Cyprus: A Modern History’, I. B. Tauris, London, (2nd edition) 2009, Commonwealth & Comparative Politics, XLIX, 1, 2011, 148-151. 41 Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus, 25-8; Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915, 157-8.

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declarations in favour of enosis ‘the enosis policy of the church is universally accepted’ by historians42 even though Rolandos Katsiaounis, in his 1996 study (which Hatzivassiliou lists in his bibliography), provided sufficient evidence to support the fact that nobody welcomed Wolseley with such words; 2) Robert Holland and Diana Markides in 2006 who, although having consulted Katsiaounis’s 1996 study, erroneously concluded that ‘that some gliding reference was made to the “national aspiration” seems fairly certain – if not at Larnaca, then when Wolseley first met the Archbishop, Sofronios (sic), in Nicosia’;43 and 3) William Mallinson in his 2005 study that claimed that Kyprianos demanded enosis in his welcome address to Wolseley (thus ignoring Katsiaounis’ study) and in his 2009 edition stubbornly refusing to remedy this when it had been pointed out in a book review as early as 200544. These historians have set mind-sets that would never accept new evidence that contradicts their ethno-centric approaches and conclusions. Of course it suits ethno-nationalist historians who aim and claim to prove the primordial ‘Greekness’ of the Orthodox Cypriots for these words to have been said, yet there is no evidence to support the claim that Archbishop Sophronios or Bishop Kyprianos, or any other cleric or leading political figure, said these words or any others that implied support let alone demand for enosis or that Eastern Orthodox Cypriots were identified as ‘Greeks’ in their welcome addresses to Wolseley. In fact there are four crucial pieces of evidence that conclusively prove that these words were never said by Sophronios or Kyprianos: 1) the contemporary accounts; 2) the complaints of the Egyptian Brotherhood of the Cypriots of Egypt to Sophronios about the absence of enosis aspirations from the welcoming addresses; 3) the copy of Sophronios’ speech; and 4) the obituaries for Sophronios. There is no contemporary evidence that refers to any speech welcoming Wolseley with declarations of loyalty contingent on enosis in the future. British newspaper reports in The Times, the only newspaper to have had a correspondent in the island at the time, fail to report any mentioning of enosis, ‘mother Greece’, or being Greek in the speeches of Kyprianos,45 while it did not report on Sophronios’ welcome address. There is no official report from any British representative on the island on either the Sophronios or the Evanthis Hatzivassiliou, The Cyprus Question, 1878-1960: The Constitutional Aspect, University of Minnesota, Minnesota, 2002, 111. 43 Robert Holland and Diana Markides, The British and the Hellenes: Struggles for Mastery in the Eastern Mediterranean 1850-1960, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2006, 167. 44 Andrekos Varnava, ‘Still waiting for a balanced history of Cyprus’, [Cyprus] Sunday Mail, 4th September 2005. 45 The Times, 7 August 1878, 10a-b. 42

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Kyprianos addresses, and Wolseley fails to mention either in his diary, despite mentioning various meetings with Sophronios.46 A recent article on the reportage of Greek language newspapers in Constantinople of the addresses welcoming Wolseley claims that enosis was mentioned by one newspaper, despite the fact that no newspapers in Constantinople had any correspondents in Cyprus at the time.47 The article, which is littered with factual errors and published in an unrefereed journal, and is thus academically unverifiable, does not critically engage with the sources nor cross-reference them, and totally ignores the work of others on this subject. If a newspaper in Constantinople reported that the British were welcomed with speeches expressing a desire for enosis, this does not mean that such a speech was made, and could be attributable to false reporting and wishful thinking, as indeed were much of the ‘reports’ which appeared in the British press on Cyprus’ exaggerated expectations of value.48 Katsiaounis covered the complaints of the Egyptian Brotherhood of the Cypriots of Egypt to Sophronios about the absence of enosis aspirations from the welcoming addresses in his 1996 book.49 As I established in my monograph, the Brotherhood was made up of Hellenised Christians (mainly from the Ionian Islands) and Hellenised locals of Limassol and Larnaca who had settled in Egypt. In a letter to Sophronios dated 25 July, the Brotherhood encouraged Sophronios to ‘not be daunted’ because with ‘Turkey’ out of Cyprus, the road to uniting Cyprus with Greece was ahead.50 As Katsiaounis relates, ten days later the Brotherhood wrote a stinging attack on the speech delivered by the Bishop of Kitium to Sophronios: [We] had been led to utter despair by the address which had been delivered by the Bishop of Kitium and had unjustly and by a misunderstanding been ascribed to yourself and in which the new administration was being welcomed and the supreme governor of the Island was being addressed in a language

46 Wolseley Journal, various dates, (ed.) Anne Cavendish, Cyprus 1878: The Journal of Sir Garnet Wolseley, Nicosia, 1991, 28-34. 47 Andreas Antonopoulos, «ƈ ƑơƱơƷƾƱƧƳƧƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƳƴƧƭ ƍƥƣƜƫƧ ƃƱƥƴơƭƟơ ơưƼ ƴƧ ƓƪƯưƩơ ƴƹƭ Ɔƫƫƞƭƹƭ ƴƧƲ ƋƹƭƳƴơƭƴƩƭƯƽưƯƫƧƲ: ƈ ƓƴƜƳƧ ƴƯƵ ƎƥƯƫƼƣƯƵ» (The Cession of Cyprus to Great Britain and the Discussions of the Greeks of Constatinople: The Stance of Neologos’), ƋƵưƱƩơƪơƟ ƓưƯƵƤơƟ, LXIX, 2008, 153-69, 163. 48 See Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915, 93-126. 49 Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus, 27-8; 50 AAK, Sophronios Archive, File XXVI, Item 7, Brotherhood to Sophronios, 25 July 1878, in Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus, 28.

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which was unclear and wanting, and in the name not of the entire Island or of the Fatherland but of the Greek community.51

The authors reveal that they had read Sophronios’ address in the local newspapers, and they were slightly more satisfied with it. In his reply, Sophronios questions the claim of the Brotherhood regarding the nation (Greek) that Cypriots belong to, revealing that ‘we have not up to now experienced something like this’, and arguing that it would not only endanger Cypriot customs, but also Cypriot interests because there were opposing interests, no doubt he meant British and Muslim Cypriot interests, but also, quite clearly, of Orthodox Cypriot.52 An analysis of Sophronios’ actual speech53 reveals that he unconditionally welcomed the British with declarations of loyalty and promised his full cooperation. Indeed, he states exactly that ...she (Britain) has the further advantage of a population which is peaceful and easy to govern, and which, without renouncing its origin or its aspirations, will be faithful and devoted to its new and paternal authority.

What Sophronios means by the ‘origins’ and ‘aspirations’ of the people of Cyprus are not Greece and enosis respectively: regarding origins he means Eastern Orthodoxy (in the case of the Muslims – Islam) and Cyprus (as homeland), and for aspirations he not only means ‘peaceful co-existence’, but under conditions of equality. Indeed, this latter point, he goes on to add, was his hope – that the British would bring equality before the law for both Christians and Muslims, hinting that, the only problem for the Christians during Ottoman rule was the inequality in the judiciary. The concept of equality is undoubtedly an idea of the Enlightenment, represented, for example, by the social contract. Social equality – equality for all in society – subsequently lent itself, during the French Revolutionary period, to offer possibilities for establishing a civil loyalty and therefore identity within society to a state or constitution, moving away from a loyalty to a monarch or noblemen. Sophronios’ desire for equality in Cyprus must therefore be understood within the imperial context of the civil colonial administration and therefore a civil colonial identity, that is, a loyalty to the British colonial 51AAK, Sophronios Archive, File XXVI, Item 8, Brotherhood to Sophronios, 5 August 1878, in Ibid. 52 AAK, Sophronios Archive, File XXVI, Item 9, Sophronios to Brotherhood, 20 August 1878, in Ibid. 53 Glenbow Library and Archives, Calgary, Canada, M1332, ‘Nicosia Address, 1878’, Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915, 292-3.

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state, in the absence of a revolutionary drive for Cypriot independence. Sophronios was the last of the ‘old’ and first of the ‘new’ ethnarchs, in that he advocated equality for the Cypriot masses, which the British agreed with and implemented, but wanted to retain the ‘old’ distinction between the high clergy and the masses, which the British disagreed with because it reminded them too much of how society was structured under the pre-modern Ottoman system. Yet, clearly Sophronios’ understandings of the Enlightenment were not enmeshed within ‘old’ counter-Enlightenment concepts, because his idea for equality as the cornerstone of British modernisation, in conjunction with the co-option of the local elite, could have resulted in a Cypriot civil colonial identity. The last piece of evidence is the failure to mention the ‘enosis speech’ to Wolseley in any of the obituaries for Sophronios when he passed away in May 1900. In the three leading newspapers, Neon Ethnos (ƎƝƯƭ ŻƨƭƯƲ – New Nation), Evagoras (ƆƵơƣƼƱơƲ – Evagoras), and Phoni tis Kyprou (Ɩƹƭƞ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ – Voice of Cyprus), there was no mention of Sophronios welcoming any British official with declarations of loyalty contingent on the future granting of enosis.54 All of the newspapers mentioned were run by men who supported enosis and therefore who believed that the Orthodox Cypriots were Greeks. In the cases of Evagoras (with the editor Pericles Michaelides) and Phoni tis Kyprou (Georgios Nikopoulos), the men were Hellenised Cypriots, while in the case of Neon Ethnos, the editor (Kleovoulos Mesolongitis) was a Greek national. Although none of the newspapers mention Sophronios welcoming any British official with declarations of loyalty contingent on the future granting of enosis, the editors of Neon Ethnos and Evagoras, especially the later, attempt to paint Sophronios as ‘ethnically minded’. Neon Ethnos, the milder of the two, pointed to Sophronios’ mentioning in his speech to Wolseley that the Cypriots welcomed the British without renouncing their ‘origins’ and their ‘aspirations’, interpreting these to mean that Sophronios was referring to the ‘Greek’ origins of the Cypriots and their enosis aspirations. This is of course plainly wrong. Sophronios’ past makes this clear – the evidence of his letter to the Jerusalem Theological School, his role at the Holy and Great Pan-Orthodox Synod, his letter to the Egyptian Brotherhood, and his subsequent actions as archbishop (further below). Pericles Michaelides in Evagoras went a step further by erroneously claiming that Sophronios said the following in welcoming Wolseley:

54 Evagoras, 10 May 1900 & 11 May 1900; Phoni tis Kyprou, 12-25 May 1900; Neon Ethnos, 13-26 May 1900. I would like to thank Dr Rolandos Katsiaounis and Dr Irene Pophaides for making these obituaries available to me.

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Ɛ ƐƱƨƼƤƯƮƯƲ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƼƲ ƫơƼƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥƽƶƱƯƳƽƭƹƲ ƷơƩƱƥƴƟƦƥƩ ƴƧƭ ƥƣƪơƴƜƳƴơƳƩƭ ƴƧƲ ƃƱƥƴƴơƭƩƪƞƲ ƥƮƯƵƳƟơƲ ƥƭ ƴƧ ƎƞƳƹ ƪơƩ ƜƳƬƥƭƯƲ ƨ’ ơƭƝƷƧƴơƩ ƴơƵƴƧƭ ƥưƩ ƴƧ ƥƫưƟƤƩ ƴƧƲ ƥƨƭƩƪƞƲ ơưƯƪơƴơƳƴƜƳƥƹƲ ƴƯƵ.55 (The Orthodox Christian people of Cyprus welcome the establishment of British rule on the island in the hope that it results in its national restoration.)

Michaelides claims that these were the exact words that Sophronios used, placing them in quotation, but they do not correspond to the traditional words that Sophronios supposedly used. It is clear from the evidence that Sophronios never expressed such a hope to Wolseley or any other British official, and here it is important to note that Michaelides was not in Cyprus in 1878, having left the island during the Ottoman period to study in Athens, and after living in Romania, returned to Cyprus in 1890. This was the first time that Sophronios was attributed with welcoming Wolseley with a declaration in favour of enosis. This was next taken up by the Bishop of Kitium, Kyrillos, after Sophronios death, and his supporters for the disputed archiepiscopal throne, in a 1903 memorial to Joseph Chamberlain, the Colonial Secretary, which claims that Sophronios welcomed the British with declarations of loyalty contingent on the future granting of enosis.56 Although it is important that the words attributed to Sophronios and/or to Kyprianos were a fabrication, there is a claim in a small pamphlet published in 1878 that a committee in Limassol welcomed Wolseley with the hope for enosis. Lambrou, a Greek philologist, only 27 years of age at the time, expressed the following hope in the last sentence: ƆƵƷƧƨƾƬƥƭ ƴƯƵƴƯ ƪơƩ ƥƫưƟƳƹƬƥƭ ƼƴƩ ƨơ ƣƥƟƭƧ ưƱƜƣƬơ Ƨ ƥƵƷƞ Ƨ ƥƪƶƱơƳƨƥƟƳơ ưƱƯƲ ƴƯƭ ƭƵƭ ŹƣƣƫƯƭ ƤƩƯƪƧƴƞƭ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ Ưƴƥ ƥưƥƳƪƝƶƨƧ ƴƧƭ ƌƥƬƩƳƳƼƭ «ŻƷƯƬƥƭ ƤƩ’ ƥƫưƟƤƯƲ, ƥƟưƥƭ Ƨ ưƱƯƻươƭƴƞƳơƳơ ơƵƴƹ ƥưƩƴƱƯưƥƟơ, ƼƴƩ, Ƨ ƂƣƣƫƟơ ƨơƪƯƫƯƵƨƞƳƧ ƴƯ ƥƭ ƴơƩƲ ƊƯƭƟƯƩƲ ƎƞƳƯƩƲ ƪơƨƩƥƱƹƨƝƭ ươƱƜƤƥƩƣƬơ».57 (We pray this and hope that the desire expressed to the British governor of Cyprus, when he visited Limassol, will become a reality: ‘We desire the hope, said the committee, that the British will follow the example of the Ionian Islands’.)

It is questionable if such a committee welcomed Wolseley with such words, since Lambrou was not in Cyprus at the time and there is no mention of it in any other source. If it was said, it means very little since the committee would have been composed of the leading elites of the city, namely the Greek nationals, primarily from the Ionian Islands, and Hellenised Cypriots. The Evagoras, 10 May 1900. Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus, 25. 57 Spyridon Paulou Lampros, Peri Kyprou, Vivliopoleion N. Karavia, Athens, 1975 (repr. of 1878 ed.), 28-9. 55 56

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claim also must be understood within the context of the pamphlet, which is essentially a propaganda booklet on the ‘Greekness’ of Cyprus, which ignores Latin and Ottoman historical legacies.

Sophronios’ Proposition for Co-option and its British Rejection Sophronios, although speaking about equality, wanted to retain the privileged status of the church as an arm of the governing structures, as it had been during Ottoman rule, in the hope of 1) maintaining the power of the Church; and 2) retaining a docile and loyal population – loyal to both church and state. In February 1879 he and his bishops (the metropolitans of Paphos, Kyrenia and Kitium) requested the recognition of their privileges in a memorial to Wolseley.58 In short, they were asking to be co-opted into the British governing structures as they had been during Ottoman times because they saw the British Empire as similar to the Ottoman. Since the British also practised co-option in almost all other parts of their Empire they were right, but they were wrong about the British practicing it in Cyprus. In May 1884, Sir Robert Biddulph, the second high commissioner of Cyprus, received a curious petition ‘from a small but active party in Cyprus, chiefly resident at Limassol, whose object is to embarrass Turkey and to pursue the same policy towards England that was successfully carried out in the Ionian Islands prior to 1864’, urging Biddulph to force Sophronios to resign, as had the Ecumenical Patriarch, Joachim III.59 Biddulph informed Derby that only a few days ago he had visited Sophronios and, there being no one else present except my Private Secretary (Hugh Sinclair), the conversation assumed a more confidential character than is the case when an interpreter is present. The Archbishop alluded to the fact of all the Bishops of Cyprus were about to hold a Synod on certain church matters, and he remarked on the intriguing character of the Bishop of Kitium and on his having resisted his advice as to the desirability of his endeavouring to work with the Government in the Legislative Council, as it was obvious that the Government were only anxious to do their best for the people of Cyprus.60

Sophronios added that there was

FO Correspondence, 4319, June-December 1879, Memorial (French) to Wolseley, 16 February 1879. 59 CO 67/34/9386, confidential, Biddulph to Derby, 24 May 1884. 60 Ibid. 58

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a party at Limassol, headed by the Bishop, who wished to create embarrassment, and who do not wish matters to be plausible, and he added that this is exactly what is taking place at Constantinople...the Patriarch wanted to establish a modus vivendi with the Porte and had come to a satisfactory agreement, but that it did not suit the aim of the agitating party...and accordingly the Ecclesiastical Councils had forced the Patriarch to resign.61

In June Biddulph informed Lord Derby, the Liberal Colonial Secretary (formerly a Tory), that Sophronios and the Bishops of Paphos (Neophytos) and Kyrenia (Chrysanthos) wanted to hold a Holy Synod in July to lay the matter of regulating church-state relations before the people that would either revert to the old system or some new one. Biddulph believed that something had to be done and that the Legislative Council would have to endorse whatever the people and the Synod proposed.62 But the Synod, held in July 1884, came to nothing, mainly because, as Neophtos told Biddulph when he visited him at Troodos on 26 August 1884, neither Kyprianos nor any representatives from the diocese of Kitium and Paphos attended. Neophytos told Biddulph that the ‘reason why the Bishop of Kitium did not attend at the Synod was his unwillingness to figure there in a secondary position, and that he had advised the representatives from his diocese not to go to the Synod but to leave the Legislative Council to settle the questions to be raised’. Neophytos apologised that representatives from his diocese did not attend, claiming that they were on their way, but ‘when passing through Limassol, [they] were persuaded not to proceed’. He told Biddulph that the Bishop of Kitium had spread a report that it was the intention of the Government to pay the salaries of the Bishops, and that this report had resulted, as he had intended, in throwing the Bishops into embarrassment by causing the people to cease the payment of the usual canonical dues; that the Bishop of Kitium suffered no embarrassment himself, as he had acquired such a position in the Island by the complete subservience to him of the native members of the Legislative Council that he could get his own dues from the people without difficulty.

Neophytos spoke strongly of Kyprianos’ intrigues and Biddulph believed that Sophronios and the other bishops were unanimous on this point, because they never made a secret of it when speaking to him or to other members of the Executive Council.63 Ibid. CO 67/34/10519, Biddulph to Derby, 10 June 1884. 63 CO 67/35/15467, No. 209, Biddulph to Derby, 29 August 1884; CO 67/35/15475, confidential, Biddulph to Derby, 29 August 1884; CO 67/38/10499, confidential, The Archbishop of Cyprus and the Bishops of Paphos and Kyrenia to the High 61 62

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In March 1885 Sophronios, Neophytos and Chrysanthos again asked Biddulph to regulate church-state relations. They argued that only then could they maintain and improve ecclesiastical and educational establishments and arrest the dismal financial plight of the church. They identified the worsening financial situation with the British occupation, and so a law was needed regulating church affairs with the state. They pleaded for government intervention because the Synod of July 1884 had come to nothing.64 In effect what they wanted was their former right to collect canonical dues from the people.65 When the government did not act, Sophronios decided to take the matter to the people, when in May 1885 he published in Salpinx a draft of a proposed law concerning the management of the affairs of the church with the state. Sophronios invited comment and Biddulph waited, but ‘not the slightest notice’ was ‘taken of it, nor has the subject…been touched upon even remotely’. Then, in January 1886, a distraught Sophronios and Chrysanthos visited Biddulph, informing him ‘if some amelioration did not take place he (Sophronios) would be obliged to resign his office as he had not the means of supporting himself in it’. He observed that there had been no feedback on his draft law and feared that Biddulph’s replacement would result in a delay in the matter. Sophronios revealed that the Eastern Orthodox ‘members of the Council are entirely led by the Bishop of Kitium [and therefore] they would not move without his concurrence’, and he obtained ‘his own dues by reason of his political position and the influence he has obtained over the people’, so it was not in his interests. Biddulph commented to Lord Stanley, the Conservative Colonial Secretary, that Kyprianos was ‘not unwilling to see his brother Bishops in difficulties whilst he exhibits to the public his own influence over his flock’. Biddulph informed Stanley that the money was a small amount: each village paid a fixed amount of, on average, two piastre, which Zaptieh’s collected. The British government would not enforce this, nor would Sophronios take the matter to court, even though his berat gave him legal authority to do so, because he Commissioner, 5/17 March 1885; For the ideological debate between the Bishopric of Kitium and the Archbishopric see, Michalis N. Michael, ‘Cities and Ideologies in 19th Century Cyprus. A Traditional Capital and a Modern Port-City’, Chronos, Revue d'histoire de l'Université de Balamand, Publications de l'Université de Balamand, XXII, 2010, 85-106. 64 CO 67/38/10499, confidential, The Archbishop of Cyprus and the Bishops of Paphos and Kyrenia to the High Commissioner, 5/17 March 1885. 65 See also, Michalis N. Michael, ‘Ottoman Rights of the High Clergy of the Church of Cyprus and British Administration’, Journal of the Cyprus Research Centre, XXXIV, 2008, 333-67 [in Greek].

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believed that it would be derogatory to his spiritual position. Sophronios wanted the government to collect the dues for him, but it could not without legislation. Biddulph opined, if legislation were passed, the Receiver General could arrange for the collecting of the dues.66 All this came to a head with the drought of 1887, which left the Karpass Peninsula in famine.67 Sophronios, because of the pressure from the nationalists (he was concerned that they would hijack any mission if he was not present), agreed to lead a deputation to London to seek aid, as had been the norm (and as he had done in 1870) under the paternalistic Ottoman system. His real reason for going, however, was to lobby for co-option. Prior to leaving, he proposed to Sir Henry Bulwer, who had replaced Biddulph as high commissioner in March 1886, that a contract be signed between the Church and the British government, because It is the duty of the Church, by means of her spiritual resources, to support the Civil Authority in the carrying out of all its just and lawful orders. On the other hand the Civil Power, by means of its material resources, must support and assist the Ecclesiastical Power.68

Although Sophronios’ motivations and intentions were very clear from this proposal, Bulwer reported that: Formerly the Archbishop had a good deal of power and influence, if he held well with the Turkish Government, and villagers and the poorer and less considered people resorted to him for shelter and protection and for the use of his influence: now there is no longer need for the people to seek this shelter or this protection as against the Government or against powerful and privileged private persons, and the Archbishop is no longer held in the same regard and popular respect as was the case formerly. …although he even now declares… that he does not want to be a part of the deputation, he has, all the same, altogether fallen in with the movement by this time, is become a part of it, and is, more or less completely, in sympathy with it... He was against, or he would have nothing to do with, the Phil-Hellenic movement that took place in the earlier days of the occupation and was denounced, if not in public in private, by the late Bishop of Kitium who wanted to oust him from the Archbishopric and to step into it himself. Since 66 CO 67/41/2184, confidential, Biddulph to Stanley, 25 January 1886; CO 67/41/2184, Proposed Bill on the Church of Cyprus, Sophronios, in the Salpinx, 1 May 1885. 67 See Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915, 139, 141. 68 CO 67/61/14066, confidential, Bulwer to Knutsford, 1 July 1889, including memorandum.

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This was a relatively good assessment of Sophronios and the impact of British rule on the higher clergy, with the exception that Sophronios was still very much against any anti-British feeling and Hellenic nationalism, as shown by his actions in England. In London in the summer of 1889, Sophronios exerted almost complete control over the deputation and was well received by the British government and the Cyprus Society, an eclectic group of High-Church Anglicans formed in July 1888 to advance health and education in Cyprus. In relation to health, the Cyprus Society planned to establish a cottage hospital at Kyrenia, travelling dispensaries and ambulances, and to send nurses; while in relation to education, it planned technical and agricultural schools and to improve religious and secular education. It was comprised of leading High-Church Anglicans, including bishops, prominent politicians, military figures, and royalty.70 Lord Nelson, a descendent of the famous naval hero, summarised thus the calling of the Cyprus Society. The Mahometan inhabitants have a claim upon us, and by improving their social position, caring for them in sickness, and raising the character of their education, we may gain a large influence over them for good. But the greatest call upon us Churchmen is the fact that in Cyprus we are brought into direct contact with a branch of the Holy Eastern Church. It is our duty to meet them in a spirit of Christian Brotherhood…We see here an Orthodox Church, holding the old faith and the old customs, and maintaining their own independence under their own archbishop and bishops; but they have been oppressed for ages. Their poverty is great and the need for better education can hardly be exaggerated. It is clearly our duty as a Christian Church, having the same Creeds, the same Sacraments, the same liturgical system, to hold out to them the right hand of fellowship.71 CO 67/60/11489, confidential, Bulwer to Knutsford, 23 May 1889. Times, 2 July 1888, 6.d; Ibid., 4 September 1889, 13.e; Ibid., 17 June 1878, 6d; Hansard (Commons), CCCXXIII, 8 March 1888, 569-70; CCCXXIV, 26 March 1888, 260-1; CCCXXX, 22 November 1888, 1811-2; CCCXXXI, 26 November 1888, 13233; CCCXLI, 4 March 1890, 1767; CCCLI, 10 March 1891, 585-7; Report of the Council of the Cyprus Society presented at the Second Annual Meeting, at the Church House, 25th June 1890, London, 1890, Hereafter Cyprus Society Report II-1890; For a full list of the members of the Cyprus Society see Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915, 297-9. 71 Cyprus Society Report II-1890, 5-6. 69

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Clearly there was a religious impulse around bringing the Anglican and Orthodox Churches closer together – even uniting them – as well as an imperial impulse driving the society. Edward Kenyon, formerly the District Commissioner of Kyrenia, and one of the founders of the Cyprus Society, arranged for a warm reception for the deputation.72 On 18 June Sophronios visited the House of Commons and met Queen Victoria at a garden party given by the Prince of Wales.73 On 23 June he attended Evensong at St. Peters in Oxford and the next day met the Cyprus Society.74 Edward Benson, the Archbishop of Canterbury, said Britain’s mission was to make Cyprus suitable for its multi-religious inhabitants. Sophronios thanked him and the Cyprus Society, which he promised to aid.75 On 27 June the University of Oxford presented him the honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity.76 Five days later he attended the civic banquet hosted by the Lord Mayor at the Mansion House.77 The memorial, which had been made available to the British in April 1889, just before the deputation left for London, made no mention of enosis or ‘mother Greece’, but instead made the following demands: 1. Taxes: Cypriots pay taxes disproportionate to their resources and means, and this taxation was contributing to the impoverishment of the island, as it was reckoned that each individual paid a yearly tax equal to about the one-fifth of his proportionate income by way of production. 2. Legislative Council reform: more power to the legislative council over taxation and to introduce laws. 3. Executive Council: asks that two natives be included, to be elected by the government. 4. Education: government assistance to middle education. 5. Agriculture: Agriculture needs promotion, including the establishment of an agricultural bank. 6. Police: must be more regulated and work better throughout districts. 7. Church-State relations: previously Sultanic firmans regulated the affairs of the church each time a Bishop was elected. These have ceased and have left the church in a state of limbo, resulting in the relations Andreas Tillyrides, ‘Archbishop Sophronios III (1865-1900) and the British’, Kypriakai Spoudai, 1978, 129-52, 137. 73 Hugh Montgomerie Sinclair, Camp and Society, Chapman and Hall, London, 1926, 167-8. 74 Tillyrides, ‘Archbishop Sophronios III’, 138. 75 Ibid., 139-40; The Times, 25 June 1889, 5.e; The Guardian, 26 June 1889, 969. 76 The Oxford Review, 27 June 1889, 2; Rev. H. T. F. Duckworth, Some Pages of Levantine History, Alexander Moring, London, 1906, 25. 77 The Guardian, 3 July 1889, 102. 72

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between the state and the church being uncertain. They ask that this be regulated by a law.78 London responded negatively to all requests to regulate church-state affairs, although the colonial officers in Cyprus were sympathetic. The British practiced co-option in most of their empire and, as Ronald Robinson established in his highly influential study of 1972, it was the preferred method of ruling because it was economical and provided security against local unrest.79 But on every occasion the British rejected Sophronios’ offer of cooption and instead instituted modern political structures. During Beaconsfield’s tenure as prime minister, Lord Salisbury, at the head of the Foreign Office which controlled Cyprus, made little modification to the local Ottoman governing system. But when Beaconsfield’s Conservatives were voted out in April 1880, Gladstone’s Liberals formed a government committed to implementing various reforms in Cyprus, starting with moving its running to the Colonial Office. Before any serious reform was considered, however, Gladstone proposed ceding Cyprus to Greece to resolve a Greco-Ottoman territorial dispute, so right from the beginning Gladstone, and indeed Gladstonian Liberals, linked Cyprus with Greece, even though, as shown above, the local elites, let alone the ordinary person in the fields and villages, did not.80 The first major reform came in March 1882, when Lord Kimberley, the Colonial Secretary, granted the island the most liberal constitution of any of the non-settler possessions at the time, including Malta, when it announced that Cyprus would have an elected legislature with a local majority. The elected local members of the legislative council were divided along religious lines according to the 1881 Census, which found the Eastern Orthodox Christians to number 73.9 per cent and the Muslims 24.5 per cent of the population, meaning that the council had nine Eastern Orthodox members and three Muslims.81 Traditional historiography has pointed out that the Muslim members added to the six official unelected British members could counterbalance the Eastern Orthodox members, and with the deciding vote with the high commissioner could therefore form a ‘block’ against the demographic majority – the

CO 67/59/9383, Bulwer to Knutsford, 30 April 1889, includes enclosures. Ronald E. Robinson, ‘Non-European Foundations of European Imperialism: Sketch for a Theory of Collaboration’, Roger Owen & Bob Sutcliffe (eds.), Studies in the Theory of Imperialism, London, 1972, 117-42. 80 Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915, 264-5. 81 C.3211, Kimberley to Biddulph, 10 March 1882; Report on the Census of Cyprus, 1881, C.4264, London, 1884. 78 79

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‘Greeks’.82 But there is no evidence to suggest that this was the intention of the British in 1882. It is very plausible that Kimberley thought that three Christian or Muslim members could be found to vote with the British members on any legislation that they really wanted to pass, especially given the support that Sophronios and his supporters promised to the British. Although by this time opposition to British rule had manifested itself in Kyprianos, who formed an alliance with Greek nationals and a handful of Hellenised Christians in Limassol and Larnaca, largely because he was angered by the British stopping him from collecting taxes, this was a fringe group.83 In any event, Sophronios thanked Queen Victoria, a gesture Kimberley welcomed,84 yet continuing to pursue the co-option of the high clergy into the British administrative structures meant that he did not consider co-option incompatible with the representative institution of the legislative council. In 1879, Salisbury rejected the appeal made by Sophronios and the three metropolitans (Paphos, Kitium and Kyrenia) for co-option and thus the preservation of their rights as accorded by the Ottoman system, because ‘the clergy have used the weakness of Turkish rule…to consolidate a power over their people which is inconsistent with all modern views of civil government’.85 Clearly, Salisbury believed that the high clergy had manipulated the Ottoman governing system to obtain a powerful role in government and a dominant role over society that was inconsistent with modern approaches to civil government and therefore with political modernity. Did this mean that Cyprus was ready for ‘modern civil government’ and political modernity? No doubt, as shown above, Gladstone’s Liberal government thought so. In 1886, in acknowledging the predicament outlined by Sophronios, Biddulph told Lord Derby, the Liberal Colonial Secretary (formerly the Conservative Foreign Secretary, who resigned over the Cyprus policy of 1878), that it was ‘very difficult for an alien government to make any proposition in so delicate a matter without having previously ascertained the general views of the people’,86 thus making statutory the state’s affairs with Panteli, A History of Cyprus, London, 2000, 57-60, 71-3. C.3211, Kimberley to Biddulph, 10 March 1882; Report on the Census of Cyprus, 1881, C.4264, London, 1884. 84 C.3384, Sophronios to CO, 23 March 1882; Kimberley to Biddulph, 29 March 1882, 84. 85 FO 421/32, Salisbury to Biddulph, 4 July 1879. 86 CO 67/38/10499, confidential, Biddulph to Derby, 29 May 1885, includes enclosures. 82 83

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the church before asking the people was not in keeping with the modernisation of Cyprus’ governance. Derby agreed, informing Biddulph that the views of the people would be ascertained at the 1886 legislature election.87 The continued rejection of co-option was reflected too in the lukewarm colonial and imperial government response to the endeavours of the Cyprus Society. Although at its zenith in 1890 when the Irving Dramatic Club performed The Tempest at St George’s Hall in aid of its mission,88 the Society was wound up by 1893, having completely failed to achieve anything in the way of education, and only achieving a modest selection of their health program. It ended up with a paltry £140 in its coffers, which it handed to the Cyprus government.89 In competition with fundraisers for archaeological endeavours, it failed to garner public support.90 Kenyon and some Anglican clergy continued work on an individual basis, receiving little support from the imperial or the colonial government.91 Why did the Cyprus Society, with so many prominent public figures as members, fail to garner the support of the British people and government? In many respects the answer to this question is the same answer to the question: why did the British imperial government reject Sophronios’ repeated demands to be co-opted? Indeed, the Conservative Colonial Secretary, Lord Knutsford, told Sophronios that placing church and state relations on a statutory basis and regulating the payment of dues was a matter for the local legislative council,92 and so it was also the case for medical and educational initiatives. So how can London’s approach to Cyprus, seeing it as ‘European’, identifying ‘Greeks’ and ‘Turks’, introducing representative government, and rejecting co-option and the paternalistic endeavours of the Cyprus Society, be understood given the clear social structures that cut across the religious collective identity on the island, which had given rise to the docile and easy to govern Cypriots? Sophronios was the exemplar: as the leader of the Eastern Orthodox Cypriots, he exhibited a total allegiance to the British colonial and imperial authority; he was dedicated to the preservation of Christian-Muslim relations; and he represented the CO 67/38/10499, confidential, Derby to Biddulph, 18 June 1885. The Times, 11 December 1890, 9e. 89 SA1/1452/1893, William Sinclair, Archdeacon of London, to His Excellency the Governor of Cyprus, 5 May 1893; SA1/1452/1893, Chief Secretary to Sinclair, 30 June 1893; SA1/1452/1893, G.A.K. Wisely to Chief Secretary, 29 December 1893. 90 Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 171-5. 91 Ibid. 92 C.6003, Knutsford to Bulwer, 22 March 1890. 87 88

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maintenance of social order, and yet believed in equality across the religious collective divide. The only possible answer lies in the British and more broadly European associations of ancient Greece with the modern ‘Greek’ space, including even those places on the European and ‘Greek periphery’ that had both a multi-religious collective and a significant degree of racial mix from neighbouring traditionally ‘non-Greek’ spaces. Cyprus is such a place, with its Latin and Ottoman settlement and migratory policies, and proximity to the Arab lands. Herzfeld argued that since Europe claimed ancient Greece as its spiritual ancestor and created a single ideal of it in place of over 150 city-states, linked only by similar language and religion, it also created a unitary ideal of ‘modern Greece’.93 The British in the imperial centre clearly situated Cyprus within this ‘modern Greece’.94

Sophronios, the British and Enosis Despite the British rejection of Sophronios’ request to co-opt the Orthodox high clergy, Sophronios never agitated for enosis, which, much to his distaste, grew into the response of some Cypriot Orthodox elite (who gradually adopted an ethno-nationalist ideology) to the problems of the island. A good example of the divisions was when in 1894 the War Office decided that a further reduction (the troops were reduced by half in 1888)95 to the size of the British garrison in Cyprus should be made because so many troops were not required in Cyprus, but were needed elsewhere in the Empire, namely in Malta, Egypt and India. When it became public knowledge that the British government intended to reduce the garrison, the Hellenists began to argue in the newspapers and coffee-houses that the British were going to abandon the entire island to the ‘barbaric Turk’. The pro-Sophronios press countered such scaremongering by downplaying the reduction as a matter of military and imperial contingency and that the British were not going to abandon Cyprus to the Ottomans.96 Accordingly, when the troops were withdrawn (the 2nd Connaught Rangers from Cyprus and Malta replaced the 2nd South Lancashire in Egypt after it had reinforced India),97 Lord Ripon, the Colonial Secretary, explained that he appreciated Cypriot disappointment and that the withdrawal would be a loss (to those doing business with the army in Limassol, which were primarily nationalists), but Cyprus would ‘be in no worse position than the great majority of the British Colonial Possessions’. M. Herzfeld, Anthropology Through the Looking-Glass, Cambridge, 1987, 28-30. Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 152-201. 95 Ibid., 214. 96 Ibid., 215-9. 97 The Times, 23 January 1895, 10g. 93 94

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Clearly, London was not threatened by an enosis/ethno-nationalist problem. Within months of reducing the garrison, peasants complained to Nicosia’s elite that they could not pay taxes and a committee in Nicosia led by Sophronios informed High Commissioner Walter Sendall that island-wide meetings would be organised and memorials presented to him on the matter.99 The subsequent meetings show the differing focus on issues of leaders in Nicosia and Kyrenia to those in Larnaca, Limassol and Paphos. The Nicosia and Kyrenia memorial wanted relief from heavy taxation; protection from the tribute; and enosis ‘if England contemplates abandoning the country’. The Cypriot Orthodox elite around Sophronios, knowing governance only under a foreign master, preferred that that master shared their faith – there is no evidence that Sophronios had an ethnic national identity. Phillios Zannettos, a firebrand Greek national, Nicholas Lanitis, a nationalist teacher, and Kyrillos Papadopoulos, who had become the Bishop of Kitium (and later Archbishop Kyrillos II), went straight to the point in the Larnaca memorial: ‘the only solution and this at the earliest possible date [was] union with mother Greece’. The Limassol and Paphos memorials followed suit.100 Sophronios reluctantly approved of enosis in 1895 in the event that the British left the island, not because he preferred it to British rule, but because he preferred it to Ottoman rule. This is ironic because Sophronios’ authority had been derived from the Ottomans, but had declined under the British. Yet his preference for Greek rather than Ottoman rule in no way reflects his co-option by the Greek nationalist ideal; in merely reflects his desire to be ruled by an Orthodox Christian state rather than a Muslim state, which was in any event dramatically different to that which he had known nearly two decades earlier, particularly with the Armenian massacres of 1894. Despite rejecting co-option and the regulation of the affairs of the church to those of the state, the British colonial administrators greatly respected Clauson 314 memorandum, Ripon to Sendall, 12 October 1894. CO67/91/8534, 97, Sendall to Ripon, 6 May 1895, with memorial, 22 April 1895. 100 CO67/91/8547, 110, Sendall to Ripon, 7 May 1895, with memorials and signatures. 98 99

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Sophronios and sympathised with his predicament. Hugh Sinclair, Biddulph’s private secretary, writing many decades later, recalled how Sophronios was wise, large-minded and prudent, anxious to be on good terms with us and perfectly truthful and loyal. But he was hard driven by the restless and intriguing Bishop of Kitium…and the agitation for annexation to Greece. As the official head of the Greek Community the Archbishop was bound to countenance… agitation and opposition; but he saw its uselessness and did his best to moderate their excesses. In his many private interviews with Sir Robert [Biddulph] he…deplored his inability to make his flock see reason. He had a fine presence, great dignity and an imperturbable calm manner.101

What is evident from this statement, beyond the respect for Sophronios, was that Sophronios gradually lost his authority over the other elites, including religious elites, as well as his people, largely because he no longer had the secular authority of the state behind him and the secular elite broke away from their previous power-sharing with the high clergy because the Church had lost its political power. Yet despite Sophronios losing his authority, he continued to command respect and power over the nationalist faction and show that he stood for cooperation between Christians and Muslims as late as three years before his passing. Two examples will suffice. The first was the spontaneous and unofficial Cypriot celebrations for Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee in 1897. Although the Diamond Jubilee was to be made a festival of the British Empire at Joseph Chamberlain’s suggestion, High Commissioner Sendall decided against organising a public celebration because he feared it might antagonise Cypriot Hellenists at a time when the Greco-Ottoman War, in which the British took a neutral position, was going badly for Greece.102 But Sendall need not have worried, for he was taken by complete surprise when on 22 June the well organised services and events generated universal and spontaneous outpourings of loyalty and affection from all sections of Cypriot society (even from the Hellenists). He even went as far as to inform Chamberlain that the celebrations made ‘that day a memorable one in the history of Cyprus’. Sendall described the astonishing scenes that included the morning church service at Phaneromeni in Nicosia that saw the adjacent streets ‘filled to overflowing’ and the English national anthem sung to Greek words and at the end enthusiastic vivals were shouted for the Queen. Then in the evening the population of Nicosia and its 101 102

Sinclair, Camp and Society, 143-4. CO67/106/12701, Sendall to Chamberlain, 4 June 1897.

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surrounding villages attended en masse what was meant to be a small event at Government House for the reading of the Queen’s message. But the celebrations did not stop there. On the following evening, Nicosia ‘was illuminated upon a scale never before witnessed. I drove through the streets in an open carriage, and nothing could exceed the enthusiasm of the orderly crowds by which they were thronged’. Similar celebrations took place in other parts of the island, compelling Sendall to conclude that ‘in no part of Her (Queen Victoria’s) dominions has the feelings appropriate to this memorable day been more sincerely responded to than in the island of Cyprus’.103 In summarising how the event was marked in each town, it becomes clear how Sophronios’ imprint was evident, since all the celebrations had a religious focus, were attended well by both Christians and Muslims, in both joint events and separate religious services, and contained civic events, which included banquets for the poorest of society from all religious backgrounds. Even though Kyrillos Papadopoulos, the leading cleric who had embraced Hellenism and opposed Sophronios’ pro-British position, participated in the Larnaca celebrations, Sophronios and his supporters (mostly mayors and local committees) were behind the organisation of these events, though their success was a reflection of the pre-modern peasant and labouring society that Cyprus was at the time. Yet despite the fact that Cyprus was a pre-modern and pre-industrial society, various ‘modern’ celebratory devices were used, such as police and boat processions, parades that included people carrying British flags and photographs of Queen Victoria, while fireworks were also on show.104 On a more intellectual level, Phoni tis Kyprou (Voice of Cyprus) published an article that brilliantly captured the life of Queen Victoria and, in line with Sophronios’ position, claimed that the Cypriots were the most loyal and contented of British subjects, who now enjoyed freedom of speech and equality before the law of all religions.105 The second example was when Sophronios and the Mufti of Cyprus led an extraordinary campaign to have Sendall re-appointed for a second six-year term of office. On 25 June 1897 Sophronios together with Ali Rifki and the elected members of the Mejiliss Idare signed a petition in church Greek and Ottoman Turkish asking for Sendall to be appointed to another six-year term because his administration had been ‘just and impartial’ and his ‘untiring endeavours for the welfare and prosperity of Cyprus have gained our deepest gratitude’. If the request were granted, the petitioners claimed that it would be ‘gratefully received by the whole population of the island, without CO67/106/14506, Sendall to Chamberlain, 25 June 1897. CO67/107/16694, Sendall and Chamberlain, 23 July 1897. 105 CO67/107/17778, Sendall to Chamberlain, 5 August 1897. 103 104

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distinction of creed or race’.106 This was mostly true, with the exception of the Hellenists, since, when no answer to the request was forthcoming, Sophronios and his supporters encouraged the local councils of various parts of the island to submit their own petitions, with the notable exception being that of Larnaca and the non-involvement of Kyrillos Papadopoulos and his coterie. Sendall received and sent to Chamberlain petitions from Limassol town and most of its villagers, and from the towns of Nicosia, Famagusta and Kyrenia, all of which repeated the same request and made similar declarations in favour of Sendall.107 The request, which was not granted owing to Sendall’s age, reflected how broader society and local representatives from many parts of the island continued to respect Sophronios and had no qualms about requesting Sendall’s reappointment in the first large-scale island-wide petitions from across the religious divide since the British occupation. Also reflected was the relative insignificance of Greek nationalism and especially enosis, for clearly Kyrillos Papadopoulos and his supporters were completely isolated on this action.

Memorialisation and Ethno-Nationalist Ascendency In 1900 Sophronios died. In the aftermath of his death ethnic nationalism and enosis started to ascend amongst the elite. This was reflected in both the dispute over who should succeed Sophronios, which arose because there were only two candidates to the archiepiscopal throne, the Bishop of Kitium, Kyrillos (Papadopoulos), and the Bishop of Kyrenia, also Kyrillos (Vasiliou), and in the memorialisation of ‘national’ heroes, which included a complete revision of certain historical events into ‘national’ cardinal points, such as the Kyprianos execution of 1821,108 and Sophronios’ welcoming of Wolseley in 1878, and more generally his legacy. Papadopoulos and his coterie, known as the Kitiaki, emphasised that the Cypriot Orthodox were Greeks109 and had no qualms about destroying Orthodox-Muslim integration. Before Sophronios died, the Kitiaki started building a network to win the archbishopric for Papadopoulos, a most sacrilegious venture. Indeed, the extent of this network was revealed by Pophaides, when she disclosed that in the village of Athienou, which was in CO67/107/16141, Sendall to Chamberlain, 15 July 1897, with enclosures. CO67/107/22899, Sendall to Chamberlain, 14 October 1897, includes enclosures; CO67/107/23575, Sendall to Chamberlain, 21 October 1897, includes enclosures; CO67/108/25593, Sendall to Chamberlain, 19 November 1897, includes enclosures; CO67/108/26678, Sendall to Chamberlain, 3 December 1897, includes enclosures. 108 See Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915, 152-5. 109 Bryant, Imagining the Modern, 82-7. 106 107

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the diocese of the Bishop of Kitium, one of the three local priests refused to perform regular Sunday mass, even extinguishing the candles of the faithful to force the villagers to vote for Papadopoulos. The local commandant of police reported that at subsequent meetings it was decided that the muktar (village head) and other leading elites who opposed Papadopoulos would be assaulted and even killed.110 Haynes Smith thought it would be tragic if Papadopoulos succeeded in becoming archbishop,111 but nothing was done. The Colonial Office saw that Cyprus was no fortress like Malta, where they decided to come down hard on the pro-Italian movement, and so could have some latitude.112 Moreover, the Kitiaki accused their opponents, the Bishop of Kyrenia and his supporters, known as the Kyreniaki, who initially attempted to maintain the true Sophronios legacy, that they were traitors and British lackeys, thus converting the Kyreniaki into moderate enosists.113 During this period, the death of Sophronios offered the Kitiaki the opportunity to embark upon a memorialisation process in an attempt to create a script of a Greek nation in Cyprus. It started with the memorialisation of Archbishop Kyrpianos as an ethno-martyr through the erection of a statue in 1901, out of funds raised in Greece. The Hellenised nationalists of the Kitiaki were taking on those ‘Ottoman era’ elites with a religious and regional identity (which Sophronios shared) and who wanted to cooperate with the British. The next step was to create a warped legacy of Sophronios, starting with a fabrication of his welcoming address to Wolseley in 1878. The myth that Sophronios welcomed the British with declarations of loyalty contingent on the future granting of enosis was created in 1903 in a memorial of the Kitiaki members of the Legislative Council to Joseph Chamberlain, the Colonial Secretary.114 Then in 1907, or soon thereafter, Andreas Thymopoulos, a sculptor who had returned from studies in Athens in 1907, built a statue of Sophronios. The monument at the Archbishopric does not compare to that of Kyprianos; it is much smaller and, more importantly, it is situated within the grounds of the Archbishopric, behind the fence, giving the effect that it is behind bars. Meanwhile, the Kyprianos monument, according to the postcard of 1906,115 had initially been within the grounds and thus behind the fence/bars, but at some point it was moved onto the footpath outside the fence/bars, no doubt to avoid the effect of 110 Local Commandant of Police to W. Collet, District Commissioner of Nicosia, 1 September 1901, in Pophaides, Genesis of Greek National Identity in British Cyprus, 141. 111 CO67/117/6013, confidential, Haynes Smith to Chamberlain, 27 February 1899. 112 Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 181. 113 See Ibid., 185-6. 114 Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus, 25. 115 See postcard in Stavros G. Lazarides, Theodoulos N. Toufexis, Nicosia, 2004, 256.

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being behind bars, where it is a favourite photograph spot for tourists. Tellingly, Sophronios’ statue was not funded by fundraising or any Cypriot nationalist committee in Greece, as Kyprianos’ statue was, but by his family. Incredibly, the inscription on his statue is a complete contradiction of Sophronios’ actions, beliefs and his true legacy. Ɛ ƋƕƑƒƐƕ ƓƙƖƒƐƎƊƐƓ ƃƒƆƔƔƂƎƐƊ! ƓƔƆƒƄƐƍƆƎ ƔƙƒƂ ƔƈƎ ƔƙƎ ƂƄƄƌƙƎ ƋƂƔƐƗƈƎ ƂƎƂƍƆƎƐƎƔƆƓ ƔƈƎ ƙƒƂ ƍ’ ƂƎƈƑƐƍƐƎƐƎ ƏƕƗƈƎ ƑƐƕ ƉƂ ƌƂƍƏƈ ƌƆƕƋƐƖƐƒƂ ƈ ƉƆƂ ƍƂƓ ƌƆƕƉƆƒƊƂ ƓƔƐƕ ƌƂƍƑƒƐƕ ƍƂƓ ƆƕƂƄƐƒƂ ƔƈƎ ƂƖƒƐƌƐƕƓƔƈ ƓƔƆƒƊƂ (Sophronios of Cyprus Britons! We now put up with English occupation Awaiting the hour with impatient spirit When our goddess Freedom will shine clad in white On the foam-bathed land of our glorious Evagoras.)

Sophronios’ was speaking, pronouncing on the misfortune of the British occupation of Cyprus and awaiting the time when freedom would come to Cyprus. Of course this was not Sophronios speaking from the grave, but an unnamed Greek Cypriot nationalist speaking in his name. Although no mention of enosis was made, there were strong Hellenic nationalistic overtones and ‘freedom’ must be understood within the context of enosis. Clearly, this was a fabrication of Sophronios’ legacy.

Conclusion Archbishop Sophronios III has been much neglected by scholars, the Cypriot elites, and consequently in the Cypriot consciousness, despite being one of the longest serving archbishops of Cyprus. Sophronios was gentle and pious, exhibiting moderation and cooperation in his dealings with both Ottoman and British imperial and colonial authorities. He aimed for negotiated solutions to the problems facing the church and the Cypriot people, particularly the peasantry. He did not believe in opposing the British with empty and antagonistic rhetoric or with agitation for enosis, because he believed that it was the duty of the church to work with the state to improve

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the lives of the Cypriot people, and that ethnic-nationalism, as represented by Hellenic nationalism, was a contradiction to Christianity and conflicted with Cypriot realities of Christian and Muslim syncretism. As archbishop he was also the ethnarch, yet, as outlined above, this role had a very different meaning to Sophronios than his successors. Sophronios was undoubtedly the last of the ‘old’ ethnarchs and the first of the ‘new’. He was the last of the ‘old’ because he wanted to continue the practise of church co-option by the state as practised under the Ottomans, which had given the church a privileged political and socio-economic position. He was also the last of the ‘old’ because he did not believe in ethnic-nationalism (i.e. Greek nationalism) or in enosis, unless the British were to abandon the island. He was the first of the ‘new’ because he saw the church as a modernising agent, urging the British to introduce equality in the judicial system and supporting representative institutions and mass education. Yet he was not ‘modern’ enough, hence his neglect and the fabrication of his legacy, because he was a very different ‘new’ to the ‘new’ as represented by his eventual successor, the firebrand Hellenic nationalist Kyrillos Papadopoulos. Sophronios was a far more complicated ethnarch and a rare intellectual for the Church of Cyprus because he appreciated the potential damage of Hellenism for the Cypriot people. In this respect, Sophronios, was ahead of his time, and perhaps still is.

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Figure 7: Portrait of Archbishop Sophronios III at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus.

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Figure 8: Signature of Archbishop Sophronios III, on letter to Grand Vizier, 27 May 1867. Source: HR.TO/449/6, 27 May 1867: Courtesy of BaûbakanlÖk OsmanlÖ Arûivleri (BOA).

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Figure 9: ‘Greek Priests Blessing the British Flag at Nicosia’. Source: Illustrated London News, 18 August 1878.

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Figure 10: Archbishop Sophronios III taken in 1878 by Max Ohnefalsch-Richter. Source: Magda Ohnefalsch-Richter, Greek Customs and Traditions in Cyprus, 1913: Courtesy of the Laiki Group Cultural Centre Photographic Archive.

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Figure 11: Archbishop Sophronios III’s statue at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2008.

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Figure 12: ‘Sophronios behind bars’, statue of Archbishop Sophronios III at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2008.

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Figure 13: Inscription on Sophronios’ statue at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2008.

CHAPTER SEVEN KYRILLOS II, 1909-16: THE FIRST GREEK NATIONALIST AND ENOSIST ARCHBISHOP-ETHNARCH ANDREKOS VARNAVA AND IRENE POPHAIDES

Kyrillos II was the first Greek nationalist archbishop of Cyprus, and therefore the first to resemble the ethnarchic tradition associated with the archbishops of Cyprus after the Second World War. He completely overturned and refashioned the traditional ethnarchic role of the archbishop of Cyprus, from a member of the colonial ruling elite with powerful links to the Ottoman imperial centre and a secular and spiritual leader of his flock, which he kept in check, to a Greek nationalist firebrand who wanted British rule replaced with Greek rule. This chapter aims to deal with the context of this changing role of the Cypriot archbishop-ethnarch as well as the consequences, while providing a portrait of Kyrillos II as a politician and person. In Cypriot historiography and Cypriot national consciousness Archbishop Kyrillos II is treated very well. His importance and legacy are emphasised because clearly he was a Greek nationalist that championed enosis. Western writers emphasise the force of his character and his determination to agitate for enosis.1 Yet Kyrillos II must be understood as a political ideologue who used the new force of ethnic nationalism to demand political power for the demographic majority, the ‘Greek’ Cypriots, and thus to break the age old integration of the Cypriot Christian and Muslim ruling class on the one hand, Sir George Francis Hill, A History of Cyprus, IV, (ed.) Sir Harry Luke, London, 1952, 577; Rebecca Bryant, Imagining the Modern: The Cultures of Nationalism in Cyprus, I. B. Tauris, London, 2004, 80, 82-4; Astonishingly, a recent book claiming to be adding something new to the scholarship on ‘Anglo-Hellenic’ relations, including, oddly, Cyprus, fails to even mention Kyrillos II once. Robert Holland and Diana Markides, The British and the Hellenes: Struggles for Mastery in the Eastern Mediterranean 1850-1960, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2006.

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and the peasant and labouring classes on the other. There was also a dark side to Kyrillos II. His supporters, undoubtedly with his full knowledge and perhaps approval, used violence against their Cypriot Orthodox Christian opponents. Also, despite owing money and claiming to be penniless, £5,000 was found in his bedroom upon his death.2 Yet as archbishop he also exercised a less fiery approach than when he was trying to obtain the top job. Kyrillos Papadopoulos was born in 1845 in the mountain village of Prodromos (the same village as his two predecessors) in the Marathasas region of the Limassol District. Perhaps for this reason, Kyrillos studied at the Jerusalem Theological School from 1866 to 1872 on a scholarship granted by the archbishopric, led by the new archbishop, Sophronios. Thus it is safe to assume, in the absence of any documentary evidence, that Sophronios thought highly of Kyrillos. On his return to Cyprus in 1873, Kyrillos’ star did not rise however. His time in Jerusalem was probably affected by the Bulgarian Schism, when only the Patriarch of Jerusalem, Kyrillos II, opposed the unanimous resolution of the Holy and Great PanOrthodox Synod, held in Constantinople in September 1872, to declare the Bulgarian Exarchate schismatic and its adherents excommunicated because it had surrendered Orthodoxy to ‘ethno-tribalism’ or ‘ethnophyletism’ (ƥƨƭƯƶƵƫƥƴƩƳƬƼƲ), which was deemed heretic (see previous chapter). Clearly, the Patriarch of Jerusalem was an adherent to ethno-nationalism; therefore it was no surprise that Kyrillos Papadopoulos also became an adherent. What is known is that at some point Papadopoulos became the priest at the Church of St John at the archbishopric and taught theology at the Cypriot School in Nicosia. From the reactions to his candidature for the vacant Kitium bishopric and election as Bishop of Kyrenia in 1889, he made himself thoroughly disliked in these positions, although he also had supporters.3

Bishop and Politician, pre-1900 In July 1889 Sir Henry Bulwer, the High Commissioner of Cyprus, sent two letters to Lord Knutsford, the Colonial Secretary, on the ‘election’ of new bishops to the vacant bishoprics of Kitium and Kyrenia.4 The bishopric of Andrekos Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915: The Inconsequential Possession, Manchester University Press, Manchester, 2009, 179-81, 186. 3 See previous chapter for discussion on Bulgarian schism and Sophronios II. For biographical information on Kyrillos Papadopoulos, see Aristedis Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƌƥƮƩƪƼƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ, 1800-1920 (Biographical Lexicon of Cypriots, 1800-1920), Nicosia, 2001, 166. 4 CO 67/61/15276, 243, Bulwer to Knutsford, 18 July 1889; CO 67/61/15233, Confidential, Bulwer to Knutsford, 18 July 1889. 2

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Kitium became vacant when the firebrand anti-British and Greek nationalist Bishop of Kitium, Kyprianos, died in December 1886. Edward Fairfield, the only member of the Colonial Office to have visited Cyprus and thus their ‘Cyprus expert’, commented that ‘his death will probably relieve the government of much trouble, for some time, until someone else like him arises’.5 A number of unsuccessful synods had been held to find a replacement. The throne had been offered to Archimandrite Myrianthus, who resided in London, but he could not accept. Sophronios was probably behind this because his desire for a state-church concordat necessitated closer links to the Orthodox Church in England and a colleague who was a genuine anglophile. After Myrianthus declined, three candidates emerged, all of whom proved unsatisfactory and in the end none were elected.6 The three candidates were Meletios, an archimandrite in Larnaca, Gerasimos, a monk at Kykko Monastery, and Kyrillos Papadopoulos. Bulwer described Meletios as ‘a man of moderate views but is thought not to be well enough educated for the post’. He had a small supporter base around those from old Larnaca, as opposed to the new emerging elites of Scala, the port at Larnaca. Gerasimos of Kykko was an interesting candidate. He had studied at the Theological School of Halki, which had become the main school of theology of the Eastern Orthodox Church’s Ecumenical Patriarchate since its founding in 1844, and at the time he was studying in Geneva under the Swiss philosopher, Ernest Naville. According to Bulwer his candidature was supported by the young Cyprus party of Limassol and by moderate persons of Larnaca and Limassol. It is unclear as to why Sophronios did not support his candidature, especially since in 1890 Gerasimos was made the Abbot of Kykko and he became a close associate of Sophronios. Perhaps Sophronios did not want to interrupt his studies.7 In any event, the serious candidate was Kyrillos. Bulwer described Kyrillos as ‘more of a demagogue than a priest. He is anti-English in his views and has obtained some notoriety for the violence and ability with which he gives expression to his views.’ Bulwer added that few liked Kyrillos, yet, for various political reasons, his candidature was supported by most of the ‘new’ political elites. Kyrillos was strongly supported by the ‘nationalist’ or ‘anti-English’ party, as Bulwer described it, which was made up of various Greek nationalists and Hellenised Cypriots who wanted Athens as their CO 67/43/19416, minute by Fairfield, 7 December 1886. CO 67/61/15276, 243, Bulwer to Knutsford, 18 July 1889; CO 67/61/15233, Confidential, Bulwer to Knutsford, 18 July 1889. 7 Ibid. For biographical information on Gerasimos, see Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƌƥƮƩƪƼƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ, 53. 5 6

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imperial centre and not London, and were led by Aristotle Palaeologos, the Constantipolean editor of Alithea newspaper. Bulwer revealed that leading political elites in Nicosia, such as Pascal Constantinides and Achilles Liassides, supported Kyrillos’ candidature for their own political ends and not because they liked him, although these ends were unclear. What is clear, as Bulwer revealed, was that Sophronios was strongly opposed to Kyrillos’ candidature. It was common knowledge that Sophronios did not like Kyrillos personally and there was no doubt that he did not like Kyrillos’ anti-English and pro-Hellenic nationalist ideology. Yet Constantinides talked Sophronios around, although Sophronios believed that by supporting Kyrillos he would be rid of him from his church. Bulwer also revealed that Bishop Chrysanthos of Kyrenia and the Abbots of Machaera and Kykko also agreed to support Kyrillos.8 A Holy Synod was convened on 28 April to determine replacements for the Bishoprics of Kitium and Paphos (Bishop of Paphos, Neophytos, had resigned in 1888, under circumstances that are unclear).9 Sophronios, with the support of Constantinides, attempted to manipulate the situation in order that Kyrillos be elected Bishop of Kitium, by appointing more supporters of Kyrillos as ‘electors’. This was obviously opposed by the opponents of Kyrillos, and they withdrew completely. Clearly, Sophronios had not counted on this much opposition to Kyrillos, although it must have secretly satisfied him. In any event, the opponents of Kyrillos united behind electing Bishop Chrysanthos of Kyrenia as the new Bishop of Kitium. Chrysanthos had many friends in Larnaca as he had been the headmaster of the Larnaca School from 1860 to 1880.10 Not only was he too willing to leave the dullness of Kyrenia and to return to Larnaca, but Sophronios must also have been pleased that the Bishopric of Kitium would go to a loyal supporter. In the end, Kyrillos lacked the popular support, yet in exchange for withdrawing he would be ‘elected’ to the now vacant Bishopric of Kyrenia.11 This ‘clergymen’s agreement’ did not go down well at all with the inhabitants of Kyrenia. Bulwer received countless protest letters from the inhabitants of Kyrenia

CO 67/61/15276, 243, Bulwer to Knutsford, 18 July 1889; CO 67/61/15233, Confidential, Bulwer to Knutsford, 18 July 1889. 9 For the basic biographical information on Neophytos, Bishop of Paphos, 1869-88, see Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƌƥƮƩƪƼƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ, 251. 10 For the basic biographical information on Chrysanthos, Bishop of Kyrenia 1880-9 and Bishop of Kitium, 1889-90 see Ibid, 429-30. 11 CO 67/61/15276, 243, Bulwer to Knutsford, 18 July 1889; CO 67/61/15233, Confidential, Bulwer to Knutsford, 18 July 1889. 8

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over the election of Kyrillos, but he could do nothing about these complaints.12 In the end, Chrysanthos died rather suddenly in September 1890, aged 62, and the Bishopric of Kitium again became vacant. Kyrillos of Kyrenia, the main candidate, was described by Edward Fairfield as a ‘Helleniste Eusagé’.13 In any event, in April 1893 Sophronios informed the colonial government that Kyrillos was ‘elected’ Bishop of Kitium.14 Although it was unclear as to whether Kyrillos could have had the same impact from Kyrenia as he did as Bishop of Kitium, his move to the Bishopric of Kitium had an immediate impact as he placed himself at the head of the Greek nationalist movement in Cyprus. Rebecca Bryant convincingly argued that Kyrillos Papadopoulos ‘became one of the most popular, vocal, and intransigent elected members of the Legislative Council... one of a new breed of vocal – even vociferous – religious leaders-cum-politicians who were learning to transform and reappropriate the formerly political dimension of their clerical role’.15 Yet it is questionable, given that there was no full franchise for the Legislative Council elections (only men aged 21 who paid verghi (property) tax on or before 13 January of the previous year could be registered to vote), that Kyrillos was ‘popular’, since only a tiny fraction of the population voted.16 To be sure, he was one of a new breed of vociferous anti-British Greek nationalists, but more importantly he was the first head of the Church of Cyprus to be as such, totally re-inventing the role of the archbishop-ethnarch. In 1889 Kyrillos had already formally entered the political arena as a member of the Legislative Council, not for the division of Nicosia and Kyrenia, where he resided, but for the division of Limassol and Paphos.17 Quite clearly he had enough of a supporter base in the Greek nationalist heartland of Limassol to win, although his election was only marginal, increasing only moderately in 1891. In 1895 Kyrillos Papadopoulos attempted to place himself before Archbishop Sophronios as the champion of the peasant and labouring classes, but without much success. In that year the peasant and labouring classes appealed to Nicosia’s political elite because CO 67/61/15276, 243, Bulwer to Knutsford, 18 July 1889. CO 67/66/18021, minute by Fairfield, 1 October 1890. 14 CO 67/80/8297, No. 99, Sendall to Ripon, 28 April 1893. 15 Bryant, Imagining the Modern, 83. 16 Phillios Zannetos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƎƞƳƯƵ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, ed. Th. Papadopoullos (2nd edn. Nicosia, 1997), II, 333. 17 CO 67/62/24263, No. 355, Hackett to Knutsford, 30 November 1889. 12 13

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they could not afford to pay taxes. A committee formed in Nicosia comprising Sophronios, Gerasimos, Constantinides, Liassides, amongst others, told Sendall that island-wide meetings would be held and memorials presented to him.18 The Nicosia-Kyrenia memorial focussed on appealing for relief from heavy taxation; protection from the tribute; and lastly enosis only ‘if England contemplates abandoning the country’. Kyrillos Papadopoulos, and his ethno-nationalist friend, the firebrand Greek national, Nicholas Zannettos, went straight to the point in the Larnaca memorial: ‘the only solution and this at the earliest possible date [was] union with mother Greece’.19 In November 1896 Kyrillos Papadopoulos was again elected to the Legislative Council for Limassol-Paphos electoral district, even though, this time, he resided in Larnaca.20 As Bishop of Kyrenia, and especially as Bishop of Kitium, Kyrillos preoccupied himself with being a thorough nuisance to the British authorities, declaring (such as in the Legislative Council) at every opportunity that the solution to all the problems in Cyprus was enosis and only enosis,21 and trying through the most scandalous means possible to upset Cypriot Muslims, and to force lino-bambaki (people, indeed entire villages, that practised both Islam and Christianity) to convert to the Eastern Orthodox Church.22 Towards the latter years of his life, Sophronios suffered from poorhealth, and Kyrillos Papadopoulos and his supporters, led by the Greek national, Nicholas Katalanos, started building a network to win the archbishopric, a most sacrilegious venture. William Haynes Smith, the high commissioner, thought it would be tragic if they succeeded The Bishop of Kitium has been very active lately in founding political vigilance committees in various parts of his diocese, and it is generally supposed that he is endeavouring to strengthen his political position in order to obtain the Archbishopric on the death of the present Archbishop who is old and very infirm. The present Archbishop has been unable from infirmity to attend the meetings of the Central Medjliss Idare for many years, and it would be a disaster for the country, while the constitution remains as it is, for the vacant place to be filled by a Militant Archbishop who was the head of numerous political associations, and on whose good will he was dependent for his emoluments.23

CO67/91/8534, 97, Sendall to Ripon, 6 May 1895, with memorial, 22 April 1895. CO67/91/8547, 110, Sendall to Ripon, 7 May 1895, with memorials and signatures. 20 CO 67/101/24037, No. 263, Sendall to Chamberlain, 13 November 1896. 21 See various examples from P. Persianis, Church and State in Cyprus Education, Nicosia, 1978, 43, 63. 22Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 180. 23 CO67/117/6013, confidential, Haynes Smith to Chamberlain, 27 February 1899. 18 19

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Haynes Smith’s warnings, however, went unheeded, and despite the ability to prevent the events that unfolded, the British imperial government allowed the new high commissioner to effectively hand the archbishopric to the very militant bishop that Haynes Smith warned would bring disaster for Cyprus as archbishop.

The Archiepiscopal Dispute, 1900-1909 Yet Kyrillos Papadoupoulos and his coterie of Greek nationals and Hellenised Cypriots, most of whom were merciless usurers, did not have it all their way. In May 1900, Archbishop Sophronios died after a long illness. The Bishop of Paphos, Epiphanios, entrusted with arranging the election for the archbishop, had predeceased him (February 1899), leaving only those of Kyrenia and Kitium (both named Kyrillos). The ensuing battle over who would succeed Sophronios was not only about who would be archbishop, but over what role the archbishop-ethnarch should have viz-a-vis the British colonial power and the Orthodox Christian community, which meant that the battle was also over ideology and collective identity. The austere Bishop of Kyrenia (Vasilliou), the subject of the next chapter, and his faction (KyreniakƟ), were led by Soprhonios’ ally, Paschalis Constantinides, and claimed Orthodoxy as the people’s true identity. They were pro-British and keen to maintain Christian-Muslim relations. They argued that secular leaders should focus on improving living conditions, and church leaders on spiritual needs, although church leaders should understand the socio-economic needs of the people. They also charged Papadopoulos and his coterie of freemasonry.24 Papadopoulos and his supporters (KitiakƟ) emphasised that the Cypriot Orthodox were Greeks and had no qualms about brawling with their opponents, with Papadopoulos threatening to sue a man for libel for calling him a freemason.25 Papadopoulos’ supporters were primarily Greek nationals and Hellenised Cypriots, who belonged to the new professional and to some extent middle classes that operated within the new modern British political and economic structures. Although it goes beyond the scope of this chapter to give a day by day and blow by blow account of the near decade long struggle to elect a successor to Sophronios, it is important to explore the role of Kyrillos 24 25

Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 179-180. Bryant, Imagining the Modern, 82-87, 89-90.

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Papadopoulos in the making and perpetuation of the conflict.26 After the passing of Sophronios, the Holy Synod, composed of the Bishops of Kitium and Kyrenia, the Abbots of Kykko and Machaira, and the Exarch of the archdiocese, met to make the arrangements to fill the vacant see, and on 25 July 1900 issued an encyclical detailing the particulars of the election. Meanwhile, although Kyrillos Papadopoulos had signed the electoral constitution (ƋơƭƯƭƩƳƬƼƲ), he realised that he had waived his right to act as president of the Synod, and decided to leave the Synod and attack its authority, which he now claimed was uncanonical. In any event, the new archbishop was to be elected by 60 electors, and the members of the Holy Synod. The controversy arose with the election of the 60. The result was not in question: 46 were supporters of Papadopoulos, and 14 supporters of Vasiliou. But the vote of the 60 electors was conducted in such a spirit of violence and fraud that the Holy Synod, dominated by Kyreniaki, refused to recognise it. Indeed, it was reported to Haynes-Smith that: ...in some villages no voting at all took place but that certificates were drawn up at a subsequent date stating that so and so had been elected; in others influence was brought to bear by money lenders and merchants, and in others people from the towns tore up the voters’ tickets after they had been placed in the ballot box and compelled the voters to hold a new election and to elect them as their representatives.27

These violent actions were typical of the approach of Kyrillos Papadopoulos and his supporters, who not only campaigned vigorously across the island, but used violence and fraud to achieve their ends. Indeed, in the village of Athienou, which was under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Kitium, one of the three local priests refused to perform regular Sunday mass, even extinguishing the candles of the faithful, to force the villagers to elect Papadopoulos supporters as their ‘delegates’. The local commandant of police reported that at subsequent meetings it was decided that the muktar

26 Published contemporary accounts vary from the Pro-Kyrillos Papadopoulos account by Hackett, and the more neutral account by Cobham, who was the district commissioner of Larnaca from 1879 to 1907. John Hackett, ‘The Archiepiscopal Question in Cyprus’, Irish Church Quarterly, 1908, 320-39; John Hackett, ‘The Close of the Archiepiscopal Question in Cyprus’, Irish Church Quarterly, 1910, 230-42; Claude Delaval Cobham, ‘The Archbishopric of Cyprus’, Church Quarterly Review, LXVII, 1908, 121-33. 27 SA1/3198/1900, Report to Haynes-Smith, quoted in Bryant, Imagining the Modern, 82.

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(village head) and other leading elites who opposed Papadopoulos would be assaulted and even killed.28 The response of the Kitiaki was predictable: appeal to the Patriarchs of Constantinople, Jerusalem and Alexandria – the Patriarch of Antioch, being born in Syria, was not considered by Kyrillos Papadopoulos as a probable supporter and was ignored – and to the Church of Greece. Initially, the British government barred outside intervention as a breach of the rights of the Autocephalous Cypriot Orthodox Church, as it had not been agreed to by the Holy Synod.29 The Holy Synod (i.e. Kyreniaki) pushed this view when it appealed in December 1901 to Haynes Smith to preserve the autocephaly of the Church from the foreign patriarchates. They argued that the British had to uphold the autocephaly of the Cypriot Orthodox Church so that when ‘the hour will come that Cyprus may…be annexed to the country with which she is nationally connected, Her Majesty’s Government may be able to say: “I give her to you, having preserved intact…the Privileges of her Church”.’30 The passage was discreetly added at the end of a long letter. Haynes Smith told Chamberlain that the Kitiaki ‘stimulated public feeling by strongly advocating Union with Greece’ and that the Kyreniaki could not ‘resist the popular cry’, but say enosis could only result with British consent.31 Haynes Smith added that the agitation keeps those who support the English administration under a species of terrorism…[because] if they…support the British administration even in the most ordinary matters of Government, they are held up as traitors in the Greek press, and their families are subjected to a continued stream of abuse which is not infrequently of a most dirty character.32

Papadopoulos’ power grew under such conditions amongst the new educated elites and those property owners who needed them for credit. In the October 1901 legislature campaign, the Kitiaki won easily. A. E. Kershaw, the chief commandant of police, reported that Hellenists misled the people into fearing that Britain would alter their religion and language. A Hellenist openly admitted to him that success came by spreading fear, blaming the British for 28 Local Commandant of Police to W. Collet, District Commissioner of Nicosia, 1 September 1901, in Pophaides, Genesis of Greek National Identity in Cyprus, 141. 29 Cobham, ‘The Archbishopric of Cyprus’, 121-33. 30 CO67/125/768, Members of the Holy Synod to Haynes Smith, 13 December 1900; 266, Haynes Smith to Chamberlain, 24 December 1900; confidential, Haynes Smith to Chamberlain, 24 December 1900. 31 CO67/125/768, confidential, Haynes Smith to Chamberlain, 24 December 1900. 32 CO67/127, confidential, Haynes Smith to Chamberlain, 6 March 1901.

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poverty (which necessitated borrowing from usurers) and offering enosis as the answer, a tactic the Ionian Islanders had also employed half a century earlier.33 Haynes Smith recognised genuine grievances, and so proposed to the Colonial Office certain remedies, which were, for the most part rejected. He was especially concerned about the tribute, and to check Hellenism more generally he suggested more social interaction between the officials and the people, proposing a proper flag – a red St. George Cross on a white background with the arms of Richard I; a native Cypriot regiment34; a statechurch concordat when an archbishop was elected (what Sophronios had wanted from the start); and power to stop the discussion of enosis in the legislature, which he claimed should only be debating internal affairs.35 The Colonial Office was divided on what to do. A. E. Collins, a junior clerk, thought it was time to check the agitators from spreading fear through sedition laws, press censorship and control of education.36 But his more experienced colleague John Anderson believed it was useless ‘trying to kill an agitation of this nature…with tea or cake or with specially designed flags and banners’.37 Bertram Cox, the assistant under-secretary, thought the proGreek press was not as bad as the pro-Italian press in Malta38 and Ommanney, the permanent undersecretary, thought Cyprus could have some latitude since it was no fortress like Malta.39 The failure to convert Cyprus into a strategic asset was determining how to handle the Hellenists. Chamberlain agreed with the experienced Colonial Office members, telling Haynes Smith that all he agreed to was the concordat and flag.40 So the cheap flag Gladstone’s government gave Cyprus was replaced with the arms of Richard I.41 Symbols of the British Empire had little effect. The Hellenists had their own symbols: the flag of Greece and popular postcards of ‘ethnomartyrs’ and current politicians. In September 1902 Kyrillos Papadopoulos 33 CO883/6, 45019, Mediterranean 57, confidential, A.E. Kershaw to Young, 14 November 1901; Thomas Gallant, Experiencing Dominion: Culture, Identity, and Power in the British Mediterranean, University of Notre Dame Press, 2002, 189. 34See Andrekos Varnava, ‘“Martial Races” in the Isle of Aphrodite’, Journal of Military History, LXXIV, 4, October 2010, 1047-67. 35 Ibid., confidential, Haynes Smith to Chamberlain, 28 November 1901. 36 CO67/128/45019, minute, Collins, 18 January 1902. 37 Ibid., Anderson, 21 January 1902. 38 Ibid., Bertram Cox, 22 January 1902; H. Frendo, ‘Maltese Colonial Identity: Latin Mediterranean or British Empire?’ (ed.) V. Mallia-Milanes, The British Colonial Experience, 1800-1964: The Impact on Maltese Society, Malta, 1988, 199-201. 39 CO67/128/45019, minute, Ommanney, 1 February 1902. 40 CO883/6, 45019, confidential, Chamberlain to Haynes Smith, 19 February 1902. 41 For the flags see http://www.crwflags.com/fotw/flags/cy_br.html

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hoisted the flag of Greece for the first time in Cyprus at Trooditissa Monastery.42 In the second half of 1901, the British government allowed the ‘new’ Patriarch of Constantinople, Ioakim III, who had earlier been Patriarch from 1878-84, with the approval of the Patriarchs of Jerusalem and Alexandria, to send a representative to report on the Cyprus archiepiscopal dispute and suggest a solution. The Patriarch’s exarch, Demetrios Georgiades, stayed in Cyprus a month interviewing members of both rival groups, and his report, dated 28 October 1901, found that both bishops were unfit to be archbishop, and both had contributed to the dispute, although Kyrillos Papadapoulos was singled out for his actions. Finally, in January 1902, the Patriarchs of Constantinople, Jerusalem and Alexandria decided to exclude both the bishops and proposed three other candidates. This did not go down well with the Kitiaki crowd, and an enraged Kyrillos Papadopoulos even threatened to resist the decision by force.43 In December 1902 the Kyreniaki, anxious to hold a proper election, wrote to Chamberlain, and he replied in January 1903 that the British government would not recognise any election of an archbishop unless it was undertaken according to the ancient laws of the Church of Cyprus and that it was free and fair. Kyrillos Papadopoulos, however, refused to work with the Holy Synod, which he refused to acknowledge, and going against the policy of the British government decided to use his power in the Legislative Council, which he had only achieved through use of the same underhanded and violent methods that he employed in the 1900 archiepiscopal ‘election’. In June 1903 he proposed his own plan in the Legislative Council but it was dropped for lack of British support.44 The dispute continued without much potential for resolution until 1907, when it flared up again, although the seeds of its resolution were planted in 1904, when, in October, the Conservative government selected Charles KingHarman to succeed Haynes Smith. King-Harman knew Cyprus well, having served as High Commissioner Robert Biddulph’s private secretary and assistant chief secretary.45 A philhellene,46 he was given a fixed £50,000 grantin-aid and was instructed to resolve the archiepiscopal dispute. He did. But

Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƌƥƮƩƪƼƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ, 166. Cobham, ‘The Archbishopric of Cyprus’, 121-33. 44 Ibid. 45 He had also married Biddulph’s daughter in 1888. 46 Persianis, Church and State in Cyprus Education, 62. 42 43

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by favouring Papadopoulos – Katalanos liked him47 – he destroyed the Orthodox-centric faction and alienated Muslim leaders, who started reacting to the prominence of Hellenism in the rhetoric of Cypriot Orthodox elites. Before the archiepiscopal dispute flared up in 1907 and 1908, and was finally ‘resolved’, Cyprus was visited by Winston Churchill, the Liberal undersecretary at the Colonial Office.48 On 9 October 1907 Churchill landed at Famagusta for a four-day sojourn on his way to British East Africa. KingHarman was pleased, but told John Clauson, who became the Chief Secretary in 1906, that ‘there was no occasion for any decoration’.49 When Churchill arrived, he found the wharf and streets at Famagusta filled with Greece’s colours and the shouts for enosis nearly deafened him.50 King-Harman informed Elgin that Greek flags were manufactured by the thousand; school children were organised and drilled to wave the national standard effectively; addresses were prepared in which Mr. Churchill’s visit to Cyprus was likened to the arrival of Mr. Gladstone in the Ionian Islands and in which he was fervently exhorted to…restore Cyprus to her Mother Greece.51

This prompted Churchill to cancel all political deputations until his second last day.52 After listening to Abdul Hamid Bey, a rich tobacco manufacturer,53 explaining that Muslim Cypriots resented the cries of enosis,54 to which Churchill replied that he could not censure the Greek Cypriots ‘for expressing their democratic prerogative’,55 Papadopoulos read the Kitiaki memorial. It began with the old myth that Gladstone had ceded the Ionian Islands to Greece; Churchill, it asserted, should do likewise with Cyprus.56 The Muslim minority, Papadopoulos claimed, had no right to deny ‘national liberation’ to the majority. This was a warped interpretation of the rights of demographic minorities, who, it was implied, had no right to protection or N. Katalanos, ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼ ƌƥƽƪƯƬơ, Nicosia, 1914; Karamanos, ƋƽưƱƯƲ, 74. SA1:2404/1907, confidential, Elgin to King-Harman, 12 July 1907. 49 SA1:2404/1907, King Harman minute. 50 C.3966, King-Harman to Elgin, 21 October 1907. 51 Ibid. 52 Ibid. 53 Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƌƥƮƩƪƼƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ, 30. 54 C.3966, King-Harman to Elgin, 21 October 1907, 4. 55 Ibid. 56 C.3966, Greek Elected Members Memorial to Churchill, Bishop of Kitium, 12 October 1907, 6. 47 48

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say on the political status of their homeland.57 Papadopoulos added that British economic policy had failed and the £1,781,942 taken in tribute would have made Cyprus ‘a paradise of the East as promised’.58 Cypriot socioeconomic problems would thus be solved in the life after enosis. The shared Cypriot economic grievances could not be incorporated into a common Cypriot response because Hellenisation subordinated Orthodox elite responses to enosis.59 Churchill expressed joy at the Greek political development, but dismissed changing the constitution to give them more power because the Muslims and British would be shut-out.60 In 1907, both bishops appealed to the patriarchates, and in June Photios, the Patriarch of Alexandria, Basil, the Bishop of Anchialos, representing Ioakim III, and the Archimandrite Meletius Metaxakis, representing the Patriarch of Jerusalem, visited the island. Photios openly supported Kyrillos Papadopoulos, and Basil supported Kyrillos Vasiliou, leading to the Patriarch of Jerusalem recalling Meletius.61 Then on 10 February 1908 the Synod of Constantinople declared Kyrillos Vasiliou archbishop. King-Harman promised to inform the Colonial Office, but did not accept the decision. Neither did Kyrillos Papadopoulos. When the bells of the archiepiscopal church tolled with a view to announcing the election of Vasiliou, the Kitiaki surrounded the building and threatened violence on Basil, the Bishop of Anchialos, the Abbot of Kykko, and their associates. The next day the Kitiaki attacked the Kyreniaki in Nicosia, while King-Harman had the zaptieh occupy the Archbishopric and called-out the Yorkshire Regiment from Polymedia. But fighting continued on the night of 9 April, forcing him to proclaim martial law.62 On 6 May he rushed through the legislature the ‘Archiepiscopal Election Law’ with the votes of the British and the eight Kitiaki members.63 In April 1909 Papadopoulos was elected archbishop unopposed after the Kyreniaki refused to partake in the elections, but in 1910 they accepted the result after Kyrillos II threatened to fill what he claimed was the vacant see of Kyrenia and the Oecumenical Patriarch refused to further support the

Ibid., 7-8. Ibid., 6. 59 Anagnostopoulou, The Passage from the Ottoman Empire to the Nation-States, 195. 60 C.3966, Churchill’s Reply to the Greek Elected Members, 12 October 1907, 21. 61 Cobham, ‘The Archbishopric of Cyprus’, 121-33. 62 CO67/151/14489, King-Harman to Elgin, 16 April 1908; The Times, 13 April 1908, 6b; Cobham, ‘The Archbishopric of Cyprus’, 121-33. 63 Cobham, ‘The Archbishopric of Cyprus’, 121-33. 57 58

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Kyreniaki.64 King-Harman was relieved,65 but the Colonial Office was concerned at the prospect of a firebrand archbishop.66 The Hellenist triumph in 1910 subordinated the Cypriot Orthodox political elites to a Greek nationalist political discourse and to enosis,67 despite divisions between hardliners, represented by Kyrillos Papadopoulos, and moderates, represented by the Kyreniaki. Equally important was that the resolution of the archiepiscopal dispute completely altered the position of archbishop-ethnarch from one of loyal supporter of colonial government, whether Ottoman or British, to consistent opponent of British rule in favour of enosis. The irony was that it had been a British colonial law that had seen to the cementing of the Greek nationalist political discourse and enosis as the only political discourse on the island’s status through the election of Kyrillos Papadopoulos.

Archbishop, 1909-1916 Kyrillos Papadopoulos became archbishop as a direct result of the politics that had conditioned and the events that had determined the turbulent era of the archiepiscopal question, and developed over a period that initially shook the Balkans and subsequently the entire European continent, engendering intensely felt vibrations in Cyprus. During his tenure, tensions manifested between the Orthodox and Muslim Cypriot communities, which he encouraged, but which were also fanned by expectations about enosis triggered by the Balkan and Great Wars. It is in this context that the role of Kyrillos II as an archbishop-ethnarch must be explored through his relations with the British authorities, his commitment to enosis and his activities as a temporal leader of the Orthodox community. Through this scope, conclusions will reveal Kyrillos’ understanding of the role of the Cypriot archbishop in the early twentieth century and how he was pivotal in transforming the role of the archbishop-ethnarch. Contemporary sources, although representing personal and thus prejudiced assessments, reveal observations on the behaviour of Kyrillos that manifested during his tenure as archbishop. In a graphic description, Magda 64 CO67/154/14682, 60, King-Harman to Crewe, 21 April 1909; CO67/158/8142, 52, King-Harman to Crewe 10 March 1910; Hackett ‘The Close of the Archiepiscopal Question in Cyprus’ Irish Church Quarterly, 1910, 230-42. 65 CO67/158/8142, 52, King-Harman to Crewe, 10 March 1910. 66 CO67/158/8142, minute, Fiddian, 22 March 1910. 67 Anagnostopoulou, The Passage from the Ottoman Empire to the Nation-States, 191, 193.

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Ohnefalsch-Richter, a German researcher who had lived in Cyprus during the early British period, emphasised his qualities as a politician as well as his status as the leader of the Orthodox Cypriot community. She wrote that Kyrillos, although a very good diplomat, aware of how to manoeuvre, to discuss, to handle politics, and to scheme, when circumstances necessitate it, falls short of his Bishops in relation to education… He has a tall and imposing stature and… a deep and full black beard and rich hair that can barely be hidden beneath his kamilavka (ecclesiastical headgear). Two sparkling eyes with dense eyelashes command his pale white face and his shaped lips meet resolutely and softly, contingent on circumstances. A hawk-like nose which, despite its position, its length and its curve, is in harmony with the face, stands out in their midst. He belongs to that breed of men that take no prisoners. On account of these distinct physical and spiritual characteristics, the Archbishop enjoys greater benefits of status than his late predecessor Sophronios, amongst the locals and the British alike. When the Governor General (sic) aims to accomplish something that concerns the Greeks, he treats him courteously and usually he achieves it68.

Ohnefalsch-Richter, not being a Cypriot or a Greek, saw Kyrillos as an outsider and therefore without any prejudice. On the other hand, Cypriot and Greek commentators were less critical. A Cypriot doctor, Kalavros, writing from Paris in 1910 to congratulate the new archbishop on his election, stressed Kyrillos’ patriotism,69 while the Greek Consul in Cyprus praised the ‘conciliatory spirit’ which the two parties demonstrated in concluding the ecclesiastical dispute.70 As archbishop, Kyrillos attempted to moderate his vociferous anti-British critique of earlier years in favour of a more diplomatic approach. Despite the accumulated grievances of the Orthodox Cypriots against the British government, which differed across the social strata, yet found expression through indifference to and abstention from celebrations for the coronation of King George V in 1911, the high clergy along with lay representatives of the Orthodox community congratulated the Commissioners on the

Magda Ohnefalsch-Richter, ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƜ żƨƧ ƪơƩ ŻƨƩƬơ ƳƴƧƭ ƋƽưƱƯ, ed. A. Marangou, Popular Bank Cultural Centre, Nicosia, 1994, 281-2. 69 AAK, AKƃ, File XLIII, Ch. Kalavros, Doctor to Kyrillos II, Archbishop of Cyprus, 11 March 1910. 70 Ibid., I. Kaloutsis, Consul of Greece in Cyprus to Kyrillos II, Archbishop of Cyprus, 20 February 1910. 68

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occasion.71 The archbishop simultaneously consented to a Muslim Cypriot proposition that the Chief Secretary be authorised by the Legislative Council to dispatch a congratulatory proclamation to the British king, George V.72 In the absence of any thanksgiving services or decorations in the towns of the island, the British administrators perceived these undertakings as reflecting the bleak and austere behaviour of the Orthodox Cypriots towards them,73 according to the Greek Consul in Larnaca. This notwithstanding, Kyrillos demonstrated a tendency to assume a restrained stance towards the British that did not border on extremity. Such a perspective was noteworthy, particularly when located in the prevalent atmosphere of the period, in which the Cypriot Orthodox elites were renowned for agitating against the colonial government. Articles strongly criticising the British ‘opportunistic and double-faced’ governance of Cyprus and the ‘arrogant, cruel, despotic and rigid lords’74 appeared in the press, complemented by others stressing the national question and the Greekness of Cyprus.75 The withdrawal of the Orthodox members from the Legislative Council in 1912 which ensued from the government’s unwillingness to yield to their demands for more local participation in the administration of the island, for proportional representation of the two ethnic groups in the Legislative Council, for expenditure of taxes for the benefit of the Cypriots and for restoration of surplus balances on the island,76 intensified the climate. Although their letter of resignation did not include any explicit reference to enosis, the resolutions of popular rallies all over the island77 as well as the press78 linked this withdrawal to the struggle for enosis. Whether these rallies attracted all class of society, and if so, why, require further investigation. Nevertheless, those organising the rallies and making speeches belonged to the political and economic elites, not the peasantry and labouring class. Hence, these rallies resulted in the creation of the Cypriot Political Organisation, the aim of which was the conduct of the political struggle of the Cypriot Orthodox people, as determined by their political

71AYE:

1912, File 107/8, ‘ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼ ƇƞƴƧƬơ’, Consul of Greece in Larnaca, to the Greek Foreign Ministry, 14 June 1911. 72 Ibid. 73 Ibid. 74 ƑơƴƱƟƲ, ‘ƈ ƑƥƱƩƢƼƧƴƯƲ ƂưƜƭƴƧƳƩƲ – ƂƫƫƯưƱƼƳơƫƯƲ ƑƯƫƩƴƩƪƞ’, 12/25 January 1912. 75 Ibid., ‘ƕưƥƱƢơƳƟơ ƅƩƪơƩƹƬƜƴƹƭ’, 5/18 April 1912. 76 The Cyprus Gazette (Extraordinary), 5 June 1912, Orthodox Members of the Legislative Council to H. Goold-Adams, 4/17 April 1912, in AAK, AKƃ, File XLIII. 77 See indicatively ibid., Resolution of the Rally in Larnaca, 15/28 April 1912. 78 See for example ƑơƴƱƟƲ, ‘ƔƯ ƥƭ ƌƥƵƪƹƳƟơ ƓƵƫƫơƫƧƴƞƱƩƯƭ’, 19/2 May 1912.

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elites.79 Muslims were excluded by virtue of the enosis demand. Indeed bicommunal disturbances occurred in late May 1912 in Limassol during the Kataklismos fair,80 and a deputation proceeded to London in August 1912 to advance the arguments presented in the resignation letter of the Legislative councillors.81 Kyrillos and his supporters had managed to unite into one political demand the grievances of the peasantry and labouring classes, which Sophronios had always attempted to assist, with the demands of the nationalist political elites for enosis. For Kyrillos and the other nationalist elites, enosis was the solution to the problems of society. In this way, the division of society along class lines, which continued to be evident, was bridged, at least theoretically in the minds of the nationalists and practically through their demands to the British. Although Kyrillos did not always play a central role in all of these events and developments, he was both responsible for encouraging the climate of discontent and presenting enosis as the only solution to perceived British failings. He presided over the popular rally in Nicosia on 28 April 1912, and signed its resolution which condemned the ‘heartless and illiberal’ British administration. The resolution also approved the establishment of the Central Committee and affirmed that the national sentiments and unalterable wish of the people to unite with Greece would never be suppressed.82 On its inception, he became the president of the Central Committee, the superior body in the hierarchical structure of the Cypriot Political Organisation,83 which had unsuccessfully requested in May the appointment of a Royal Commission to inquire into the affairs of the island.84 These activities AAK, AKƃ, File IV, ƋơƭƯƭƩƳƬƼƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƑƯƫƩƴƩƪƞƲ ƐƱƣơƭƾƳƥƹƲ, 1912, p.3. On the disturbances see CO 67/170, Report, Chief Commandant of the Police for the Year Ended 31 March 1913 to Acting Chief Secretary, 23 June 1913, enclosure in C.W. Orr, Administering the Government to Harcourt, 30 June 1913; AAK, AKƃ, File XLIII, Meletios, Bishop of Kitium to Kyrillos II, 15 May 1912. See also Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915, 189; and ƈ ƋƽưƱƯƲ ƪơƩ Ư Ƃ’ ƑơƣƪƼƳƬƩƯƲ ƑƼƫƥƬƯƲ: ƓƽƭƴƯƬƯ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƼ ƅƩƜƣƱơƬƬơ ƴƧƲ 4ƧƲ ƅƥƪơƥƴƟơƲ ƴƧƲ ƂƣƣƫƩƪƞƲ ƋơƴƯƷƞƲ 1910-1920, Phakos, Nicosia, 1999, 8-9. 81 CO 67/167, Goold-Adams, to Harcourt, 1 August 1912; CO 67/172, GooldAdams, to Harcourt, 19 February 1914. On the deputation to London in 1912 see George Hill, A History of Cyprus, IV, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1972, 425. 82 AAK, AKƃ, File XLIII, Resolution of the Rally in Nicosia, 15/28 April 1912. 83 This body also consisted of the Bishops of Paphos, Kitium and Keryneia, the Abbot of Kykko and the ex-Legislative Councillors in ibid., File IV, ƋơƭƯƭƩƳƬƼƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƑƯƫƩƴƩƪƞƲ ƐƱƣơƭƾƳƥƹƲ, 1912, pp.3-6. 84 Ibid., File XLIII, H. Goold-Adams, High Commissioner to Kyrillos II, Archbishop of Cyprus, 25 June 1912. 79 80

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signified involvement in anti-government activities which his predecessor not only discouraged but would have abhorred. Sophronios would have been turning in his grave at Kyrillos encouraging the resignation of the councillors and blaming it on ‘popular discontent’, the British rejection of their demands, and at associating the British ‘promise’ upon arrival to ensure to the Cypriot people ‘the blessings of peace, progress and civilisation’ with the ‘granting to the islanders the political and economic emancipation which they are in need of’ (i.e. enosis). For Kyrillos ‘the desire for a higher political life, which is burning in the hearts of the Cypriot people, claims the respect of the Nation that vaunts itself of its love for political conduct and freedom’.85 This type of false emotional blackmail was a characteristic feature of how Kyrillos used his ethnarchic role. Kyrillos’ fine balance between moderate rhetoric, compared to his fiery anti-British tactics of his years as a Legislative Councillor, and his continued enosist politics, arose, in part, from the position of the government in Greece and Kyrillos’ reaction to it. In 1911 the Greek Consul in Cyprus, following instructions from his superiors in Athens, warned the Cypriots against their ‘chauvinistic policy’ towards the British, in favour of a more conciliatory approach.86 During the same period, far from merely pointing out the vanity of vigorous enosist activities, the Greek Ambassador in London noted that they exasperated the British. He therefore advised Cypriots ‘to follow Gambetta’s most wise advice to his compatriots, “y penser toujours, mais n’en jamais parler”’ with relation to enosis,87 while recommending recognition of the benefits bestowed on Cyprus by the British. On this basis, reminiscent of Churchill in 1907, Cypriots should enjoy the advantages of British rule without renouncing their national desires and without irritating the administrators under the ‘silently understood condition that the affairs of the island will improve according to the just demands of the great Greek majority of Cyprus’.88 Kyrillos II was well aware of the position of the Greek government, led by the Anglophile Prime Minister, Eleftherios Venizelos. In 1912 Theophanis Theodotou, Sophronios’ nephew but a diehard enosist and Papadopoulos supporter during the 10-year archbishop dispute, who was a member of the deputation that visited London, told Archbishop Gennadios, that the Cypriots should not act without approval from the national centre. 85 Ibid., The Central Committee to L. Harcourt, Secretary of State for the Colonies, May 1912 [the exact date is missing from the document]. 86 AYE: 1912, File 107/8, ‘ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼ ƇƞƴƧƬơ’, Consul of Greece in Larnaca to the Greek Foreign Ministry, 14 June 1911. 87 Ibid., I. Gennadios, Ambassador of Greece in London to I. Gripatis, Greek Foreign Minister, 4/17 July 1911. 88 Ibid.

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He now believed that the circumstances of the ‘dismemberment of Turkey’, the prevalent British conviction that Cyprus was useless to the empire,89 and that Britain would cede Cyprus to Greece had Greece been in a position to defend it against potential occupiers, was the context for the attainment of the national goal. He therefore concluded that attacks against the high commissioner, who should be an ally rather than an opponent, should cease.90 Kyrillos was not immune to taking on board the positions of the Greek government and advisers, even if the advice was closer to that of the Kyreniaki, especially because he could better co-opt the Kyreniaki to his more extreme positions. Kyrillos’ tactics combined his newly acquired use of discretion with his more firebrand politics, depending on the situation and audience. So at times he aligned himself with the propositions of the Venizelos government and exploited the effects in the Balkans hoping that enosis would eventuate through a British policy that saw a new strong Greece as a capable ally. At such times he avoided colliding with the British, for he deemed that circumstances afforded enosis prospects in the framework of good relations with them, given the broader Balkan situation. Invoking developments in the Balkans, Kyrillos even signed a petition which declared that ‘[t]his Greek country, which has been detached from the Turkish yoke by Great Britain, feels very deeply the benefaction thus done to it’. It also expressed the conviction that ‘the great changes occasioned in the Near East by the Balkan war would have removed all hesitations of Great Britain arising from engagements amounting to mere forms and that Great Britain, who is the advocate, par excellence, of the doctrine of the nation’s rights, would have adopted the just national claim of a people ruled by her’ and reiterated the persistence for enosis.91 Kyrillos did not hesitate to appeal to the ‘Great, Godfearing and Christian Power’, Britain, to solicit assistance for the Greek population of Thrace and Asia Minor ‘undergoing systematic and continuous… persecution by the fanatic Turkish mobs’,92 demonstrating his positive attitude to the British and identification with the concept of ‘unredeemed Greeks’. This tactic shows above all that Kyrillos was an

Further evidence in support of the argument in Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus. AAK, AKƃ, File XLIII, Th. Theodotou, former Legislative Councillor to Kyrillos II, Archbishop of Cyprus, 9 August 1912. 91 CO 67/173, Kyrillos, Archbishop of Cyprus, senior clergy and the Orthodox members of the Legislative Council to Harcourt, 16/29 May 1914, enclosure in Goold-Adams to Harcourt, 11 June 1914. 92 Ibid., Kyrillos II to Goold-Adams, 16/29 August 1914, enclosure I in GooldAdams to Harcourt, 25 September 1914. 89 90

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opportunist and, unlike his predecessor, a wily politician who believed in enosis by any means. Often Kyrillos did not need to use forceful language or overt anti-British rhetoric, since the local Greek language newspapers did it. The newspapers focussed on developing the view that the British colonial administration favoured the Cypriot Muslims93 and co-operated together in the Legislative Council against the Orthodox Cypriots.94 The Legislative Councillors, simultaneously, campaigned for an increase in the representation of the Orthodox Cypriots in the legislative body so as to secure a majority.95 Cypriot Orthodox elites, including the archbishop, established the new political position, based on a warped sense of democracy, that, because they were the demographic majority, they had the right to determine the political status of the island over the demographic Muslim minority. This completely went against Sophronios’ view to preserve and encourage Christian and Muslim co-operation, which slowly deteriorated from this period. Despite Greek Cypriot elite expectations for enosis arising from the developments in the Balkan Wars, they were met with Britain’s dry and unsurprising response that ‘no change in the political situation of the Island is contemplated’.96 Kyrillos’ tactics remained consistent into the years of the Great War – putting pressure on the British for enosis through various actions designed to upset the British. Muslim and Orthodox Cypriot elite reacted differently to enosis rumours. The three Muslim legislature deputies petitioned Lewis Harcourt, the Colonial Secretary, rejecting enosis, independence and self-rule, fearing Greek domination.97 On the other hand, the Greek Cypriot leaders sensed the moment to demand enosis even more fervently.98 The Colonial Office was powerless because enosis ‘depend[ed] on questions of ‘high policy’ and has not yet come under consideration, so far as we are aware’.99 On 7 January 1913, Archbishop Kyrillos, after chairing a meeting of See ƑơƴƱƟƲ, ‘ŹƪƱơƴƯƲ ƖƩƫƯƴƯƵƱƪƩƳƬƼƲ’, 31/3 February 1913. See ibid., ‘ƈ ƂƽƮƧƳƩƲ ƴƹƭ ƃƯƵƫƥƵƴƾƭ – ŻƷƯƬƥƭ ƪơƩ ƂưƥƩƫƜƲ – ƂưƥƩƫƞ ơƭƴƟ ƂưƥƩƫƞƲ’, 5/18 June 1914. 95 CO 67/172, Goold-Adams to Harcourt, Colonial Secretary, 7 May 1914. 96 AAK, AKƃ, File XLIII, Goold-Adams, to Kyrillos II, 16 July 1914. 97 CO883/7/10, 72, 41168, Orr to Harcourt, 19 December 1912, enclosing letter and petition from Mehmed Shevket, Mustapha Hami and Mehmed Ziai to Harcourt, 13 December 1912. 98 CO883/7/15, 77, 493, Orr to Harcourt, 24 December 1912, to FO 9 January 1913, with Greek letter and petition from a meeting on 19 December at the Archiepiscopal Palace and signed by over 30 leaders. 99 CO67/167/41168, minute, Fiddes, 28 December 1912. 93 94

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notables, publicly and unilaterally proclaimed enosis.100 The expectations for enosis were given a further boost when Britain annexed the island on 5 November 1914101 after the Ottoman entry into the Great War on the side of Germany. Not only was Cyprus permanently disconnected from the Ottoman Empire, but Greek Cypriot political elites were encouraged to regain faith in the British commitment to justice and liberty as well as situate Cyprus within the discourses on self-determination. In praising the struggle of Britain and its allies in favour of the principle of nationalities and in offering Cypriot assistance in this cause, the archbishop and lay leadership of the Orthodox community voiced their hopes that Cyprus would emerge from this period united with the Greek Kingdom ‘to which she belongs of right and which is destined to continue in Cyprus the noble principles of liberty and equality of civic rights’ introduced by Britain.102 Kyrillos, ever the opportunist, pushed for enosis through tactics that sometimes saw him praising the British and at other times saw him criticising them. Upon the British offer of Cyprus to Greece in October 1915, in return for Greek participation in the war on the side of the Entente, which the Greek government rejected,103 the Orthodox Cypriot establishment was further encouraged to believe that the British would soon succeed in ceding Cyprus to Greece. The offer was interpreted by both the press104 and the representatives of the Orthodox community as denoting Britain’s recognition of Greek Cypriot national rights. In extending their gratitude to the British, the Orthodox Legislative Councillors and the archbishop conveyed their conviction that this development would constitute ‘the last station in the fulfilment of our so long awaited national rehabilitation’. They also professed the sympathy with which ‘the Greek people of Cyprus follow the struggle of England and Her Allies which they consider to be also their own as being a struggle for the great principles and ideas of liberty and civilisation which have been the symbol and ideal of the Hellenic world from the time of its

Georghallides, A Political and Administrative History of Cyprus, 93; Panteli, A History of Cyprus, 68-69; Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 256-8. 101 For the Cyprus Annexation Order in Council see ƑơƴƱƟƲ, ‘ƈ ƑƱƯƳƜƱƴƧƳƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥƩƲ ƴƯ ƂƣƣƫƩƪƼƭ ƋƱƜƴƯƲ’, 30/12 November 1914. 102 CO 67/174, Kyrillos II and the Orthodox Members of the Legislative Council to Harcourt, 8 November 1914, enclosure I in Goold-Adams to Harcourt, 20 November 1914. 103 Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 262-5. 104 ƆƫƥƵƨƥƱƟơ, ‘ƈ ƑơƱơƷƾƱƧƳƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥƩƲ ƴƧƭ ƆƫƫƜƤơ – ƋƱƟƳƥƩƲ ƪơƩ ƄƭƾƬơƩ ƴƯƵ ƂƣƣƫƩƪƯƽ ƔƽưƯƵ’, 31/13 November 1915, referring to publications in the British press. 100

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appearance in the world’.105 Kyrillos even assured the High Commissioner, Sir John Clauson, that his community would give no cause for unrest amongst the people, while the Legislative Councillors proclaimed their acknowledgement of their status as British subjects.106 Indeed, Clauson distinguished between Kyrillos’ quest for enosis and the more firebrand politicians. In 1916, Clauson set apart the ‘Hellenistic extravagance of speeches within church precincts and athletic grounds’ from the ‘aggressive obstruction of Greek political claims on loyalist fellowsubjects in places of public resort’. He divulged that the ‘Greek flag is at present doing duty in Cyprus as a symbol of Hellenism, and does not, in my opinion, connote disloyalty to British sovereignty… My experience of Greek Cypriots is that they have a deep respect for English institutions and ideals and that their Hellenic sentiments do not run counter to their loyalty to British rule’.107 Whether Clauson’s understanding of popular respect regarding the British institutions was accurate or not,108 the fact remains that Kyrillos reassured him that his community would not seek the union of Cyprus with Greece ‘otherwise than with the willing consent of England’.109 Kyrillos’ obsession to advance the policy of enosis, which, unlike his predecessor, constituted another parameter of his ethnarchic activity, meant that he played a leading role in its propagation among the Orthodox Cypriots, even if this role was less extreme than some of his colleagues. He turned the Church of Cyprus into a bastion of nationalist agitation through the legitimacy that his position as the archbishop entitled him to, by acting both within the boundaries of the Orthodox Cypriot community as well as by establishing a collaborative relationship with representatives of the Greek government. As early as 1909, he invited the Orthodox Cypriots to participate in a public memorial for the fall of Constantinople and pray for the restoration of the Byzantine Empire.110 In an encyclical addressed to the clergy and Orthodox Cypriots, in which he implicitly connected the notion of CO 67/178, Kyrillos II and Orthodox Members of the Legislative Council to Andrew Bonar Law, Colonial Secretary, 26/8 November 1915, enclosure in Clauson to Law, 11 November 1915. 106 Ibid., Clauson to Law, 8 November 1915. 107 CO 67/180, Secret, Clauson to Law, 21 January 1916. 108 Grievances against the Tribute, the nature of the Legislative Council, the Constitution of the island and against governmental indifference towards education and agriculture surfaced in 1916 in ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƲ ƖƽƫơƮ, ‘ƐƩ ƍƥƣƟƳƴƯƩ ƑơƱƜƣƯƭƴƥƲ ƴƧƲ ƑƱƯƼƤƯƵ ƪơƩ ƴƧƲ ƆƵƧƬƥƱƟơƲ ƥƭ ƋƽưƱƹ – ƈ ƑơƩƤƥƟơ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƄƥƹƱƣƟơ’, 12 January 1916. 109 CO 67/180, Secret, Clauson to Law, 21 January 1916. 110 ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƲ ƖƽƫơƮ, ‘ƆƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴƩƪƼƭ ƪơƩ ƆƨƭƩƪƼƭ ƋƝƭƴƱƯƭ’, 30 May 1909. 105

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the Megali Idea to the national struggle of the Orthodox of Cyprus, Kyrillos argued that on its belief in the resurrection of the Byzantine Empire, the Greek nation took up arms in 1821. He then prayed that such faith in the national idea would guide the Greek nation, including the Orthodox Cypriots, through this moment that was critical in terms of national and political affairs.111 His communication with Nearchos Physsenzides, an advocate in Egypt who was trying to organise sections of Hellenism living outside the borders of the Greek state to contribute to volunteer for the Greek army, revealed that Kyrillos contemplated the dispatch of military regulations from Greece.112 He thus promoted the identification of the Orthodox Cypriots with the Hellenic ideals and activities. The archbishop indisputably consumed energies in coordinating enosist activities within Cyprus. As the president of the Central Committee of the Cypriot Political Organisation, he controlled the organisation and structure of the Local Committees and the activities undertaken and resolutions passed by local rallies.113 He simultaneously attempted to paternalistically exhort the entire Orthodox Cypriot community to contribute financially to the endeavours of the enosis struggle114 and to those of Greece in the Balkan Wars,115 and played an active part in remitting the donations of Orthodox Cypriots to Greece.116 Indeed, despite newspaper lamentations criticising Cyprus’ inadequate support towards Greece117 and of the declaration of Cypriot neutrality for the duration of the conflict between the Balkan states and the Ottoman Empire by the British administration,118 Kyrillos demonstrated fraternal sentiments towards the Greeks. In 1912 and 1913, he forwarded sums donated by Orthodox Cypriots to the Greek state, which constituted, as Venizelos remarked, a piece of evidence testifying to ‘the

111 AAK, AKƃ, File II, Encyclical of Kyrillos II, to the Orthodox Clergy and Orthodox Cypriots, 20 May 1909. 112 AAK, AKƃ, File XLIII, Confidential, Physsenzides to Kyrillos II, 5 September 1910. For biographical information on Physsenzides see Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƌƥƮƩƪƼƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ, 396-7. 113 See ibid., L. Georgiou, President of the Varosha Committee to Kyrillos II 16 April 1912; Ibid., Meletios, Bishop of Kitium and President of the Larnaca Committee to Kyrillos II, 16 April 1912; Ibid., Resolution of the Rally in Larnaca, 15/28 April 1912. 114 Ibid., Encyclical of Kyrillos II to priests, teachers, ecclesiastical commissioners and the entire Orthodox Cypriot population, 2 June 1912. 115 Ibid., Kyrillos II to the Orthodox priests and population of the Nicosia district, 9 July 1913. 116 Ibid., Kyrillos II, to Venizelos, 31 January 1913. 117 ƑơƴƱƟƲ, ‘ƑƯƵ ƆƟƭơƩ Ƨ ƋƽưƱƯƲ’, 11/24 October 1912. 118 Ibid., ‘ƐƵƤƥƴƥƱƼƴƧƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ’, 18/31 October 1912.

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bonds of solidarity holding together the Greek’ nation.119 It is this sensitive chord of the people that Kyrillos aimed to strike in soliciting Orthodox Cypriot financial or material contribution towards the Greek struggle against Bulgaria in the Second Balkan war, which he meticulously connected to the Orthodox Cypriots. The Greeks, Kyrillos II stressed, ‘spill their precious blood, sacrifice all their property in favour of the liberty of our enslaved brethren and in favour of us ourselves, and we are called upon to give only some money or a few kilos of wheat… as a token of our interest for them and as the financial assistance which the Motherland needs’.120 And it was in this context that he, along with the other prelates, was engaged in the collection of money within Cyprus in favour of the building of the Greek flagship King Constantine in 1914.121 Indeed, the enosist and nationalist activities which Kyrillos II as the ethnarch had coordinated, began to establish the association of more and more of the Orthodox of Cyprus, especially the middle class, with the Greek state. More importantly, they conveyed an attribute which was to characterise the role of the ethnarch in the twentieth-century: that of the traditional defender of the bonds of Cyprus and Greece and orchestrator of the national-political struggle of the Orthodox Cypriots. Through preaching in churches at instances of Greek national celebrations, he advanced the idea that the ultimate goal of Hellenism, including the Orthodox Cypriots, was the Megali Idea. In 1916, on the anniversary of the Greek Revolutionary War, Kyrillos communicated to the population what he portrayed as the glorious and selfsacrificing role of the church in favour of the national regeneration, locating such activity in the tradition that had retrospectively been created and according to which the one and only incessant aim of Hellenism in the period preceding, during and subsequent to the Greek War of Independence was ‘the restoration of the Greek Throne in the all-glorified City of Constantine’.122 On the anniversary of the name day of the King of the Hellenes in the same year, he stressed the significance of ‘dedication to national and political unity’.123 Against this background, the Orthodox Cypriot establishment’s disinclination ‘to press the matter [of the refusal of

AAK, AKƃ, File XLIII, Venizelos to Kyrillos II, 17 June 1913. Ibid., Kyrillos II to the Orthodox priests and population of the Nicosia district, 9 July 1913. 121 Ibid., File IV, President and Secretary General of the Central Committee for the Building of King Constantine to Kyrillos II, 17 April 1914. 122 ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƲ ƖƽƫơƮ, ‘ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ – ƈ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƞ ƆƨƭƩƪƞ ƆƯƱƴƞ ƥƭ ƌƥƵƪƹƳƟơ’, 29 March 1916. 123 Ibid., ‘ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ – ƈ ƃơƳƩƫƩƪƞ ƆƯƱƴƞ’, 24 May 1916. 119 120

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the Greek government to accept Britain’s offer of Cyprus] at Athens’124 intensely, should be understood. Regardless of their historical accuracy or inaccuracy, the ideas which Kyrillos promoted bestowed a sense of nobleness and tradition to the activities of the ethnarch, which contemporary press hastened to cheer.125 To this effect, during a period in which Patris expressed regrets about the intensity of the national struggle in Cyprus, pointing out the calmness of the population and labelling the activities of the leadership of the national struggle as slack,126 Kyrillos actively contributed towards positioning Cyprus and its Orthodox Cypriot community in the wider Greek ‘imagined community’. As the President of the Committee for Pancyprian Schools, he requested in 1914 from the Greek Ministry of Ecclesiastical Affairs and Public Education the selection of learned, educated, and trained individuals who could act in the capacity of teachers or headmasters in Orthodox Cypriot schools.127 In the same period, the School Committee, the muhtar and the teacher of the school of Kalopanayiotis village, extended their gratitude to the archbishop for his donation of pictures of emblematic Greek figures, including Venizelos, Kountouriotis, the King, and the Queen.128 Kyrillos also supported the sponsoring of Orthodox Cypriot children by the King of the Hellenes.129 In 1916, King Constantine, through the Secretary of the Royal Political Office in Greece, acknowledged the archbishop’s assistance in the baptism of a child in Nicosia by the Greek Consul representing the King, as well as the loyalty of the archbishop to the Greek throne.130 While Clauson referred to a ‘confusion of political and racial boundaries’131 amongst the Cypriot Orthodox, such activities did convey Hellenic ideals, symbols and allegiances to the Orthodox community of Cyprus, with which the population could identify.

CO 67/178, Paraphrase telegram, Clauson to Law, 8 November 1915. See for example, ƑơƴƱƟƲ, ‘Ɛ Ƃƣƾƭ ƴƹƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ’, 21/3 June 1914. 126 Ibid., ‘ƑƹƲ ƑƱƝưƥƩ ƭơ ƋơƭƯƭƟƦƧƴơƩ Ƨ ƆƭƝƱƣƥƩơ ƈƬƾƭ’, 19/2 July 1914. 127 See for AAK, AKƃ, File XLIV, Greek Minister of Ecclesiastical Affairs and Public Education to Kyrillos II, 21 December 1914. 128 Ibid., School Committee, muhtar and teacher of Kalopanayiotis village school to Kyrillos II, 1/14 December 1914. 129 See indicatively CO 67/180, Confidential, Clauson, to Law, 21 January 1916; CO 67/181, Extract from Ɩƹƭƞ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, No. 1519, 9/22 April 1916, enclosure in, Confidential, Clauson, to Law, 13 May 1916; ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƲ ƖƽƫơƮ, ‘ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ – ƑƭƥƵƬơƴƩƪƜ ƔƝƪƭơ ƴƯƵ ƋƹƭƳƴơƭƴƟƭƯƵ Ɗƃ’, 17 May 1916. 130 AAK, AKƃ, File XLIII, Secretary of the Royal Political Office in Greece to Kyrillos II, 22 February 1916. 131 CO 67/180, Secret, Clauson to Law, 21 February 1916. 124 125

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The examination of the role of Kyrillos II as an ethnarch cannot be spherical without reference to his activity as a leader of the Orthodox Cypriots in relation to their social and economic demands and conditions. In the early months of his tenure as archbishop, Kyrillos supported education, the smooth functioning of which had been hampered by the events of the Archiepiscopal Question.132 In his capacity as the archbishop, he invited all the Orthodox inhabitants of Nicosia to elect a school committee which would regulate the running of schools in Nicosia.133 Along with the members of the Holy Synod, Kyrillos attempted to establish transparency in the collection of the zeteiai for the preservation or erection of holy and charitable foundations, aiming to avoid the exploitation of the Orthodox population through the regulation of the procedure134 and to exercise checks on the administration of parish churches in order to ensure legality.135 He, and the other members of the Holy Synod, circulated an encyclical in which they cautioned about the ethical dangers faced by young women sent to Egypt by parents or guardians in search of a better life.136 Kyrillos participated in the appointment of teachers in Orthodox schools,137 and received appeals for economic support for the educational endeavours of Orthodox Cypriot students to many of which he positively responded.138 Indeed, many individuals petitioned the support of the archbishop in favour of their problems and grievances as aid towards their hardship. In 1911, P. Christopoulos, requested that the archbishop advocate in favour of a salary increase for Cypriot judges who were paid disproportionately lower than English presidents of courts;139 in 1912, Angeliki Petridou, an inhabitant of Alexandria and widow of a native Cypriot, asked for archiepiscopal assistance so that her father-in-law would accept to house her and her daughters and thus guarantee a married life to her offspring;140 in 1915 Georgios Christofi, an inhabitant of Apostolos Loukas in Nicosia, implored the assistance of

Persianis, Church and State in Cyprus Education, 82-5. AAK, AKƃ, File XLIV, Kyrillos II to King-Harman, 1/14 February 1910. 134 Ibid., File II, Encyclical of Kyrillos II, Iacovos, Bishop of Paphos, Meletios, Bishop of Kitium and Kyrillos, Bishop of Kyrenia on zeteiai, 4 May 1910. 135 Ibid., Encyclical of Kyrillos II and three bishops on the administration of parish churches, 4 May 1910. 136 Ibid., File XLIV, Encyclical of Kyrillos II, Iacovos, Bishop of Paphos, Meletios, Bishop of Kitium and Kyrillos, Bishop of Kyrenia, 3 May 1910. 137 See generally, AAK, AKƃ, File XLIV. Kyrillos II was the chairman of the governing body of secondary schools in Nicosia, see Persianis, Church and State in Cyprus Education, 131-2. 138 See for example ibid., Georgios Stylianides, student to Kyrillos II, 11 January 1915. 139 Ibid., P. Christopoulos to Kyrillos II, 1/14 March 1911. 140 Ibid., File XLIII, Angeliki Petridou to Kyrillos II, 15/28 September 1912. 132 133

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Kyrillos for employment;141 by 1916 Kyrillos intervened on behalf of Orthodox Cypriots living within the Ottoman Empire, including his nephew, who had been forcibly taken for service in the Ottoman army.142 Such evidence enlightens the way people understood the role of the archbishop-ethnarch. The varying appeals of Orthodox Cypriots to Kyrillos revealed their conviction that the position of the leader of the ecclesiastical hierarchy incorporated lay responsibilities – as with his predecessors. His responses to these appeals were indicative of his acceptance of his role as encompassing such duties, as well as of his determination to perpetuate the bond of interdependence between the prelature and population from all walks of life. Such popular perceptions pertaining to the social activity of the leader of the Church of Cyprus were revealed even through voices criticising the senior clergy and the church, Kypriakos Filax complained in 1916 that …despite the deep respect and reverence which the people maintains towards its Ecclesiastical centres and the holy clergy, great distrust and disappointment has overtaken it. In the prelates it has not found, as it had expected and deserved to expect, its spiritual shepherds and fathers, prepared to sacrifice themselves in favour of their flock… Today, the prevalent opinion of the people about its prelates, is that they only aim at levying money and do not take care of the church and their flock.

While the newspaper then warned about the danger of the complete estrangement of the people from its ecclesiastical leaders, which is ‘the main reason behind the prevailing communal inertia and almost disintegration amongst us’, it also emphasised that it was the church’s responsibility to concert all endeavours towards the progress and prosperity of the people.143 Kyrillos’ approach in relation to the social and economic challenges faced by the Orthodox Cypriots defined the inclusion of such temporal duties in his role as the archbishop and the head of the Cypriot church. In this manner, whereas in the past under Sophronios the archbishop represented the entire island when it came to socio-economic issues, Kyrillos II gave coherence to the structure of the Orthodox Cypriot community.

141 Ibid., File XLIV, G. Christofi, of Apostolos Loukas in Nicosia to Kyrillos II, 20 June 1915. 142 Ibid., Grey, to W.H. Page, US Ambassador to Britain, 10 February 1916. 143 ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƲ ƖƽƫơƮ, ‘ƔƩ ƑƱƜƴƴƯƬƥƭ ƈƬƥƟƲ ƵưƝƱ ƈƬƾƭ ƂƵƴƾƭ;’, 19 January 1916.

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Conclusion If Sophronios was the ‘last of the old’ and the ‘first of the new’ archbishops of Cyprus, Kyrillos was the first Greek nationalist and enosist archbishopethnarch and the first political brawler. He adapted to and used the British introduction of political modernity by reconfiguring the political power of the church; not through Sophronios’ failed co-option efforts, but through repositioning the church as a political and ideological opposition to the British. The fact that the British introduced political modernity in a limited way played into Kyrillos’ hands; for example when the British rejected Sophronios’ desire for co-option because it contradicted the division of church and state in modern political practise this policy did not result in them barring clerics from ‘elected’ office in the Legislative Council. He also used the British introduction of political modernity, such as the encouragement of ‘Greek’ and ‘Turkish’ identities in the areas of education, to further his enosist aims. Yet despite his obsession with enosis and his brawling nationalist tactics, once he became archbishop he was able to use different tactics to achieve his ends. Although this makes him consistent in relation to his aims, it makes him inconsistent in relation to his methods. This observation can be observed in almost all of his successors, all of whom were, like Kyrillos II, Greek nationalists and uncompromising enosists.

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Figure 14: Portrait of Archbishop Kyrillos II at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus.

CHAPTER EIGHT KYRILLOS III, 1916-33: BETWEEN SOPHRONIOS III AND KYRILLOS II IRENE POPHAIDES

Kyrillos III, Archbishop of Nova Justiniana and All Cyprus from 1916-33, left his imprint on the ethnarchic tradition of the Cypriot Church. During his seventeen-year office he faced and responded to a number of challenges of a religious, ecclesiastical, political and ideological (communism, nationalism and fascism) nature, his handling of which revealed his perception of the authority and role of the ethnarch. His archiepiscopacy was dotted with issues pertaining to and arising from what Greek Cypriot political elites perceived as the British unwillingness to implement on Cyprus the noble rhetoric of the Great War period regarding national self-determination, the wavering popular devotion to the enosist struggle particularly in the years of the Greco-Turkish war of 1919-22, the diminishing popular respect to the ecclesiastical institution and the clergy, the divisiveness that ravaged the Greek Cypriot political elites, the British attack on the Church of Cyprus and the events of 1931 which, along with his ecclesiastical and religious responsibilities, absorbed his energies. This chapter, in analysing and contextualising Kyrillos’ approaches to exercising what he thought were his ethnarchic duties, will bring to the fore the role of the archbishop-ethnarch from 1916-33. Kyrillos III led the Cypriot Church at a time of significant internal and external developments. In examining and focusing on these events, scholarship has merely touched upon his personality and actions as an archbishop; instead it has studied him more thoroughly as a party to the notorious Archiepiscopal Question from 1900-1910, perpetuating him in popular imagination and in historiographical debate as the Kyrilloudin (small Kyrillos) of the archiepiscopal dispute. In so doing, it has reached conclusions that provide interesting insights into his personality and religious and temporal activity, which constitute starting points for further investigation. The general consensus amongst scholars has been that Kyrillos

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resembled the archbishops of the Ottoman period. He has been portrayed as a saint-like man determined to uphold the traditions of the Church1 in the manner of a veritable churchman 2 , as a weak character 3 , committed to avoiding conflicts with the rulers4 , and as politically moderate, inimical to extremes and unequivocally loyal to the ideal of enosis5. A different strand of scholars, constituting the exception to the norm of non-elaboration on Kyrillos III’s archiepiscopacy has, in an encomiastic manner, depicted him as one of the greatest Cypriot archbishops; a scholarly, ascetic, radical and modernising ecclesiastic who sought to reform and rejuvenate the clerical structure while simultaneously advancing the enosist struggle in a spirit that was conciliatory to the British 6 . In reassessing his archiepiscopacy, this chapter employs Kyrillos’ trajectory in the period ending in 1910 and in the years 1916-33 as analytical tools in order to evaluate and present his archiepiscopal activity in its true colours.

Kyrillos before becoming Archbishop Kyrillos III was born Panayiotis Vasiliou, 7 in the village of Prastio in the Famagusta district (unlike his three predecessors who had all been born in the village of Prodromos, in the Marathasas region of Limassol District) in 1859. 8 He was the last archbishop of the Church of Cyprus to have substantially experienced Ottoman rule, a fact which exerted an impact on his understanding of the role of the clerical hierarchy. He grew up in an environment in which the contemporary archbishop, Sophronios, acted under the clauses of the berat issued to him by Abdülaziz in 1865 as the sole

 1 Rebecca Bryant, Imagining the Modern: The Cultures of Nationalism in Cyprus, I.B. Tauris, London, 2004, 84. 2 Sir George Francis Hill, A History of Cyprus, (ed.) Sir Harry Luke, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1972, IV, 579. 3 Heinz A. Richter, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, (trans.) C. Sarropoulos, Estia, Athens, 2007, 255. 4 Robert Holland and Diana Markides, The British and the Hellenes: Struggles for Mastery in the Eastern Mediterranean 1850-1960, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2006, 185. 5 Nicos Christodoulou, ƔƯ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƼ ƇƞƴƧƬơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƴƜ ƴơ ŻƴƧ 1900-1910, Kentro Meleton Ieras Monis Kykkou, Nicosia, 1999, 38. 6 Venedictos Englezakis, ƆƟƪƯƳƩ ƍƥƫƝƴơƩ ƤƩơ ƴƧƭ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƭ ƋƽưƱƯƵ (4ƯƲ ƝƹƲ 20ƯƲ ƂƩƾƭ), Morfotikon Idrima Ethnikis Trapezis, Athens, 1996, 606-13; Andreas Vittis, ‘ƋƽƱƩƫƫƯƲ Ƅ’: Ɛ ŹƣƩƯƲ ƪơƩ ƌƼƣƩƯƲ ƂƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ (1916-1933)’, ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƞ ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƆƴơƩƱƥƟơƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƾƭ ƓưƯƵƤƾƭ V, 2001, 23-40. 7 Ibid., 23. 8 Aristides Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƌƥƮƩƪƼƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ 1800-1920, Livadiotis, Nicosia, 2001, 166.

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and unambiguous leader of the church;9 a role that ran shoulder-to-shoulder with his administrative responsibilities, including those of the temporal leader of his millet10 as well as the representative of the island to the Porte on issues transcending religion. 11 At the same time, he sought to maintain good relations both with the Ottoman dignitaries in Cyprus and those in Constantinople. 12 In this context, as well as for reasons relating to the Christian dogma, Sophronios, along with other primates of the Eastern Orthodox Church, in 1872 condemned the Bulgarian Exarchate and its adherents as schismatic, and renounced tribalism. 13 This ethnarchic activity, which Kyrillos witnessed as he entered adulthood, imprinted on him the patterns of Sophronios’ archiepiscopacy, aspects of which he was later to implement in his own term as archbishop. Vasiliou demonstrated an aptitude for learning from an early age. His initial engagement with education took place in Cyprus; in 1875 Kyprianos Economides, Bishop of Kitium, directed him to schools in Larnaca. At the age of twenty in 1879 he was ordained deacon, took the name of Kyrillos and was located in Limassol, whereupon he continued his studies.14 During the years he spent in the diocese of Kitium, he came in contact with the ways in which Kyprianos approached his office. Kyprianos followed Sophronios in demonstrating loyalty to the Ottoman administration.15 He sought to secure the perpetuation of the privileges the Cypriot Church enjoyed under Ottoman rule into the British period, as an integral part of the Church’s

 9 AAK, ƂƱƷƥƟƯƭ ƂƯƩƤƟƬƯƵ ƓƹƶƱƯƭƟƯƵ ƃ’, 1865-1900, File VII, ‘Imperial Berat (LettersPatent) Issued to His Grace the Archbishop of Cyprus on His Installation in the Year 1865’, 1865. 10 There are many examples of appeals of Orthodox laymen to Sophronios for mediation with the authorities in order to satisfy their requests. See Michael N. Michael, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƐƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞ ƑƥƱƟƯƤƯ (1571-1878): ƈ ƓƴơƤƩơƪƞ ƓƵƣƪƱƼƴƧƳƞ ƴƧƲ Ƴƥ ƉƥƳƬƼ ƑƯƫƩƴƩƪƞƲ ƆƮƯƵƳƟơƲ, Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia, 2005, 271-2. 11 See chapter by Andrekos Varnava in this book on the 1870 Sophronios-led deputation to Constantinople which advocated the detachment of Cyprus from the Archipelago administrative district and support for the drought-stricken Cypriots. 12 Michael, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ, 273-5. 13 On the Holy Synod of 1872 see Paraskevas Matalas, ŻƨƭƯƲ ƪơƩ ƐƱƨƯƤƯƮƟơ: ƐƩ ƑƥƱƩưƝƴƥƩƥƲ ƬƩơƲ ƓƷƝƳƧƲ (Ethnicity and Orthodoxy: The Adventures of one Case), University of Crete Press, Iraklion, 2002, 327-37. 14 Vittis, ‘ƋƽƱƩƫƫƯƲ Ƅ’, 24-5. 15 See Rolandos Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus during the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century, Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia, 1996, 24.

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tradition. 16 Simultaneously, however, he was involved in the process of yielding authority over the administration of his diocese’s economic affairs to laymen from 1868, initiated by the exigency of accumulated episcopal debts.17 In the initial years of British rule, Kyprianos, in his capacity as a legislative councillor from 1883-6,18 actively and vociferously opposed the British rulers and their administration of the island.19 Kyrillos was, consequently, exposed to the varying avenues through which Kyprianos attempted to preserve the traditional authority of the Church. Kyrillos completed his studies in Greece from 1882-9 on the financial support of his family and to a lesser extent of the Bishop of Kitium, where he read philology and theology. 20 Most importantly, at the University of Athens, he came into contact with the Greek ideal and its notion of unity as it was conveyed through the medium of education. The ‘University’, argued the intellectual Spyridon Komnos in 1867, ‘disseminates, as it were, Greece to the East…and thus lays the ground for the political union of the scattered members of the large Greek family’. 21 In addition to such influences, Kyrillos’ time in Athens in the 1880s coincided with the efforts of the Greek Kingdom to free, and expand its borders to include, ‘unredeemed’ territories and populations. In 1881 such efforts, which, under the mediation of the Great Powers, resulted in the incorporation of Thessaly and the province of Arta in Epirus into the Greek state,22 could have been perceived as evidence of the realistic potential of the Megali Idea. The ensuing crisis of 1885-6, during which Greece mobilised its armed forces to contest territories in



16 This endeavour was epitomised by a memorial of the Archbishop and the Bishops of Paphos and Kitium to the first British High Commissioner in 1879 in Hill, History, 572-3; Andrekos Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915: The Inconsequential Possession, Manchester University Press, Manchester, 2009, 157-8. 17 Michael, ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ, 290-4. 18 Prodromos Prodromou, ƋƽưƱƩƯƩ ƑƯƫƩƴƥƵƴƝƲ, 1878-1950: ƋƯƩƭƹƭƩƪƼƲ ƍƥƴơƳƷƧƬơƴƩƳƬƼƲ ƪơƩ ƑƯƫƩƴƩƪƞ ƆƫƟƴ, Aigaion, Nicosia, 2010, 272. 19See for example Philios Zannetos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƎƞƳƯƵ ƋƽưƱƯƵ (Nicosia: Epiphaniou, 1997), II, 93-7, 103-5, in which Kyprianos complained that the Orthodox Cypriots could not appeal to the authorities in their native language, Greek, and about tax levies on monasteries. 20 ƂưƼƳƴƯƫƯƲ ƃơƱƭƜƢơƲ (henceforth Ƃƃ), ‘ƂƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƋƽƱƩƫƫƯƲ Ƅ’, XXII, 1933, 356. 21 Komnos quoted in Constantinos Th. Dimaras, ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƼƲ ƒƹƬơƭƴƩƳƬƼƲ, Ermis, Athens, 1994, 350. See also Paschalis Kitromilides, ‘ƔƯ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƼ ƋƱƜƴƯƲ ƹƲ ƆƨƭƩƪƼ ƋƝƭƴƱƯ’, in D. Tsaousis (ed.), ƆƫƫƧƭƩƳƬƼƲ – ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƼƴƧƴơ: ƊƤƥƯƫƯƣƩƪƯƟ ƪơƩ ƃƩƹƬơƴƩƪƯƟ ŹƮƯƭƥƲ ƴƧƲ ƎƥƯƥƫƫƧƭƩƪƞƲ ƋƯƩƭƹƭƟơƲ, Estia, Athens, 1983, 152. 22 Douglas Dakin, ƈ ƆƭƯưƯƟƧƳƧ ƴƧƲ ƆƫƫƜƤơƲ, 1770-1923, Morfotiko Idrima Ethnikis Trapezis, Athens, 2005, 209-12.

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Epirus,23 as well as upheavals in Crete in 1888 and 1889 in the framework of its demand for union with the mainland,24 constituted manifestations of the dynamics of this ideal, which were filtered to Cypriot students in Greece. Indeed, these students, identifying themselves with the unredeemed, expressed their certainty that the Greek Prime Minister worked for the promotion of the national ideal of all Greeks, including the Orthodox Cypriots. 25 These ideas must have made an impression on Kyrillos, influencing his stance vis-à-vis the enosis struggle. On his return to Cyprus in 1890, Kyrillos was appointed teacher in Limassol, a position he kept until 1895, when he was elected Bishop of Kyrenia.26 He entertained concerns prior to undertaking this episcopal office, which he eventually set aside, yielding to ‘the great pressure of the public opinion, of almost the whole of Cyprus, in favour of accepting the offered throne’. 27 In an edifying letter to his brother, an instance of personal deposition of perceptions away from the public sphere, Kyrillos invoked religious and ecclesiastical vocabulary to analyse the reasons on account of which he hesitated in accepting the throne of Kyrenia and to delineate the principles that would define his exercise of duties. He disapproved of the behaviour of the high clergy and disclosed that he deemed himself ‘incapable of pretending, as many of the current prelates do, saying one thing and thinking another. By no means would I have ever thought of employing in my work intrigues and machinations, quite habitual among our clergy…In short, I condemn entanglement in politics’.28 He intended to be just and fair, acting as per his conscience and in a piously Christian manner for the benefit of his flock, regardless of friendships and enmities. He fed no hope of accumulating wealth and committed himself to the principle of selfabnegation and self-sacrifice. 29 This document reveals simultaneously his conviction that a prelate’s authority and activity should comply with ‘the law of the Gospel, the interest of the flock and the benefit of the Motherland and



Ibid., 212-5. Richard Clogg, ƓƵƭƯưƴƩƪƞ ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƆƫƫƜƤơƲ, 1770-2000, Katoptro, Athens, 2003, 89. 25 ƂƫƞƨƥƩơ, 2/14 March 1885. The address of Cypriot students in Athens to the Greek Prime Minister, Trikoupis, is not published under a title. 26 Ƃƃ, ‘ƂƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƋƽƱƩƫƫƯƲ Ƅ’’, XXII, 1933, 356. 27 Kyrillos, Bishop of Kyrenia, to his brother, 31 May 1895, in ibid., ‘ƍƩơ ƆưƩƳƴƯƫƞ ƴƯƵ ƂƯƩƤƟƬƯƵ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƋƵƱƟƫƫƯƵ Ƅ’. ƄƱơƶƥƟƳơ ƜƬơ ƴƧ ƆƪƫƯƣƞ ƴƯƵ ƹƲ ƍƧƴƱƯưƯƫƟƴƯƵ ƋƵƱƧƭƥƟơƲ ƴƹ 1895’, XXIII, 1933, 402. 28 Ibid. 29 Ibid., 402-3. 23 24

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the Nation’.30 Importantly, this is the only allusion he made to the nation, in a letter which is otherwise free from any nationalist and enosist vocabulary, content or spirit. The environment in which Kyrillos was raised and educated, marked this document; the extent to which he was to abide by his proclaimed principles of 1895 will be measured against his activity as a prelate. Having been elected to the episcopal throne of Paphos and having turned it down in 1899,31 Kyrillos became party to the multidimensional and largely political Archiepiscopal Question of 1900-9, which broke out on Sophronios’ death, despite his earlier criticism of the prelates’ involvement in politics. In interpreting such entanglement, the historian should not lose sight of the initiatives of the coterie of laymen and ecclesiastics that supported Kyrillos during this period. The nature of evidence, by and large comprising dispatches and encyclicals of the Holy Synod as a whole, does not permit a conclusive differentiation between Kyrillos’ deliberations and those of the Holy Synod over which he presided, and whose antagonism to the Bishop of Kitium32 was made clear by the sources.33 Simultaneously, contemporary and subsequent sources, be they antagonistic, sympathetic to or detached from Kyrillos Vasiliou and the kyreniaki party, make allusions to the involvement of laymen such as Paschalis Constantinides and Achilleas Liasides in the formulation of the stance maintained and the approach pursued by Kyrillos34 and the Holy Synod. 35 That the Bishop of Kyrenia was subject to such



Ibid., 403. Ibid., ‘ƂƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƋƽƱƩƫƫƯƲ Ƅ’, XXII, 1933, 356-7. 32 The Abbots of Kykko and Machaira and the Archimandrite and Exarch of the Archdiocese voted in favour of the Bishop of Kyrenia in the archiepiscopal elections of 1900, in John Hackett, ‘The Archiepiscopal Question in Cyprus’, The Irish Church Quarterly, I, 4, 1908, 323. The reasons why they were hostile to the Bishop of Kitium was summarised in ibid., 321. 33 See SA1:3198/1900, The Holy Synod to W. F. Haynes-Smith, High Commissioner, 30/13 September 1900; AAK, ƂƱƷƥƟƯƭ ƂƯƩƤƟƬƹƭ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƹƭ – ƍƥƳƯơƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƥƟơ – ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƼƭ ƇƞƴƧƬơ 1900-1910 (henceforth AAK, AAA), File XLI, Memorandum of the Holy Synod to the Delegation of the Patriarchs on the Archiepiscopal Question, 21 July 1907. 34 Frangoudes hinted that Liasides controlled Kyrillos Vasiliou, in Georghios Frangoudes, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƯƵ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƯƽ ƇƧƴƞƬơƴƯƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, Alexandria, 1908, 11, 14. To the same effect Zannetos and Hill argued that Kyrillos Vasiliou, wanting in will, could be easily manipulated and that the archiepiscopal struggle was merely a personal battle for these specific laymen in Zannetos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ, III, 200-2; Hill, History, 579. 35 The deacon Demetrios Georgiades, a representative of the Ecumenical Patriarchate sent to Cyprus, reported in 1902 that Liasides and Constantinides had ‘rendered the so called Holy Synod their organ and from what it appears the Holy Synod do [sic] 30 31

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pressures was a reality which cannot be challenged; evidence similarly stresses that he tolerated and permitted lay participation in ecclesiastical affairs and condoned ecclesiastical politics. The extent to which, however, these influences had penetrated his modus operandi cannot be absolutely discerned via evidence. Through this prism, the ensuing analysis traces and elucidates attributes of the stance and activity of Kyrillos Vasiliou as a prelate during this turbulent period, which contribute to a deeper understanding of his archiepiscopacy. Kyrillos focused his attention on preserving and perpetuating what he thought were the ancient privileges and rights of the autocephalous Church of Cyprus and its Holy Synod, as per precedent and canons. In 1900 he and the Holy Synod, which, following the withdrawal of the Bishop of Kitium, was composed of five members,36 reacted negatively to the proposal of the Bishop of Kitium and the elected representatives that supported his candidature to appeal to the Churches of Constantinople, Alexandria and Jerusalem to require assistance in resolving the Cypriot ecclesiastical dispute. 37 The Holy Synod categorically criticised the kitiaki party for insulting the authority of the Church of Cyprus by invoking foreign intervention in its internal affairs 38 and communicated that the Synod respects the interest of the sister Churches, ‘but repels any tendency affecting the privileges of the Autocephalous Church of Cyprus which date from eternity.’ 39 Kyrillos endeavoured to safeguard the Cypriot ecclesiastical autocephaly, which he deemed was called into question and was subject to infringement by the activity of the kitiaki party and the attempted patriarchal interference.



not take even the least decision without their advice’. In defense of his assertion, Georgiades reported that Kyrillos immediately and secretly informed Paschalis Constantinides about the deacon’s request for the objections to the archiepiscopal elections, in Demetrios Georgiades, Deacon to Ioakim III, Ecumenical Patriarch, 28 October 1902, as published in ƎƝƯƭ ŻƨƭƯƲ, 4/17 January 1903, in SA1:2107/1907. Liasides, correspondingly, pioneered in manifestations in favour of the protection of the autocephaly of the Church of Cyprus and the privileges of the Holy Synod which supported the Bishop of Kyrenia, in Ɩƹƭƞ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, ‘ƈ ƅƩơƤƞƫƹƳƧ ƴƧƲ ƅƥƵƴƝƱơƲ Ɣơ ƑƱƯƭƼƬƩơ ƴƧƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ - ƘƞƶƩƳƬơ ưƱƯƲ ƴƧƭ ƓƽƭƯƤƯƭ’, 6/19 October 1900. 36 These were the Bishop of Kyrenia, the Abbots of Kykko and Machaira, the Exarch of Karpasia and the Archimandrite of the Archdiocese, in Christodoulou, ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƼ ƇƞƴƧƬơ, 42. 37 On the kitiaki proposals see Zannetos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ, III, 216-21. 38 Hill, History, 582-3. 39 SA1:3198/1900, Telegram of the Holy Synod of the Church of Cyprus to Constantine V, Ecumenical Patriarch, 21 December 1900.

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The relations between the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the Bishop of Kyrenia entered a different orbit in the period subsequent to the ascension of Ioakim III to the throne of Constantinople in 1901. The new patriarch’s expressed purpose with relation to the upkeep of the autocephaly of the Cypriot Church, was for the Great Church to ‘alertly follow the course of events in relation to the outstanding electoral question; its desire and heartfelt prayer in favour of…the canonical, in mutual cooperation of the legitimate constituents, election of the archbishop, upholding unaltered the fundamental sacred institutions and privileges of the most holy autocephalous sister Church of Cyprus, has been manifested many a time’.40 It was precisely on this point that an alignment, at least, in declared objectives occurred between the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the Bishop of Kyrenia, the Holy Synod and the kyreniaki party. Under these circumstances, therefore, the Bishop of Kyrenia, presiding over the Holy Synod, agreed to authorise a process of arbitration through which the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the Patriarchates of Alexandria and Jerusalem would settle the ecclesiastical dispute, because ‘the prolongation of that abnormal state was infinitely injurious to the Church…and there was no other expedient’.41 In concurring with this development, kyreniaki supporters participating in the summons of deacon Demetrios Georgiades, who was dispatched to Cyprus from the Ecumenical Patriarchate in 1901, 42 re-emphasised their determination to reach a settlement that would perpetuate the autocephalous status of the Cypriot Church and would not overlook or minimise the opinion and rights of the Holy Synod.43 The commitment that Kyrillos Vasiliou demonstrated to pan-Orthodox canons and precedent thus becomes immediately apparent. Although he and the Holy Synod insisted on the canonical standing of the Holy Synod of Cyprus in which, essentially, only one bishop participated, they recognised at the same time that under exceptional circumstances, as was the case in 1821,



AEP:A/73, 226-7, The Ecumenical Patriarchate to the Bishops of Kyrenia and Kitium, 4 August 1901. 41 SA1:c738/1902, The Holy Synod to J. Chamberlain, Colonial Secretary, 22/7 March 1902. 42 Demetrios Georgiades arrived in Cyprus in an unofficial mission to acquaint himself with the sequence of events and work with the two bishops and those around them towards a canonical solution to the question, in AEP:A/73, 272-3, The Ecumenical Patriarchate to the Bishops of Kyrenia and Kitium, 4 September 1901. This solution would be based on the privileges and customs of the autocephalous Church of Cyprus, in ibid., 275-6, The Ecumenical Patriarchate to Patriarchs of Alexandria and Jerusalem, 5 September 1901. 43 Zannetos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ, III, 343-4. 40

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the Cypriot Church could seek the assistance of sister churches;44 they hence assented to the arbitration. In this context, Kyrillos opposed the endeavour of the Bishop of Kitium and the kitiaki legislative councillors to propose a bill aimed at settling the Archiepiscopal Question; an attempt which the patriarchate described as a ‘deviating step’ 45 that would ‘render the autonomous and autocephalous Church of Cyprus subjugated to the state and its legislative Body.’46 Indeed, the Holy Synod vindicated its activity and legitimate standing on the basis of pan-Orthodox canons and ordinances; on the same grounds it censured the approaches, arguments and activity of Kyrillos Papadopoulos as anti-canonical. 47 Kyrillos Vasiliou, therefore, championed the jurisdiction of the Eastern Orthodox Church ‘under which comes also our Church of Cyprus’ and which ‘is most precisely prescribed by the holy Canons of the Œcumenic and Local Synods and by other ordinances and ecclesiastical precepts of the Church in general’,48 which would protect the autocephaly of the Cypriot Church. That Kyrillos Vasiliou became the honorary president of the club Orthodoxia,49 the raison d’être of which was ‘the defense and consolidation of the principles of the Orthodox Christian Church’, 50 and appealed to the Ecumenical Patriarchate for collaboration through the dispatch of a theologian to the club,51 indicated his commitment to advancing Orthodoxy. The importance the kyreniaki placed on Orthodoxy was further manifested through charging their opponents with freemasonry. 52 By questioning the devotion of the kitiaki and Kyrillos Papadopoulos to Orthodoxy as disciples of freemasonry, ‘not only a heresy, but also the complete denial of the Christian symbol, that differs little from complete atheism’53 and juxtaposing these contentions with the famous excommunication of freemasonry by



44 AAK, AAA, File XLI, Memorandum of the Holy Synod to the Delegation of the Patriarchs on the Archiepiscopal Question, 21 July 1907. This was an erroneous assertion since, as it has been established in earlier chapters, the successors to those executed were handpicked by the Ottoman governor. 45 AEP:A/74, 321, The Ecumenical Patriarchate to Bishop of Kyrenia, 3 August 1902. 46 Ibid., 322, The Ecumenical Patriarchate to Patriarch of Jerusalem, 3 August 1902. 47 SA1:656/1908, The Holy Synod to Lord Elgin, Colonial Secretary, 10/23 March 1908. 48 Ibid. 49 Christodoulou, ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƼ ƇƞƴƧƬơ, 20. 50 Ɩƹƭƞ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, ‘ƓƽƫƫƯƣƯƲ «ƐƱƨƯƤƯƮƟơ»’, 7/20 July 1900. 51 AEP:A/73, 317, The Ecumenical Patriarchate to Bishop of Kyrenia, 26 September 1901. 52 Bryant, Imagining the Modern, 87-8. 53 Ɩƹƭƞ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, ‘ƑơƱƜƱƴƧƬơ – Ɛ ƍơƳƳƯƭƩƳƬƼƲ, ƂƨƥƁơ’, 17/30 March 1900.

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Archbishop Kyprianos in 1815, 54 the kyreniaki invoked the ecumenicity of Orthodoxy, touching upon tradition and popular mythology, in order to portray themselves better in Orthodox stature than their opponents. To the same effect, in hustling to denounce the kitiaki allegations of having been a disciple of Apostolos Makrakis whose preaching had been condemned by the Church, short of truth, 55 Kyrillos Vasiliou sought to secure his Orthodox standing. Although the spirit prevalent in the written exchanges of the Bishop of Kyrenia and the Holy Synod with the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the British rulers, and their public interventions in the press, was oriented towards Orthodox Christianity, mingled with respect for ecclesiastical canons and traditions, on sporadic occasions they made references to the nation and the motherland.56 The issue of enosis was simultaneously present in the rhetoric of the lay supporters of the kyreniaki party; it was after all one of the main axes around which the Archiepiscopal Question was fought. Proclamations such as that the Orthodox Cypriot people ‘clearly preaches before its civilised rulers its union with its mother Greece and denotes that it prefers the mother, even if dressed in rags, rather than the stepmother vested in purple and byssus’, 57 were commonplace in the newspapers that promoted the kyreniaki cause. Devotion to Orthodoxy and to the cause of enosis were not perceived as mutually exclusive allegiances by the kyreniaki camp. At the same time, despite his disapproval of politics in ecclesiastical affairs of earlier years, Kyrillos realistically comprehended that they constituted an integral part of a prelate’s office, and involved himself in a process of charges, countercharges and recrimination. The Holy Synod ascribed the unsuccessful attempts of the arbitrators in 1901-2 to the Bishop of Kitium, declaring that he ‘refused to co-operate with the Holy Synod for a local election and thus became the cause of the failure of the device of the Most Holy Arbitrators’. 58 Analogously, a delegation consisting of one



Ibid., ‘ŻƪƴơƪƴƯƭ ƑơƱƜƱƴƧƬơ – «Ɛ ƂƶƯƱƩƳƬƼƲ ƴƯƵ ƆƨƭƯƬƜƱƴƵƱƯƲ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƋƵưƱƩơƭƯƽ ƪơƴƜ ƴƹƭ ƍơƳƳƼƭƹƭ»’, 25/7 September 1900. 55 Kyrillos published a letter on 23 October 1900, which appears in Zannetos, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ, III, 229-35. 56 See SA1:3198/1900, The Holy Synod to Haynes-Smith, High Commissioner, 30/13 September 1900. 57 Ɩƹƭƞ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, ‘ƋơƪƼƢƯƵƫƯƭ ƅƧƬƯƳƟƥƵƬơ’, 20/2 June 1906. Similarly see ibid., ‘ƐƩ ƐƫƵƬưƩơƪƯƟ’, 31/3 January 1906; ibid., ‘25 ƍơƱƴƟƯƵ’, 25/7 April 1906; ibid., ‘Ɛ ƆƨƭƩƳƬƼƲ ƴƹƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ’, 18/1 December 1906. 58 SA1:c738/1902, The Holy Synod to Chamberlain, Colonial Secretary, 22/7 March 1902. 54

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representative from each of the Patriarchates of Constantinople, Alexandria and Jerusalem, which was commonly invited to proceed to Cyprus by the Bishops of Kitium and Kyrenia 59 and which arrived in June 1907, was immediately faced with the complaints and accusations of each party against the other. The Holy Synod and Kyrillos Vasiliou protested that the Bishop of Kitium in going from town to town and from village to village performed sermons, unprecedented in ecclesiastical history, declaring himself candidate for the position of the archbishop in the same way in which he declared himself candidate for the position of the legislative councillor. In this manner he divided people…and hatreds amongst Christians become intransigent… The Most Holy Patriarchal Delegation is called to contribute towards a remedy which will strike at the roots of this situation.60

The simultaneous transformation of the political and ecclesiastical conflict that tormented the Church of Cyprus into an arena in which the patriarchates contested each other,61 was a reality to which the Bishop of Kyrenia did not react. His toleration of and partaking in the political aspect of the ecclesiastical question notwithstanding, Kyrillos Vasiliou did not demonstrate thirst for personal authority. In January 1902, consequently, when the arbitrators unanimously resolved to exclude the two Cypriot prelates as candidates to the archiepiscopal throne on account of their factious behaviour,62 Kyrillos, who was reported to have sought, at any rate, the withdrawal of his

 59 AEP:A/80, 217, The Ecumenical Patriarchate to Bishops of Kitium and Kyrenia, and the Holy Synod of Cyprus, 4 June 1907. 60 AAK, AAA, File XLI, Memorandum of the Holy Synod to the Delegation of the Patriarchs on the Archiepiscopal Question, 21 July 1907. 61 Indicative of the rivalry that surfaced between the patriarchs were their differing approaches to the solution of the Archiepiscopal Question. In February 1908 the Ecumenical Patriarch proposed the Metropolitans of Veria, Didimoticho and Kassandria as candidates for the Cypriot archiepiscopal throne, in AEP:A/82, 66, Telegram of Ioakim III, Ecumenical Patriarch to the Holy Synod of Cyprus and Vasilios, Metropolitan of Anchialos, 7 February 1908. The Patriarch of Alexandria, Photios, on the other hand, riposted that such action could not be canonically justified, would be rejected by the people and resembled an earlier unsuccessful attempt, in Hackett, ‘Archiepiscopal Question’, 336-7. Photios’ position was in line with the arguments of the kitiaki. 62 Telegram to the Bishops of Kitium and Kyrenia, 25 January 1902, in AAK, AAA, File XLI, Memorandum of the Holy Synod to the Delegation of the Patriarchs on the Archiepiscopal Question, 21 July 1907.

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candidature,63 and the kyreniaki party, raised no objections.64 In 1908, upon arrival of the news that he had been elected archbishop by the Synod of Constantinople, 65 which caused turmoil in Cyprus, 66 Kyrillos reacted in a similar manner. He expressed the intention to resign the archiepiscopal office, a decision with which the Ecumenical Patriarch was at variance. 67 Indeed, on 30 March 1908, when a kyreniaki mob gathered to congratulate him on his election, Kyrillos proclaimed in an appeasing fashion that ‘[t]he question is not yet settled, but in order that it should be settled, you must remain peaceful…thank you for coming to see me and you will obliged (sic) me by returning to your houses quietly’.68 During the same period he was reported to have claimed that he ‘fore-saw that our party would come to take me to the Archbishopric in order that I should walk over corpses. I was obliged to accept the election because they had determined death for me had I remained obdurate. Had I found a ship’s Captain, I should have fled from Cyprus…I shall state to the newspapers, to the Patriarchate, and to the Government, that I resign’ (sic).69 As evidence indicates, his determination to resolve the Archiepiscopal Question, in a canonical manner that upheld the autocephaly of the Church, went beyond any personal aspirations.



Georgiades to Ioakim III, 28 October 1902, in ƎƝƯƭ ŻƨƭƯƲ, 4/17 January 1903, in SA1:2107/1907. 64 Hackett, ‘Archiepiscopal Question’, 329; Christodoulou, ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƼ ƇƞƴƧƬơ, 69. 65 AEP:A/82, 80, Ioakim III, telegram, to the Holy Synod of Cyprus, 19 February 1908. 66 A kitiaki mass rally condemned this election, arguing that the Ecumenical Patriarchate had encroached on the autocephaly of the Cypriot Church and the ancient privileges of the people and called for the immediate passing of a bill regulating the election of the archbishop, in SA1:656/1908, Resolution of the Nicosia Rally, 21 February 1908. A kitiaki mob occupied the Archiepiscopal Palace, threatening violence, in order to prevent the enthronement of Kyrillos Vasiliou as archbishop, in SA1:2107/1907, King-Harman, High Commissioner to Lord Elgin, Colonial Secretary, 5 March 1908, while other instances of violence also surfaced; see SA1:656/1908, J. H. Learmonth, Chief Commandant of Police to J. E. Clauson, Chief Secretary, 8 April 1908. These resulted in the occupation of Nicosia and its vicinity by an armed police force in order to re-establish peace and order, in ibid., Proclamation by the High Commissioner King-Harman, 10 April 1908. 67 AEP:A/82, 88, telegram, Ioakim III, to Kyrillos ‘Archbishop of Cyprus’, 21 February 1908. 68 SA1:656/1908, Report to the Chief Commandant of Police, 30 March 1908. 69 SA1:1056/1908, Extract from ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƲ ƖƽƫơƮ which, according to the Chief Secretary, was found by Kyrillos Vasiliou to be correct except for minor inaccuracies, Clauson to King-Harman, 13 April 1908. 63

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Simultaneously, the communication between the Holy Synod and the British administration during the archiepiscopal dispute sheds further light on Kyrillos’ attitude to prelacy, leading to three main conclusions. Firstly, the Holy Synod demonstrated an understanding of the separation of civil and ecclesiastical spheres, acknowledging the British administrators as temporal heads within the island. In 1908 Kyrillos Vasiliou, along with the abbots of Kykko and Machaira and the archimandrite of the archdiocese, affirmed the absurdity of a situation in which the ecclesiastical authority would claim rights belonging to the jurisdiction of the state; by the same token, they pronounced, it would be incongruous for the state to ‘legislate about the election and qualifications of ecclesiastical Ministers’.70 It was to the British belief in the separation of religious and civil jurisdictions within Cyprus71 that the Holy Synod appealed many a time in its endeavour to preclude the possibility of a resolution to the problem through an electoral law.72 Such understanding of the principle of separation of church and state, however, did not involve complete adherence to it; the Holy Synod reported periodically the prevalent situation to the British authorities,73 going as far as to pray for ‘the Respected Government to help th[e Holy Synod] in their efforts to settle the question’.74 In 1908, when Kyrillos Vasiliou was elected archbishop by the Synod of Constantinople, the Holy Synod sought, as per the custom, governmental recognition of the appointment.75 Indeed, Kyrillos and the Holy Synod crossed the line that separated the ecclesiastical and state authorities at times when the autocephaly and traditions of the Church of Cyprus were deemed to be in jeopardy. Thus emerges the second conclusion, namely Kyrillos and the Holy Synod’s determination to defend the autocephaly of the Church of Cyprus, vis-à-vis external and unrequested interference in the affairs of the ecclesiastical hierarchy by invoking secular involvement. In 1900 the Holy Synod appealed

 SA1:656/1908, The Holy Synod to Lord Elgin, Colonial Secretary, 10/23 March 1908. 71 As late as 1907 King-Harman insisted that the local government should not intervene in the resolution of the Archiepiscopal question, in SA1:2107/1907, confidential, King-Harman to Elgin, 18 June 1907. 72 See for example SA1:656/1908, The Holy Synod to Elgin, 23 February/7 March 1908. 73 In such reports the Bishop of Kitium was portrayed as the party responsible for the protracted dispute and guilty for acting anti-canonically, in SA1:c738/1902, The Holy Synod to Chamberlain, 22/7 March 1902. 74 CO 67/138, The Holy Synod to Haynes-Smith, 7 April 1904, enclosure 1 in Haynes-Smith, to Lyttleton, Colonial Secretary, 7 April 1904. 75 SA1:656/1908, Clauson to Bishop of Kyrenia, 1 April 1908. 70

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to the government to prevent the patriarchates from a potential intervention in the affairs of the Cypriot Church, which had not been requested by the Holy Synod.76 In cases, however, in which the government, without having been invited by the Holy Synod, solicited interference in the ecclesiastical affairs, Kyrillos rejected it. In 1902, for example, he refused to furnish the High Commissioner with a copy of the results of the elections of representatives for the archiepiscopal elections, which Haynes-Smith had asked for.77 Thirdly, the Bishop of Kyrenia did not fall short of disagreeing with and even criticising British initiatives and policies. In 1908, in a polemical letter to the Colonial Secretary, the Holy Synod expressed its dismay at the governmental failure to ‘properly and lawfully assist the Holy Synod in the further continuation and completion of its task’. It condemned the British authorities for supporting the adoption of a bill proposed by legislative councillors concerning the archiepiscopal election as an attempt to ‘usurp rights which belong exclusively to the Church’, for driving out of the Archiepiscopal Palace ‘by force…the Ecclesiastical Authority of the Country with its Personnel’ and for ‘still holding the said Palace by the Police’. It charged the administration with ‘the greatest part of the responsibility for the protraction, hitherto, of the question and for the present quite unlawful situation’ and for attempting ‘to break off our Church’. 78 Concurrently, kyreniaki mouthpieces, in uttering arguments such as that ‘the chivalrous British did not do what they trumpeted and proclaimed they would on their landing…We are heavily taxed, more than any other people, without enjoying anything, in order rather to nourish our masters’,79 attacks British policies. On 6 May 1908 the Archiepiscopal Election Law passed through the Legislative Council, voted by its official and eight Orthodox members that were supporters of Kyrillos Papadopoulos. 80 Kyrillos Papadopoulos was elected archbishop on 21 April 1909, approved by the government,81 and the resignation of Kyrillos Vasiliou was eventually endorsed by the Ecumenical

 SA1:3198/1900, The Holy Synod to Haynes-Smith, 30/13 September 1900. SA1:c632/1902, Bishop of Kyrenia to Chief Secretary, 27 March 1902. 78 SA1:656/1908, The Holy Synod to Elgin, 10/23 March 1908. 79 Ɩƹƭƞ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, ‘ƋƽưƱƯƲ-ƋƱƞƴƧ’, 23/6 July 1900. See also, ibid., ‘Ɛ ƋƯƲ Ƒ. ƋƹƭƳƴơƭƴƩƭƟƤƧƲ’, 28/10 August 1900; ibid., ‘ƐƩ ƋơƴơƱƣƧƨƝƭƴƥƲ ƖƼƱƯƩ’, 13/26 May 1906; ibid., ‘ƅƩơƴƟ ƂƤƱơƭƯƽƬƥƭ’, 15/28 July 1906. 80 Hackett, ‘Archiepiscopal Question’, 338-9; Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 185-6. 81 SA1:103/1909, Approval of the Election of Archbishop by King-Harman, 21 April 1909. 76 77

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Patriarch who also advised that he be addressed as the former Archbishop of Cyprus and the President of Kyrenia.82 The foregoing analysis, unravelling the manifestation of influences he had been subject to in his earlier years, in the context of an ecclesiastical and political struggle in which he was a protagonist, illuminates Kyrillos’ attitudes towards prelacy and attributes that characterised his archiepiscopacy. Without neglecting his exposition to influences from his lay and clerical entourage, his determination to secure and uphold the traditions of the Cypriot Church, on account of which he overlooked the notion of separation of clerical and state affairs and criticised the British administrators, his commitment to Orthodox canons and precedent, his acknowledgement and toleration of the presence of temporal politics in ecclesiastical affairs and, to a lesser extent, his underlying support for the nationalist cause, were displayed.

Kyrillos as Archbishop-Ethnarch In November 1916, on Kyrillos II’s death, Kyrillos Vasiliou was elected Archbishop of Cyprus, retaining this position until 1933 when he died. He took office when, internally, the Church of Cyprus and the bourgeoisie had already developed into the foremost agents of the enosis struggle within the island, representing it as the universal aspiration of the Greek Cypriot community. Meanwhile, externally, World War I raged. One of the first problems Kyrillos encountered as an ethnarch revolved around the disunity that had infiltrated the ranks of the Greek Cypriot middle class, particularly the politicians and high clergy, owing to the schism in Greece between the venizelists and the royalists. 83 In acknowledging this reality, he attempted to appease the two factions by appealing to what he considered their common ground, namely ‘the Patriotism of our Politicians who, at such critical moment, will rank the interest of the country above any differences in personal or political perceptions’.84 In acting as a balancing and mediating force, Kyrillos encouraged the co-deliberation of the two opposing factions over enosis, which the Greek Cypriots ‘have never ceased to declare’, and which took the form of a pancyprian conference at the Archbishopric in 1917. This conference, presided over by the archbishop and attended by the



AEP:A/83, 74-5, The Ecumenical Patriarchate to Kyrillos, ‘Archbishop of Cyprus’, 18 March 1909. 83 See for example ŻƭƹƳƩƲ, ‘ƐƩ ƑơƱ’ ƈƬƟƭ ƃơƳƩƫƼƶƱƯƭƥƲ’, 14/27 April 1917; ibid., ‘ƂƩ ƅƯƮơƳƟơƩ ƴƯƵ ƪ. ƇơƭƭƝƴƯƵ’, 29/12 October 1917; ibid., ‘ƆưƩƳƴƯƫƞ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƞƲ ƑƱƜƮƥƹƲ ƴƯƵ ƂƭơƨƝƬơƴƯƲ’, 29/12 October 1917. 84 AAK, ƂƱƷƥƟƯƭ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƋƵƱƟƫƫƯƵ Ƅ’, 1916-1933 (henceforth AAK, AKƄ), File XXXVI, Kyrillos III, Archbishop of Cyprus to S. Araouzos, 30 August 1917. 82

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high clergy, incumbent and former legislative councillors, lay notables, directors of newspapers, and representatives from the whole of Cyprus (although of course not from the peasantry and labouring class), resulted in a resolution, commending the Allied effort, declaring the readiness of Greek Cypriots to participate in the war under the Greek flag, and expressing their powerful and unaltered desire for enosis.85 Yet Kyrillos did not advance enosis for utilitarian purposes. He was committed to the ideal and he perceived he had a duty to bolster it as an ecclesiastic and as an heir to Sophronios’ tradition, as had been revised by nationalist mythology. It was his status within Cyprus as the leader of the Orthodox ecclesiastical hierarchy in which, it was ahistorically and linearly alleged, ‘our Nation found its great and faithful guardian and courageous vindicator of its national traditions’,86 and his belief that subsequent to the British occupation of the island, the political life and activity of the Orthodox community had entered a course defined by the ‘fundamental program’ of the late Sophronios, succinctly expressed as ‘the people of Cyprus… acquiesce in the British occupation without, however, abnegating its descent and desires’,87 that prompted Kyrillos to lead a deputation to London from 1918-20. He clearly held that tradition required him to head the Greek Cypriots politically and nationally. Critically, this deputation consisting of both venizelists and royalists,88 revealed that the enosist struggle could unify the contemporary Greek Cypriot community. The aim and course of action of the deputation affords insight into the role of the archbishop-ethnarch. That Kyrillos III headed it underlines the position of leadership in the political and national struggle of the Greek Cypriots that the archbishop had consolidated, despite dissenting voices. Indeed, arguments to the effect that it was ‘the exclusive function of the Greek-Christian Members of the Council to “manipulate both the internal

 Ibid., Annex of ƑơƴƱƟƲ, 29/12 November 1917. Ƃƃ, ‘Ɛ ƆƨƭƜƱƷƧƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ’, IX, 1918-9, 150. 87 Kyrillos III ascribed these words to Sophronios when the latter welcomed Sir Garnet Wolseley to the island in AAK, AKƄ, File XXXVI, Annex of ƑơƴƱƟƲ, 29/12 November 1917. 88 The participants of the deputation were the Legislative Councillors Th. Theodotou, N. Paschalis, D. Severis, N. Lanitis, N. Nicolaides, Ph. Zannetos, L. Loizou and G. Emfiejis, under the leadership of Kyrillos III, in Ƃƃ, ‘ƑơƭƧƣƵƱƩƪƞ ƑƱƯưƯƬưƞ ƴƧƲ ƑƱƥƳƢƥƟơƲ’, 9 (1918-9), 153. 85 86

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and the external policy of the people represented by them”’89 failed to take root; the deputation, described as the ‘most serious course of action which has hitherto been attempted by the Island on the national question’, 90 departed in November 1918 under the archbishop’s leadership. Having already stated that he waited for the opportune moment to arise in order to act for the ‘immediate settlement of our affair when the fortunes of the nations and peoples will be determined’,91 Kyrillos, along with the legislative councillors, resolved to make their way to Britain at the time when the armistices were signed, demonstrating an awareness of international politics and developments. Deeming that the cause of enosis would be better advanced at this historical juncture, the deputation announced that ‘[w]e depart, Compatriots, for the English Metropolis, counting on English principles and English honour, bearing one and only agenda; no thoughts can in any way alter it, to pursue Enosis and only Enosis’92. Kyrillos’ belief in the veracity of the noble principles and ideals that Britain advocated throughout the period of World War I, surfaced through the deputation’s actions while in Britain. It made known to the British public, politicians and governmental dignitaries that we completely and blindly trust the British Nation, its traditions, its principles and its sense of justice. The Church of Cyprus and our compatriots are certain that, in the hands of your magnanimous Nation, which had embarked upon a five-year war for the freedom of the world and the abolition of despotism, the question of their national liberty will receive a fair treatment as per the best British traditions…we dare say that these principles could not be enforced on any other place on earth, which is more appropriate or fair or honest, than on our Island, the Greek population of which justly demands its Union with Mother Greece.93

This type of approach went as far as to attempt to challenge the British to prove the verisimilitude of their rhetoric by appealing to its moral high ground. In declaring the issue of enosis a British affair as much as a Cypriot one because ‘we consider that the honour of Great Britain imposes on you

 89 Theodotou, quoted by the High Commissioner in CO 67/188, J. E. Clauson, High Commissioner, to Lord Granville, British Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary in Athens, 2 April 1918. 90 ƎƝƯƭ ŻƨƭƯƲ, ‘ƈ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƕưƼƨƥƳƩƲ’, 3/16 November 1918. 91 AAK, AKƄ, File XXXVI, Kyrillos III to S. Araouzos, 30 August 1917. 92 Announcement of the members of the deputation to Britain in ƎƝƯƭ ŻƨƭƯƲ, ‘ƑƱƯƲ ƴƯƭ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƼƭ ƌơƼƭ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ’, 3/16 November 1918. 93 Appeal of the Cypriot deputation in London to the British people, 15 March 1919, in Ƃƃ, ‘ƈ ŻƪƪƫƧƳƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƑƱƥƳƢƥƟơƲ’, 16 (1918-9), 271.

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the obligation to respect and implement in this way these noble principles in favour of which you and the liberal and democratic nations fought together…On the basis of what moral or honest principle would the British nation decline to unite Cyprus with Greece?’94, the Cypriot prelate and the deputation tried to transform their national claims into a universal issue of morality. Far from being restricted to the publication of appeals to the British nation agitating for the union of Cyprus with Greece, the political activity of Kyrillos as the head of the Cypriot deputation to London extended to ventures underlining its approach: pursuit of enosis in a fashion conciliatory to the British. In February 1919 the deputation met with the Colonial Secretary and reiterated the Greek Cypriot desire for enosis, assuring him that it did not originate from British maladministration. 95 The deputation also cultivated relations with the English clerical hierarchy and came in contact with academic personalities, such as the Chancellor of the University of London, all of whom reportedly supported enosis. 96 It appealed to the House of Commons, the House of Lords97 and the British Prime Minister98 in writing, conveying its pro-British attitude in the form of declarations expressing the gratefulness of the Greek Cypriots to Britain who ‘liberated us in 1878 from the abominable Turkish yoke and…has thenceforth guided us with discipline on the road to freedom…We consider Great Britain as our second homeland’, alongside its demand for enosis.99 Meetings with, and advice from, Eleftherios Venizelos contributed to the pursuit of such a pro-British approach. On its way to London, Venizelos told the deputation in Paris that the noble principles of the British and the Allies would be conducive to the favourable settlement of the Cypriot question.100 Venizelos encouraged the deputation to heed the recommendations of the ‘national centre’ in not referring the Cypriot question to the Peace Conference, permitting Britain instead to settle it alone; advice the Cypriot deputation took.101 In ensuing meetings in London, Venizelos reassured the

 94 Appeal of the Cypriot deputation in London to the British people, 5 May 1919, in ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƲ ƖƽƫơƮ, ‘ƈ ƋƽưƱƯƲ ƑƝưƯƩƨƥƭ ƥưƟ ƴƧƭ ƃƱƥƴƴơƭƩƪƞƭ ƅƩƪơƩƯƳƽƭƧƭ’, 14 May 1919. 95 Ƃƃ, ‘ƈ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƑƱƥƳƢƥƟơ’, XIV, 1918-9, 240-3. 96 Ibid., ‘ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ – ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƑƱƥƳƢƥƟơ’, XIII, 1918-9, 224. 97 Ibid., ‘ƈ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƑƱƥƳƢƥƟơ’, XXV, 1919-20, 44-5. 98 Ibid., ‘ƕưƼƬƭƧƬơ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƑƱƥƳƢƥƟơƲ ưƱƯƲ ƴƯƭ ƑƱƹƨƵưƯƵƱƣƼƭ ƴƧƲ ƂƣƣƫƟơƲ’, XIX, 1919-20, 103-8. 99 Ibid., 106-7. 100 Ibid., ‘ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ – ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƑƱƥƳƢƥƟơ’, XIII, 1918-9, 225. 101 Ibid., ‘ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ – ƔƯ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƭ ƇƞƴƧƬơ’, XVII, 1918-9, 290-1.

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deputation that enosis lay in ‘entirely friendly hands’.102 The extent to which Venizelos’ influence affected the course of the Cypriot deputation was indicated by Kipriakos Philax; in July 1919, it reported that ‘the persistent and imperative contention of Mr Venizelos has always been the friendliest and most devout stance of the Greek people and its representatives towards the sovereign power in Cyprus and he dismissed every step which could potentially be misinterpreted as encompassing an anti-British spirit’, and lamented the exigency of the Cypriot deputation to accept Venizelos’ directions and perceptions on the grounds that he handled the national affairs of Hellenism, part of which was Cyprus.103 Simultaneously the Cypriot deputation published articles in the British press either in defence of the cause of enosis or in response to allegations against it expressed in Britain, in the framework of which it advanced its solid belief in the eternal Greekness of the island and the Orthodox community, the democratic sense of justice of the British nation and Cypriot willingness to allow Britain to defend its remote and small interests on the island in the future through an arrangement with Greece. 104 These initiatives, however, proved unavailing; in late 1920 the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies communicated to the deputation Britain’s decision to maintain Cyprus.105 For all their abortiveness, they did stress three important parameters of Kyrillos III’s political activity. He esteemed and enforced the guidelines presented to Cyprus from the national centre and particularly from Venizelos; he engaged in a conciliatory deposition of arguments to the British in favour of enosis, invoking liberal British traditions; and he was committed to the goal of enosis. The spirited and prolonged attempt of the archbishop and the Greek Cypriot members of the Legislative Council in Britain to attain enosis, failed to strike a sensitive cord among the masses of the people in Cyprus. The legislative councillor Evgenios Zenon reported, in 1919, difficulty in accumulating money to support the efforts of the deputation. He went on to remark that ‘we, Cypriots, still do not wish to believe that “Hannibal ad

 Ibid., ‘ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ’, XXXI, 1919-20, 143. ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƲ ƖƽƫơƮ, ‘ƋơƴơƬƥƱƩƳƬƼƲ ƆƵƨƵƭƾƭ: ƈ ƂƫƞƨƥƩơ ƆƬưƱƼƲ’, 23 July 1919. 104 See article of the Cypriot deputation in The Times, reproduced in Ƃƃ, ‘ŹƱƨƱƯƭ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƑƱƥƳƢƥƟơƲ’, XXIV, 1919-20, 23-6; article of the Cypriot deputation in The Morning Post, reproduced in AB, ‘ŹƱƨƱƯƭ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƑƱƥƳƢƥƟơƲ’, XXVII, 1919-20, 72-5; article of the Cypriot deputation in The Times, reproduced in AB, ‘ŻƪƪƫƧƳƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƂưƯƳƴƯƫƞƲ’, 48 (1920-21), 22-24; response of the Cypriot deputation to Percy White in The Spectator, in ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƲ ƖƽƫơƮ, ‘ƔƯ ƍƝƫƫƯƭ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ. ƂưƜƭƴƧƳƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƂưƯƳƴƯƫƞƲ’, 24 September 1919. 105 ƎƝƯƭ ŻƨƭƯƲ, ‘ƈ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞ ƕưƼƨƥƳƩƲ’, 23/5 November 1920. 102 103

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portas”…neither are we deeply moved by the idea of our forthcoming liberation. We are to be pitied’. 106 Malcolm Stevenson, the officer administering the government, corroborated the ‘almost complete cessation of any agitation locally for union with Greece’. 107 This realisation, in conjunction with the facts that a conciliatory approach towards the British had proved unsuccessful and that the British had adopted a less tolerant stance on enosist manifestations in the context of the Greco-Turkish war of 1919-22,108 put the Church and the bourgeois establishment on a collision course with the British authorities. In December 1920, the Greek Cypriot legislative councillors resigned in protest over the British decision to reject enosis.109 Kyrillos’ position in this new state of affairs was clear: he led the anti-British reaction while, simultaneously, persistently advancing the enosist demand. In 1921 the Political Organisation of Cyprus, which aimed at enosis and whose membership included ‘all the adult Greek residents of Cyprus as well as those living abroad’, was established. 110 The ‘face’ of the National Council, the authority that represented the Greek Cypriots in all actions relating to the promotion of the Political Organisation and its enosist objective, was the Church and Kyrillos III. Its configuration, comprising five ex officio members, namely the archbishop as its president, the Bishops of Paphos, Kitium and Kyrenia and the Abbot of Kykko, forty elected representatives and one elected by the body of teachers, 111 strengthened the enosis cause. That the enosis movement acquired a formal political structure under the leadership of the clerical hierarchy legitimised the enosis demand and transformed it into a sacred cause.112



106 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XXXVI, E.N. Zenon, Legislative Councillor to Iacovos, Bishop of Paphos, 22 June 1919. 107 CO 67/197, confidential, Stevenson to Viscount Milner, Colonial Secretary, 15 April 1920. 108 In 1921, for example, the British authorities did not permit the celebration of the centenary anniversary of the Greek War of Independence, in AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XXXIV, Memorandum from Kyrillos III and the Legislative Councillors to W. Churchill, Colonial Secretary, 8/21 April 1921. 109 ƎƝƯƭ ŻƨƭƯƲ, ‘ƔƯ ŻƣƣƱơƶƯƭ ƴƧƲ ƑơƱơƩƴƞƳƥƹƲ ƴƹƭ ƃƯƵƫƥƵƴƾƭ’, 5/18 December 1920. 110 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XXXVI, Constitution of the Political Organisation of Cyprus, 1921. 111 Ibid. 112 Sia Anagnostopoulou referred to enosis as a holy message, in ‘ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƩ Ư ƆƨƭơƱƷƩƪƼƲ ƴƧƲ ƒƼƫƯƲ: 1878-1960’, ƓƽƣƷƱƯƭơ ƉƝƬơƴơ – ƂƶƩƝƱƹƬơ ƋƽưƱƯƲ (July 1998 – March 1999): 205-6.

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In this framework, Kyrillos and the National Council did not restrict themselves to mere enosist agitation; they engaged instead in a tactic of nonco-operation with the administration, which they related to British rejection of enosis. Having unsuccessfully proposed the conduct of a plebiscite in which the Greek Cypriots would, allegedly, be given the opportunity to state that their sole aspiration was enosis, as well as a visit of the Colonial Secretary to Cyprus in order to personally ascertain the real popular desire,113 the Political Organisation resolved to adopt an inflexible stance towards the British regime. It decided to abstain from participation in the legislative elections of 1921;114 a policy adhered to during the by-elections of the same year.115 At the same time, Kyrillos and the Greek Cypriot temporal establishment incorporated grievances of a wider social nature in their rhetoric, which ran side-by-side with their enosist demands, in the context of their anti-British stance. In heavily criticising the British administration for obstructing the celebrations commemorating the Greek War of Independence in 1921, which marked the centenary anniversary of the Greek revolution, Kyrillos and the Greek Cypriot legislative councillors reproached the government for swiftly recruiting police and for transferring British troops from Egypt, which flamboyantly paraded through the streets of the capital...Draconian laws have been passed of late by the official and Mohammedan members of the Legislative Council, providing for restriction of the Freedom of the Press and for the deportation of aliens from the island. Martial law continues to be in force…as if this island constitutes a battlefield…The people, Your Honour, can only think of one objective to these illiberal and autocratic measures – the suppression of its national sentiment in order to appear content with the foreign regime116.

There is little doubt that the decisions of the Political Organisation and the course of action of the National Council did not solely reflect the perceptions of Kyrillos III or the high clergy on the national question; they, at once, contained convictions of laymen such as Theophanis Theodotou.117 The head of the ecclesiastical hierarchy demonstrated perceptiveness in comprehending the prevalent circumstances and historical exigencies; he

 113 CO 67/202, Memorial of the Greek Cypriot Members of the Legislative Council to Churchill, 8 March 1921; telegram, Kyrillos III to Churchill, 11 March 1921; respectively enclosures 3 and 1 in Stevenson, to Churchill, 13 March 1921. 114 ƑơƴƱƟƲ, ‘ƔƯ ƘƞƶƩƳƬơ ƴƧƲ ƅƥƵƴƝƱơƲ ƑơƣƪƵưƱƟƯƵ ƓƵƭƥƫƥƽƳƥƹƲ’, 13/26 October 1921. 115 CO 67/204, confidential, Stevenson to Churchill, 5 December 1921. 116 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XXXIV, Memorandum from Kyrillos III and the Legislative Councillors to Churchill, 8/21 April 1921. 117 CO 67/204, confidential, Stevenson to Churchill, 25 October 1921; CO 67/207, Stevenson to Churchill, 25 March 1922.

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realised that the archbishop of British Cyprus in the 1920s could, by no means, singlehandedly control the public and political affairs of his community. Reflecting his accurate judgment, he conceded that the introduction of the Legislative Council by the British as well as the emergence of other elements, whose opinion weighted over the affairs of the community, necessitated collaboration between ecclesiastical and lay forces.118 Admitting that the Church was no longer the only institution in Cyprus representing the Greek Cypriots, Kyrillos stated that even though the archbishop, by virtue of his status as the ethnarch, possessed rights over the affairs of the island, as per the new state of affairs, he could not fail to acknowledge comparable rights to the legislative councillors. 119 He thus authorised and promoted the involvement of the Church in the public sphere in a close collaboration with laymen, as part of his duty to lead his flock. On a different level, the stance of non-co-operation with the British, which came in stark contrast to the conciliatory, yet fruitless, attitude which the deputation to London had pursued just a few years earlier, stressed the fact that the Greek Cypriot clerical and lay establishment took notice of the public feeling and the wider historical circumstances. In a period in which news of the victorious progression of the Greek forces in Anatolia reached Cyprus, inspiring nationalist outbursts, 120 in which Ireland and Egypt advanced towards independence, and in which popular discontent with the British authorities transpired, 121 the agenda of the clerical and lay establishment encompassed these characteristics, and Kyrillos promoted them. In 1922, he emphatically declared that recently, the fate of other peoples, who are under the administration of Great Britain, has been settled, as in the case for instance of Ireland…that has now become a free state, as also is the case of Egypt, that has been declared to be an independent country and of little Malta, that has become a mistress in her

 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XL, Kyrillos III to the editor of ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƲ ƖƽƫơƮ, 17 August 1929. Ibid., Kyrillos III to the editor of ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƲ ƖƽƫơƮ, 19 August 1929. 120 ƑơƴƱƟƲ, ‘ŻƮơƫƫƯƲ ƆƭƨƯƵƳƩơƳƬƼƲ ƥưƟ ƴơƩƲ ƆƨƭƩƪơƟƲ ƎƟƪơƩƲ’, 14/27 July 1921. 121 See indicatively, advocacies in favour of better working conditions and just remuneration of workers in mines and about the duty of the government to preclude their exploitation by employers in ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼƲ ƖƽƫơƮ, ‘ƕưƝƱ ƴƹƭ ƆƱƣơƴƾƭ ƥƩƲ ƴơ ƍƥƴơƫƫƥƟơ’, 26 April 1916; complaints against the constitution of the island, the Cyprus Tribute which burdened the island and the fact that the government did not adequately promote education and agriculture in ibid., ‘ƐƩ ƍƝƣƩƳƴƯƩ ƑơƱƜƣƯƭƴƥƲ ƴƧƲ ƑƱƯƼƤƯƵ ƪơƩ ƴƧƲ ƆƵƧƬƥƱƟơƲ ƥƭ ƋƽưƱƹ – ƈ ƑơƩƤƥƟơ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƄƥƹƱƣƟơ’, 12 January 1916; protests against the rising prices of grain in ŻƭƹƳƩƲ, ‘ƔƯ ƋơƨƞƪƯƭ ƴƧƲ ƋƵƢƥƱƭƞƳƥƹƲ’, 14/27 July 1917; grievances about the poor state of the transport system that adversely affected the producers in ƎƝƯƭ ŻƨƭƯƲ, ‘ƔƯ ƇƞƴƧƬơ ƴƧƲ ƓƵƣƪƯƩƭƹƭƟơƲ’, 24/6 September 1918. 118 119

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own house…Cyprus alone, which is Hellenic from the most ancient times and which has a most vigorous national conscience and is inhabited by a people who are advanced in culture and civilisation, Cyprus alone has not obtained the desired object, that is, its national rehabilitation, but is kept by force and against its own will far from the arms of the Mother Country.122

The end of the Greco-Turkish war and the exchange of populations witnessed an adaptation to circumstances in the politics represented by Kyrillos. While newspaper correspondences reported that ‘the tragedy is the most horrid’, 123 a section of the Greek Cypriot community became disillusioned with the idea of enosis. In a caustic dispatch to the National Council, a number of Greek Cypriots demanded that ‘Athens and everything that is called Greece remain sights of archaeological pilgrimage, and we, who unfortunately still bear the name Hellenes, shall live and prosper as human beings under the British sceptre’. They then exhorted the leadership of the Political Organisation ‘to align yourselves with reality in order not to plunge the Cypriot people into destruction… National ideals, national dreams should no longer exist. They are all a hoax; they are all legends; they are all a deceit…Your first duty is to dissolve yourselves…We do not wish for appeals neither to Venizelos nor to Commander Constantine XII’.124 In a less spirited manner, the Bishop of Paphos informed the archbishop that the recent events had exercised a disheartening effect on national struggles.125 Responding to these circumstances Kyrillos, representing the National Council, addressed the British and introduced a novel approach; he applied for ‘substantial constitutional liberties to the Island’, requiring selfgovernment, in the framework of which Muslim and Christian Cypriots would be represented proportionally in the legislative and executive branches and the Governor would have the right of veto, in anticipation of the utter aim of enosis.126 The British reaction that Cyprus had not yet manifested a political development that would justify such concessions 127 provoked the National Council’s heavy criticism of British illiberal governance, crushing taxation and its attempt to remove control over education from communities.



CO 67/207, Kyrillos III to Churchill, 6/19 March 1922, enclosure 1 in, confidential, Stevenson to Churchill, 23 March 1922. 123 ƆƫƥƵƨƥƱƟơ, ‘ƆưƩƳƴƯƫơƟ ƥƮ ƂƨƧƭƾƭ – ƈƬƥƴƝƱƯƵ ƂƭƴơưƯƪƱƩƴƯƽ’, 29/11 November 1922. 124 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XXXVI, Citizens of Cyprus to the Members of the Committee of the National Council, 21 September 1922. 125 Ibid., File XXXV, Iacovos, Bishop of Paphos to Kyrillos III, 12 September 1922. 126 CO 67/208, Kyrillos III, to the Duke of Devonshire, Colonial Secretary, 3/16 December 1922, enclosure 1 in, confidential, Stevenson to Devonshire, 24 December 1922. 127 CO 67/210, Kyrillos III to Devonshire, 10/23 March 1923, enclosure in, confidential, Stevenson, to Devonshire, 6 April 1923. 122

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The Council also demanded an end to the Tribute, the establishment of an agricultural bank and the appointment of a commission to inquire into the ‘hopeless condition of the public affairs, the financial distress of the people and the maladministration of the Island’.128 In the following years, down to 1931, Kyrillos’ political and ethnarchic activity persisted along the same lines. He stuck to the demands of social reform as a stepping-stone to enosis, as well as to anti-British manifestations, despite the fact that the momentum of the Political Organisation and the National Council had subsided due to internal discord. Indeed, by 1925 the inability of the National Council to espouse a united policy during the legislative elections129 was one demonstration of its deep divisions.130 On 1 May 1925, the day of the proclamation of Cyprus as a British colony, Kyrillos attended the official ceremony. He then handed a letter to the administration in which he protested against the manifest British neglect of Greek Cypriot national desires; an action which the Governor ascribed to ‘the extreme section of which, through weakness of character, His Beatitude has been forced to become the unwilling mouthpiece’.131 The role of laymen in the formulated approach of Kyrillos III should not be minimised;132 it should not be exaggerated either. Indeed, had the archbishop been forced into pursuing the policies and politics he did, he would not have engaged in a range of parallel activities in an attempt to bolster them. Such activities, nonetheless, dotted Kyrillos’ archiepiscopacy. In the period subsequent to the defeat of the Greek forces in Asia Minor, the archbishop undertook to enlighten the people beyond Cyprus on the prevalent situation on the island, the grievances of the Greek Cypriot community against the British administration and the desire for enosis. He contacted authorities including the House of Lords,133 the Duke of York,134

 128 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XXXVI, Resolution of the Third National Assembly of Cyprus, 3 June 1923. 129 Ibid., File XL, Address at the Commencement of the Works of the National Assembly, 20 November 1926. 130 The Bishop of Kyrenia, Makarios, argued that political and civil liberties en route the achievement of enosis constituted little less than an aberration, which could only disorient the struggle for enosis. He then resigned his ex officio membership in the National Council, in ibid., File XXXV, Makarios to Kyrillos III, 29 March 1923. 131 CO 67/214, Stevenson, Governor, to Leo Amery, Colonial Secretary, 5 May 1925. 132 See generally AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XL for correspondence between Kyrillos III and laymen. 133 Ibid., File XXXIV, Kyrillos III petition to the House of Lords and Colonial Secretary, 14 October 1924.

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Eleftherios Venizelos,135 the Atlantis of New York,136 and urged members of the Anglo-Hellenic League 137 to contribute to the promotion of what he represented as the goals of the majority of the Greek Cypriot people. In this spirit, by 1928 he even recommended contacting the League of Nations about the Cypriot question. 138 Interestingly, a comparison between this correspondence and Kyrillos’ correspondence as a bishop presiding over the Holy Synod during the Archiepiscopal Question, albeit concerning different but still political matters, reveals a distinct alteration in vocabulary, echoing his ability to adapt his priorities to the exigencies of times, of the ecclesiastical institution and of his role. His ecclesiastical and religious articulation on the canons of Orthodoxy and the autocephaly of the Cypriot Church of the 1900s was succeeded by notions such as ‘motherland’, ‘national liberation’, ‘constitutional liberties’ and ‘international representations’. At the same time, Kyrillos engaged in enosist and anti-British activity at home. He exploited the opportunity afforded by the visit in 1927 of Mario Lago, the Italian governor of the Dodecanese, to draw connections between the Dodecanese and Cyprus, identifying them as members of dictatorially repressed Hellenism, to express ‘protest in national solidarity’ and to incite the Greek Cypriots to abstain from celebrations in Lago’s honour. Indeed, he advised that the occasion was apt for hoisting the national banners and demonstrating the incessant Cypriot desire for enosis. 139 He was personally involved in petitioning the British authorities to permit the return of the Greek nationals Nicolaos Katalanos and Philios Zannetos to Cyprus,140 both of whom had been exiled in the early 1920s on account of their intense nationalist agitation, and customarily officiated at the liturgy for the anniversary of the Greek War of Independence, praying for the realisation of enosis.141 On the occasion of the victory of the Greek forces in Kütahya in 1921, Kyrillos officiated at a service in Phaneromeni Church at the end of

 Ibid., Kyrillos III to the Duke of York, 15 January 1929, in which a copy of the Memorial addressed to the House of Lords was enclosed. For this Memorial see ibid., Memorial addressed to the House of Lords through the Right Honourable the Speaker, Lord Norton, 15 January 1929. 135 Ibid., Kyrillos III, to E. Venizelos, 25 May 1925. 136 Ibid., Kyrillos III, to the editor of ƂƴƫơƭƴƟƲ in New York, 4 February 1929. 137 Ibid., File XL, Kyrillos III, to W. Pember-Reeves, President of the Anglo-Hellenic League, 20 April 1924. 138 Ibid., Kyrillos III, to the Members of the Legislative Council and Mayors of Cyprus, 7 December 1928. 139 Ibid., Kyrillos III Encyclical to Orthodox Christians of Cyprus, 21 October 1927. 140 Ibid., File XXXIV, R. Storrs, Governor to Kyrillos III, 14 May 1930. 141 See for example ƑơƴƱƟƲ, ‘ƈ ƆƨƭƩƪƞ ƆƯƱƴƞ ƥƭ ƌƥƵƪƹƳƟơ’, 30/12 April 1923. 134

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which he called for cheers in favour of the union of all Hellenes,142 while also orchestrating public contributions for the benefit of the widows and orphans of the Greco-Turkish war. 143 In 1924, he participated in the centenary celebration of the death of the renowned philhellene, Lord Byron, at the club Agapi tou Laou.144 In 1928, acting in defiance of the advice of Eleftherios Venizelos,145 the archbishop and the members of the Legislative Council resolved to not participate in the jubilee celebrations of the British administration in Cyprus. 146 In a clear documentation of their anti-British stance and commitment to enosis, they encouraged the Greek Cypriot population to refrain from the forthcoming festivities as a matter of ‘elementary dignity’. In emblematically coupling social and political grievances with enosist aspirations, they protested against the fact that for fifty years, against every divine and human law and against the principles declared in the Great War for self-governing of the Nations, we are kept away from the arms of our mother…But parallel to this obvious and material injustice we are enduring for fifty years continual other injustices…The Greek inhabitants constituting the five sixths of the population have no material voice in local legislation…We are governed by people answerable to third persons, and those in England: who have no responsibility whatever nor are answerable to the taxed Cypriots with whom they have neither mental nor spiritual or ideological touch nor are they able to acquire such; all these have fatally led us to the tragical state of the present misery and poverty of this place. Unsupportable taxations have burdened this place…Apart from these our Greek Race is disputed…Refraining however from the Government festivals we are bound to proceed by demonstration to express loyally and where necessary our displeasure and remonstration because for a fifty years English ruling the hopes, wishes, and ideals of the Greek population of this Island remained unsatisfied.147

The proclamation thus summarised Kyrillos’ political stance in the years that followed 1922. His leadership of the National Organisation, which was

 Ibid., ‘ŻƮơƫƫƯƲ ƆƭƨƯƵƳƩơƳƬƼƲ ƥưƟ ƴơƩƲ ƆƨƭƩƪơƟƲ ƎƟƪơƩƲ’, 14/27 July 1921. Ibid., ‘ŻƱơƭƯƩ ƆƨƭƩƪƯƟ’, 21/4 May 1921. 144 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XL, Resolution signed by Kyrillos III, 20 April 1924. 145 CO 67/224/1, R. Storrs, Governor to Amery, 5 June 1928. 146 This occurred in the face of the abolition of the Cyprus Tribute announced by Storrs in August 1927. See G. S. Georghallides, Cyprus and the Governorship of Sir Ronald Storrs: The Causes of the 1931 Crisis, Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia, 1985, 50-8. 147 CO 67/224/1, Proclamation of the Holy Synod and the Members of the Legislative Council to the Greek Population of the Island, 7 March 1928, enclosure 1 in Storrs to Amery, 5 June 1928. 142 143

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established in 1930 with the objective of focusing on and promoting enosis, setting aside the issue of political liberties which had been the cause of internal divisions 148 and which was composed of both laymen and ecclesiastics, served similar purposes. His constant participation in events of nationalist essence or overtones, served as a continual reminder to the population of the Church’s allegiances and commitment to enosis. To be sure, such activity was not disconnected from the emergence of the Communist Party in Cyprus, the articulated rhetoric of which revolved around the rights and grievances of the labouring and rural population. In expressing demands immediately relevant to popular plight, 149 this party could evolve into a potential contestant to the authority the clerical and lay establishment exercised over the masses. By 1930, therefore, members of the establishment expressed the opinion that through economic amelioration the nationalist movement could attract peasants to its objectives.150 In addition to these activities, Kyrillos frequently addressed the Greek Cypriot community through encyclicals aiming to convey his positions to his flock. 151 Such communication with the people, a common practice among Cypriot archbishops, was particularly revealing in terms of style. While its content was indeed compatible with the ideas and policies that Kyrillos had championed through his activities, its style focused, on occasion, on the equation of national vocabulary with the religious one. In utilising phrases such as the ‘national gospels’, ‘the Angel of salvation has not yet brought as far as here the great message’, ‘let us take a formidable oath’, 152 Kyrillos sanctified enosis, transforming it into a holy cause upon the materialisation of which Greek Cypriots would be salvaged. 153 In all this, Kyrillos’ political pursuits constituted the implementation of what he understood to be his duties as the ethnarch; ‘our Church’, he proclaimed, ‘throughout the long



AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XL, Confidential note to the Archbishop of Cyprus from an unknown sender, 22 August 1930. 149 See CO 67/213, D. A. Chrysostomides, Secretary of the Communist Party of Cyprus to the British Labour Party, 26 February 1924, enclosure 1 in W. Gillies, Secretary of the Joint International Department of the Trades Union Congress and the Labour Party to J. H. Thomas, Colonial Secretary, 12 March 1924. 150 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XL, I. Pigasios, Member of the National Organisation to Kyrillos III, and other Members, 10 March 1930. 151 See ibid., File XXXV, Kyrillos III Encyclical to Orthodox Christians, 6 March 1921; ibid., Kyrillos III Encyclical to the priests and the Orthodox Christians, 18 May 1921; ibid., Proclamation of the Holy Synod, the Members of the Legislative Council and the Mayor of Nicosia to the Greek people, 6 March 1928; ibid., Prayer during the service of 25 March 1931. 152 Ibid., Kyrillos III Encyclical to Orthodox Christians, 6 March 1921. 153 See footnote 112. 148

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national course, never having been detached from its people but always having coordinated her actions towards their most beneficial outcome, would not act today in a manner alien to and different from its traditions’.154 It is in this light that Kyrillos’ reaction to the demonstrations of October 1931 should be interpreted. In its immediate aftermath, the archbishop remained steadfast to the principles of promoting enosis and criticising the British administration. He did express his deepest grief about the events, including the arson of the Governor’s house; he nevertheless brought to the attention of the British authorities that such actions should be contextualised as springing from the desperation of the people whose rights had not been satisfied, transposing the responsibility of the occurrences to the ‘administrative system prevailing in Cyprus’. 155 He concurrently sought to remind the Greek Cypriots, in a manner bordering realism and prudence, that the national activities of their community had remained loyal to the principle of national rights through efficient measures that do not exceed limits. He then submitted his paternal advice, which was in line with the suggestions of Venizelos, ‘a person whose opinion always outweighs all others’; he encouraged the Greek Cypriots to keep away from actions that may prove dangerous or may contravene British regulations in the process of expressing their national desires.156 His attempt to maintain a balance, in a period during which the British government imposed harsh and restrictive measures, 157 raised a tide of hostility against him.158 It was construed by more extreme elements as tantamount to apathy and indifference towards the critical watershed that the national struggle underwent, and violation of his duties as the head of the Church and the ethnarch; an anomalous situation which, it was asserted, could be resolved by his withdrawal from the archiepiscopal throne.159 His immediate reaction to the Oktovriana events and their repercussions, was representative of his ethnarchic behaviour thus far; he endeavoured to protect what he described as the ecclesiastical hierarchy’s traditional right of involvement in the political affairs of the island stemming from the Byzantine



AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XXXV, Kyrillos III Encyclical to Orthodox Christians, 11 September 1925. 155 Ibid., File XXXIV, Kyrillos III to Storrs, 19 November 1931. 156 Ibid., File XXXV, Kyrillos III Encyclical to the people on the latest events, 2 November 1931. 157 On these measures see Vias Livadas, ‘Ɣơ ƆươƪƯƫƯƵƨƞƳơƭƴơ ƴƧƭ ƆƮƝƣƥƱƳƧ’, in V. Livadas, Y. Spanos and P. Papapolyviou (eds.), ƈ ƆƮƝƣƥƱƳƧ ƴƯƵ ƐƪƴƾƢƱƧ 1931 (Ɣơ ƐƪƴƹƢƱƩơƭƜ), Nicosia, 2004, 199-202; ƔơƱơƷơƟ ƥƭ ƋƽưƱƹ ƪơƴ’ ƐƪƴƾƢƱƩƯƭ, 1931, Nicosia, 1932, 33-5, in AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XL. 158 Ibid., Many residents of Nicosia to Kyrillos III, 24 November 1931. 159 Ibid., Rossides to Kyrillos III, 3 November 1931. 154

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period, which was threatened by British modernism,160 and through this, his community. To this effect, he prayed for the repatriation of the exiled ecclesiastics, the deportation of whom obstructed the smooth functioning of the autocephalous Church.161 Undoubtedly, Kyrillos derived his status as the ethnarch from his position as the archbishop of the Church of Cyprus. As he professed, the sine qua non relation between the archiepiscopal and ethnarchic duties of the head of the Cypriot ecclesiastical hierarchy constituted ‘an obligation and a mandate given by the people during the election of the bishops. According to it the people elects its bishops under the dual capacity of the ecclesiastical and national leader and accepts through them the execution of duties relating to the ecclesiastical and political matters of the land’. 162 His attributes as an ecclesiastical leader can therefore enlighten his personality as an ethnarch. The declining popular respect towards the clergy of every rank was a reality which Kyrillos attempted to curtail as soon as he was elected archbishop. In 1917 the newspaper Enosis excoriated the town clergy for including limited evangelical preaching in services, and the village clergy for performing services unaware of what they deliver in the churches and for being more concentrated instead on agricultural and trading activities and on lending money on interest.163 The bishoprics were accused of accumulation of excessive wealth and were criticised for requiring taxation,164 while monks were charged with scandalous involvement in ‘temporal and political affairs or surrender to horrid licentiousness resultant of sloth’.165 By 1920, a Paphiote abridged popular disillusionment with the clergy, the ‘exploiters of the people who dance on the back of the populace of Paphos’.166 As a remedy to this situation, Kyrillos attempted to further the educational level of priests167 by supporting the seminary which Meletios Metaxakis, Bishop of Kitium from



By 1932, the British administration clearly attempted to curb and even abolish ecclesiastical involvement in political affairs, in ibid., File XXXIV, Storrs to Kyrillos III, 9 April 1932. 161 Ibid., Kyrillos III to Storrs, 27 March 1932; ibid., Interview of Kyrillos III, Ph. Cunliffe-Lister, Colonial Secretary and R. E. Stubbs, Governor, 21 March 1933. 162 Ibid., Kyrillos III to Storrs, 27 March 1931. 163 ŻƭƹƳƩƲ, ‘Ɛ ƊƥƱƼƲ ƋƫƞƱƯƲ’, 12/25 October 1917. 164 ƎƝƯƭ ŻƨƭƯƲ, ‘ƓƵƭƯƤƩƪơƟ ƕưƥƱƢơƳƟơƩ’, 6/19 January 1918. 165 Ibid., ‘ƐƩ ƍƯƭơƷƯƟ ƥƭ ƋƽưƱƹ’, 17/30 August 1918. 166 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XVII, Letter of a Paphiote nicknamed ‘Culture’, entitled ‘Scenes from the Paphian Vatican’, 28 November 1920. 167 See Englezakis, ƍƥƫƝƴơƩ, 608. 160

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1910-8, had established168 as well as by encouraging the foundation of the Clergy Association 169 through which, in 1918, a one-year course was established and delivered to candidates who, upon successful completion of the exam, would be ordained priests. 170 Kyrillos simultaneously called for teachers to enter the ranks of the clergy171 and oversaw in 1918 the initiation of the circulation of the official mouthpiece of the Cypriot Church, Apostolos Varnavas, one of the avowed purposes of which was to educate, through its religious content, the uneducated Cypriot clergy.172 He also sought to bring the flock in closer communion with the Church through pastoral tours, in the context of which each Orthodox could reveal to the prelates ‘the hardships repressing his soul, awaiting paternal understanding, consolation…courage and support’.173 This was an activity he did not fall short of performing,174 even during the turmoil of October 1931.175 The phenomenon of the removal of the lifestyle and behaviour of the Greek Cypriots from Christian ways was another problem Kyrillos endeavoured to address. He recognised, early on, the inadequately devout and hasty manner in which men attended ecclesiastical rituals,176 leaving the church before the end of services to make their way to cafes and markets, demonstrating a preference to material indulgence over spiritual wellbeing. 177 Women, particularly of upper social strata, demonstrated a similar indifference to religion, attributable to the poisonous effect of the west on ancestral customs; the religious sentiment of the lower classes, intermingled as it was with superstition, tended to evaporate as well.178 In attempting to uphold morality and Christian ethics, Kyrillos circulated encyclicals offering his advice; he, indicatively, recommended pious, modest

 168 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XVII, Proclamation of Kyrillos III to the abbots of the monasteries, the priests of the churches, and the Orthodox Christians, 25 March 1917. 169 Ibid., Confirmation of Kyrillos III for the establishment of the Clergy Association, 1 December 1916. 170 Ƃƃ, ‘ƂưƯƪơƴƜƳƴơƳƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƂƫƧƨƥƟơƲ ƪơƩ ƅƩƪơƩƯƳƽƭƧƲ’, 7 (1918-9), 126. 171 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XVII, Kyrillos III Encyclical to the teachers of Cyprus, 22 December 1919. 172 Ƃƃ, ‘ƆƣƪƽƪƫƩƯƲ’, 1 (1918-9), 2. 173 Ibid., ‘ƂƩ ƑƯƩƬơƭƴƩƪơƟ ƑƥƱƩƯƤƥƟơƩ’, 74 (1921-2), 54-5. 174 Englezakis, ƍƥƫƝƴơƩ, 609. 175 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XXXV, Kyrillos III to Nicodemos, Bishop of Kitium, 15 October 1931. 176 Ibid., File XVII, Proclamation of Kyrillos III to Christian people, 13 December 1916; ibid., Kyrillos III Encyclical to Christian people, 2 April 1927. 177 Ƃƃ, ‘ƗƥƩƱƟƳƴƧ Ƨ ƓƵƭƞƨƥƩơ ƴƧƲ ƂưƯƷƹƱƞƳƥƹƲ ƥƪ ƴƯƵ ƎơƯƽ ưƱƯ ƴƯƵ ƔƝƫƯƵƲ ƴƧƲ ƉƥƟơƲ ƌƥƩƴƯƵƱƣƥƟơƲ’, (1930), 396-7, in AAK, ƂƋƄ, 1916-1933, File XVII. 178 AB, ‘ƈ ƉƱƧƳƪƥƵƴƩƪƞ ƬơƲ ƋơƴƜƳƴơƳƩƲ’, 3 (1918-9), 58-60.

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and demure dressing style for women, as opposed to the widely-spread fashionable and revealing one.179 He simultaneously sought to advance the educational standard of his flock by focusing on scholarship.180 During his time in office, a philological contest which encouraged entries on the history of the island and other works of patriotic content,181 as well as a scholarship contest for studies in Greek higher institutions,182 were established, and the publication of books, including Hackett’s history of the Church of Cyprus,183 was advanced. Kyrillos III tried to make the ecclesiastical institution more compatible with contemporary needs and more prepared to encounter contemporary challenges. According to Englezakis, he attempted to carry through drastic changes in the organisation of the Church, but was faced with opposition.184 He encouraged the participation of the Church of Cyprus in international religious meetings and conferences. In 1919, for instance, he accepted an invitation of the American Episcopal Church for the Cypriot Church to partake in a pan-Christian conference,185 while in 1924 the Church of Cyprus was represented in a religious-social-political conference in Birmingham.186 He also tried to fortify the Church against communism, which emerged in an organised form in Cyprus in the 1920s. Apostolos Varnavas published articles on its adverse results,187 while the Church used the threat of excommunication in its attempt to limit the current.188 Most importantly, Kyrillos posed as the defender of the ecclesiastical traditional privileges and rights, which the British administration attempted to limit or alter. In 1923 he complained against the Education Bill that threatened the ‘ancient privileges of Church

 179 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XVII, Kyrillos III Encyclical to the Christian people, December 1924. 180 See Englezakis, ƍƥƫƝƴơƩ, 609-10. 181 Ƃƃ, ‘ƑƱƯƪƞƱƵƮƩƲ ƖƩƫƯƫƯƣƩƪƯƽ ƅƩơƣƹƭƟƳƬơƴƯƲ’, 8 (1918-9), 145. Upon his death, Kyrillos III left one third of his property for the continuation of this contest, in ƆƫƥƵƨƥƱƟơ, ‘ƋƵưƱƩơƪƜ ƎƝơ – ƈ ƵưƼ ƴƯƵ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƋơƴơƫƥƩƶƨƥƟƳơ ƑƥƱƩƯƵƳƟơ’, 22 November 1933. 182 AB, ‘ƋơƭƯƭƩƳƬƼƲ ƴƯƵ ƅƩơƣƹƭƩƳƬƯƽ ƴƧƲ 24 ƊƯƵƭƟƯƵ 1919 ƤƩơ ƔƱƥƟƲ ƕưƯƴƱƼƶƯƵƲ ƥƩƲ ƅƩơƶƼƱƯƵƲ ƥƭ ƆƫƫƜƤƩ ƂƭƹƴƝƱơƲ ƓƷƯƫƜƲ’, XXII, 1918-9, 368-9. 183 Ibid., ‘ƗƱƯƭƩƪƜ’, 56, 1920-1, 160. 184 Englezakis, ƍƥƫƝƴơƩ, 608. 185 Ƃƃ, ‘ƆưƩƴƱƯưƞ ƴƧƲ ƆưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƞƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƴƧƲ ƂƬƥƱƩƪƞƲ ươƱƜ ƴƹ ƍ. ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƹ ƋƽưƱƯƵ’, XVIII, 1918-9, 303. 186 ƋƞƱƵƮ, ‘ƈ ƊƥƱƜ ƓƽƭƯƤƯƲ’, 7 March 1924. 187 For example, AB, ‘ƆưƩƳƴƯƫƞ ƴƧƲ Ɗ. ƓƵƭƼƤƯƵ ƴƧƲ ƐƱƨƯƤƼƮƯƵ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƴƧƲ ƎƯƴƩƯơƭơƴƯƫƩƪƞƲ ƒƹƳƟơƲ’, XXX, 1919-20, 117-9. 188 AAK, ƂƋƄ, File XVII, Secretary of the Holy Synod to the Director of Education, Nicosia, 1 May 1931.

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authorities and communities respected even under Turkish rule’, granting the government rights to interfere with the education of the Greek Cypriot community.189 He ultimately emphasised to the British that ‘the Orthodox Church, Your Honour, has always been national and, above all, in captive Greek parts it has been the official Ethnarchic authority of the people under alien rule’.190

Conclusion Kyrillos III was indisputably an important figure in the history of ethnarchy in Cyprus. His understanding of the role of the archbishop-ethnarch vacillated between the approaches and perceptions of Sophronios and Kyrillos II, progressively moving closer to those of his immediate predecessor. This was a result of the influences he had been exposed to in his formative years, and the form they took when they unfolded under specific historical circumstances. He viewed his archiepiscopal role as encompassing the dual duty of leading his community religiously and politically. On the religious level, he demonstrated remarkable commitment to the principles of Orthodoxy and determination to perpetuate the autocephaly of the Church of Cyprus. He attempted to ameliorate the relations of the ecclesiastical institution with its flock and to contribute to the intellectual and ethical advancement of laymen and clergymen alike. This, of course, did not diminish his devotion to leading his community politically. His ability to adjust to prevalent circumstances meant that he could rearrange his priorities according to the exigencies of time: his underlying support for enosis of earlier years transformed into a strong dedication to enosis during his archiepiscopal years; and his conciliatory approach to the British during the 1910s turned into an anti-British stance in the 1920s. He demonstrated prudence, moderation and adaptability in his political activities; he appreciated the inevitable ascent of the middle class into the political life of the Greek Cypriot community and the importance of international relations vis-à-vis the enosis struggle, he pursued constitutional liberties en route to enosis in the post1922 period, and paid attention to the national centre. Above all, he zealously strove to preserve the ethnarchic role of the Church. Undoubtedly, Kyrillos III has not been surrounded by the glory of a national martyr, the aura of the last of the ‘old’ archbishops or the radiation of the ‘first’ of the ‘new’. His archiepiscopacy, nevertheless, contributed substantially to the subsequent



Ibid., File XXXIV, telegram, Kyrillos III to Cyprus Colonial Secretary, 22/4 June 1923. 190 Ibid., Holy Synod to D. Shiels, Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies, 2 December 1930. 189

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progress of the enosist struggle and the ethnarchic tradition. Indeed, he should be understood as an archbishop who asserted the right of the Church of Cyprus to remain at the forefront of and command authority over the affairs of the Greek Cypriot community in the future.

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Figure 15: Portrait of Archbishop Kyrillos III at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus.

CHAPTER NINE LEONDIOS AND THE ARCHIEPISCOPAL QUESTION, 1933-47: THE DEMISE OF AN APOLITICAL ETHNARCHY? ALEXIS RAPPAS

Officially serving the shortest term as Archbishop in the history of the Cypriot Orthodox Church, from 6 June to his death on 26 July 1947, Leondios Savva nevertheless was a towering figure having led the Church of Cyprus through fourteen of its most difficult years in the twentieth century.1 Following an island-wide Greek Cypriot uprising and the burning down of the governor’s residence in October 1931, Cyprus, a British possession since 1878, was subjected to a very atypical – by British standards – authoritarian rule, severely restricting freedom of speech, movement and assembly, and other civil liberties. The avowed objective of such a regime was to clamp down on irredentist politics on the island, primarily the Greek Cypriot elite’s dream of enosis, or Union with Greece, which the British blamed for the 1931 ‘disturbances’. A little later, in 1933, the Archbishop Kyrillos III died. In circumstances this chapter will clarify, Leondios Savva, the 37 year-old bishop of Paphos, assumed the leadership of the Greek Orthodox Church of Cyprus for the next fourteen years of its history as ‘acting archbishop’ or Locum Tenens. Leondios Savva, whose resolve often verged on stubbornness, was far from being a consensual figure, within or without the Church. And yet he was propelled at the head of an unambiguously nationalist anti-colonial resistance at a time when the British had clamped down very hard on it. Under these trying circumstances, Leondios further refashioned the secular role and influence of the Church into an even more staunchly Greek nationalist institution. He worked hard to reclaim the archbishop’s moral title to ethnarch. Although Greek irredentists understood the term ‘nation’ as 1

Aristeidis L. Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƌƥƮƩƪƼƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ, 2005, 220.

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referring to the Greek (secularised) nation, under Ottoman governance, it designated the Christian ‘nation’ over which the Orthodox archbishop was granted administrative as well as spiritual powers.2 The sense of the term Ethnarch that emerges from Leondios’ various speeches is an interesting blend harnessing the nationalist commitment to eternal Hellas, however without its exclusive undertones. Savvas’ brand of nationalism often clashed with that of shrewd conservative politicians who expected him to take a stronger stand against the rising left wing. And yet, although he was profoundly committed to enosis, Leondios, born in a poor Limassol family in 18963 and having attended his hometown’s first socialist meetings in 1919,4 remained very sympathetic to the left wing and even to the fate of the island’s other religious communities. Indeed Leondios’ political beliefs resist classification in the traditional left/right divide. He would perhaps best be characterized as an integral Hellenist. ‘Hellenist’ instead of Greek nationalist because his commitment to Hellas was largely essential and quite detached from practical political concerns, a fact resented by many Greek Cypriot notables. ‘Integral’, because it is hardly doubtful that he took very seriously the holistic ecclesiastical and almost messianic language in which he couched his political interventions. Leondios’ headstrong commitment to holistic Ethnarchy and inaptitude to compromise even with his allies bears all the signs of faith, which in his case is hard to disentangle from political beliefs. His obduracy eventually cost him his political independence as the titles he reclaimed and the institution The literature on the millet is extensive. A classic analysis is that of Benjamin Braude and Bernard Lewis, ‘Introduction’, in B. Braude and B. Lewis (eds), Christians and Jews in the Ottoman Empire: The Functioning of a Plural Society, I, The Central Lands, New York, Holmes and Meier Publishers, 1982, 1-36. A more recent discussion can be found in Victor Roudometof, ‘From Rum Millet to Greek Nation: Enlightenment, Secularization, and National Identity in Ottoman Balkan Society, 1453-1821’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, XVI, 1, 1998, 11-48. For Cyprus see Paschalis Kitromilides, ‘Imagined Communities and the Origins of the National Question in the Balkans’, European History Quarterly, XIX, 2, 1989, 149-192; Sia Anagnostopoulou, ‘Le processus de formation de la memoire nationale grecque chez les Chypriotes grecs (fin XIXedebut XXe s.)’ in Y. Ioannou et F. Metral (eds), Chypre et la Méditerranée orientale: formation identitaire, perspectives historiques et enjeux contemporains, Paris, Boccard, 2000, 175184; Victor Roudometof and Michalis N. Michael, ‘Redéfinition des frontières EgliseEtat à Chypre après 1878. Perspective historique sur l’Eglise orthodoxe chypriote’, Social Compass, LVI, 1, 2009, 35-48; Andrekos Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915: The Inconsequential Possession, Manchester University Press, Manchester, 2009, 152-7. 3 Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ, 219. 4 Ploutis Servas, ƋƯƩƭƞ ƑơƴƱƟƤơ, Nicosia, Proodos, 1997, 73. 2

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created at his initiative in December 1944, the Bureau of Ethnarchy, were hijacked by conservative politicians. This chapter pieces together the political trajectory of Leondios Savva from the time he took the helm of the Church as Locum Tenens, in 1933, to his death in 1947. It focuses specifically on the ‘Archiepiscopal Question’, namely the tug-of-war between the Orthodox clergy and colonial authorities regarding the filling of the Archiepiscopal Throne’s vacancy following the incumbent’s demise in 1933. It argues that during that time the Church, which had been durably weakened following the 1931 uprising, re-established itself as the main hub of nationalist politics in Cyprus, as Greek notables availed themselves of, and in the process denatured, Leondios’ confrontational attitude towards colonial authorities. This process however, imposed on Leondios and on subsequent archbishops important restrictions on their political agency. After briefly presenting the political conditions prevailing in 1930s Cyprus and their impact on ecclesiastical affairs, an account will be given of the Archiepiscopal Question and its implications for Leondios and more generally for the social and political position of the Church of Cyprus. It will be shown that in the late 1930s Leondios was ‘fabricated’ as a national leader of a much different sort than what he himself intended the Archbishop to be. The chapter will conclude by highlighting the relative marginalization of Leondios’ agency in the context of an increasingly intense rivalry between the conservative right and the progressive left among Greek Cypriots during and soon after World War II. In October 1931, fifty-three years into the island’s history as a British colony, a wave of revolts submerged the island, culminating in Nicosia, where the governor’s residence was burned down. Because many nationalist leaders tried to harness the uprising for their own ends, and on account of the fact that none of the island’s other communities – particularly the Turkish Cypriot – partook in it, colonial authorities and, later, historians, were quick to interpret the revolt as a manifestation of a deep-seated Greek Cypriot popular attachment to enosis. In fact research has shown that particularly difficult economic and financial conditions and profound political divisions played a much more important role in triggering the events.5 The

George S. Georghallides, ‘Ɛ ƗơƱơƪƴƞƱơƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ưƯƫƩƴƩƪƞ, ƯƩ ƤƩƷƼƭƯƩƥƲ ƴƹƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƪƱƟƳƧ ƴƯƵ 1931,’ in ƅƩơƫƝƮƥƩƲ ƴƯƵ ƌơƺƪƯƽ ƑơƭƥưƩƳƴƧƬƟƯƵ ơƱ. 5, Nicosia, Publications of the Nicosia Municipality, 1997; Alexandros Apostolides, ‘ Economic Growth or Continuing Stagnation? Estimating the GDP of Cyprus and Malta, 19211938’, unpublished PhD dissertation, London School of Economics and Political Science, 2010, 201-7.

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revolt was both a ‘humiliating blow’ and a ‘godsend’ for colonial authorities.6 For a while successive governors had expressed their frustration at the existing constitution providing for the election of representatives by two religiously separated electoral colleges, Christian and Muslim, at every level, from the village authorities to the central Legislative Council. Facing an increasingly vocal demand for enosis in the Legislative Council, which was relayed in the virtually free Greek Cypriot press, governors complained about being put into the humiliating situation of having to anxiously rely on the vote of Muslim representatives to block Christian initiatives.7 .

The 1931 uprising offered colonial authorities the opportunity to do away with all the institutions which they considered as impediments to the discharge of their duties. A series of measures, referred to by Cypriots as the ‘illiberal laws’ were enacted in its wake, the most important of which being the abolition of the Legislative Council and of elections in general, the prohibition of any public advocacy of enosis, the establishment of censorship of the press, and the imposition of restrictions on the right of assembly of more than five persons. In addition, ten Greek Cypriot notables were deported for life, including two of the island’s four bishops, Makarios of Kyrenia and Nicodemos of Kitium – the latter having also served as a member of the Legislative Council – who were considered to be morally and politically responsible for the events. But repression was not an end in itself. It merely freed the hands of the government which deployed an ambitious plan, laid out in a 1933 memorandum by Governor Sir Reginald Stubbs, aiming at thoroughly reforming the local society.8 A central passage in Stubbs’ policy paper concerned the fate reserved to the Cypriot political leadership: ‘At the same time as we endeavour to breed up good leaders for the people we must take steps to crush the bad ones. Of these, there are two species – the Communists and the Church.’ The former, according to Stubbs, had been suppressed with the new penal laws; as to the latter, it is worthwhile reproducing much of Stubbs’ thoughts:

Robert Holland, Britain and the Revolt in Cyprus, 1954-1959, Oxford, The Clarendon Press, 1998, 4-5; Diana Markides and George S. Georghallides, ‘British Attitudes to Constitution-Making in Post-1931 Cyprus,’ Journal of Modern Greek Studies, XIII, 1, 1995, 63-81, here 68. 7 Ronald Storrs, Orientations, London, Ivor Nicholson and Watson, 1937, 553. 8 For an in-depth analysis of the colonial administration’s designs and policies in the 1930s, Alexis Rappas, ‘The Elusive Polity: Imagining and Contesting Colonial Authority in Cyprus during the 1930s,’ Journal of Modern Greek Studies, XXVIII, 2, 2008, 363-97. 6

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It is an astonishing thing that in this country, where the Churches stand empty all the year except at Easter and Christmas and an occasional Saint’s holiday, the Church still has such power. It is notorious that it is corrupt through and through. The village priests are mere ignorant peasants, not even understanding the language of their liturgy (...). The revenues of the monasteries and the sees are squandered in the support of concubines and bastards of the monks and bishops, or occasionally diverted to the use of their illegitimate relatives. The Church is notoriously the worst of landlords. And yet its influence persists. I think that here again the reason is historical. In Turkish times the Archbishop was the only spokesman of the Greek people with the authorities so of course anybody who did not do what the Church told him had no chance of getting his case considered favourably by the authorities, and the influence thus acquired has persisted. (...) In my opinion, if the influence of the Church were removed, Philhellenism [sic] would die out very quickly. (...) As regards the Church, [nationalism] is a case not of loving Greece but of hating England, because English rule means the gradual termination of the power of the Church. (...) If [the Archbishop] continued to give trouble, I should be inclined to take stern measures to draw his teeth. I should advise appointing a Commission to enquire into the financial position of the Church and its administration of its estates. (...) Then as a result of the Commission two courses of action would probably be found desirable: a) To place the temporalities of the Church under independent Commissioners, as in the case of the Turkish religious trusts (Evcaf): b) To acquire and distribute to the peasantry considerable part of the Church lands.’9

Hence the measures contemplated by colonial authorities to break the Church’s social influence were extremely far-reaching. The opportunity to enact them was provided by the demise of the archbishop and the ensuing debates regarding elections to replace him. The Cyprus Government’s Church policy would be the long-lasting legacy of Sir Herbert Richmond Palmer, governor of the island between 1933 and 1939. Contrary to his representation in official correspondence, Leondios was a learned man. After studying theology in Athens (1919-23), he became a teacher at the Pancyprian seminary of Larnaca (1923-6). In 1928 he proceeded to New York’s General Theological Seminar on a scholarship and earned a Bachelor of Theology and then a Master of Sacred Theology at Columbia University.10 It was during his stay in the United States that he was

9 CO 67/254/4 Cyprus Political Situation, 1934. Memorandum by Sir R.E. Stubbs, 16 October 1933. 10 Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ, 219.

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appointed bishop of Paphos in 1930. It is only after Kyrillos III’s death that he began to play a prominent part in Cypriot politics. When Kyrillos III died of pleurisy on 16 November 1933 at the age of 74,11 Leondios assumed the role of Locum Tenens (acting Archbishop) of the Archiepiscopal Throne on account of his bishopric’s seniority among Cyprus’ three dioceses. Under the terms of his mandate, he was charged with convening a Holy Synod with his counterparts Makarios of Kyrenia and Nicodemos of Kitium in the shortest possible time to proceed with the election of a successor to Kyrillos III.12 A tug-of-war ensued with the colonial authorities who refused to allow the return of the two other bishops who had been deported for their role during the 1931 uprising and more generally for their advocacy of enosis. In a rather univocal understanding of the situation at hand, Governor Stubbs thus stated that the high clergy ‘and their supporters within and without the Church desire[d] their return…in order that they may continue their political activities and pursue (with renewed authority, were one of them to be elected Archbishop) their work of sedition’.13 In reaction, the three bishops later agreed to postpone the elections indefinitely until these ‘uncanonical restrictions’ were lifted, a position officialised in the March 1935 ‘Pact of Jerusalem’.14 Perhaps unexpectedly for both the clergy and the colonial authorities, the lingering vacancy of the archbishop’s throne generated an intense debate in the Greek Cypriot press: in fact the ‘Archiepiscopal Question’ (ƔƯ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƼƭ ƇƞƴƧƬơ) as it was referred to, became the dominating topic as much as it offered a coded language, in a context of censorship, to discuss all of the Greek Cypriot community’s political concerns.

Phoni tis Kyprou, ‘Ɛ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƋƽƱƩƫƫƯƲ Ư Ƅ’,’18 November 1933. Barnabas Tzortzatos, Metropolitan of Citrum, ƐƩ ƃơƳƩƪƯƟ ƉƥƳƬƯƟ ƅƩƯƩƪƞƳƥƹƲ ƴƧƲ ƂƵƴƯƪƝƶơƫƯƵ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ. ƍƥƴƜ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƞƲ ƂƭơƳƪƯưƞƳƥƹƲ, Athens, Apostolic Editions of the Diaconate of the Church of Greece, 1974, 35. 13 CO 67/252/13 Cyprus. Archbishopric of Cyprus 1933. Governor’s telegram and secret dispatch transmitting postal censor’s secret report to the colonial secretary, 20 and 24 November 1933; Phoni tis Kyprou, ‘ŻƪƪƫƧƳƧ ưƱƯƲ ƴƧƭ Ƃ.Ɔ. ƴƯƭ ƋƵƢƥƱƭƞƴƧƭ ƵưƥƱ ƴƧƲ ƥươƭƼƤƯƵ ƴƹƭ ơưƥƫơƨƝƭƴƹƭ,’ 28 November, 1933. 14 Phoni tis Kyprou, ‘ƈ ơưƜƭƴƧƳƩƲ ƴƯƵ ƓƥƢ. ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƯƽ,’ 2 December 1933; Ibid., ‘ƊƥƱƜ ƓƽƭƯƤƯƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ. ƂƭơƪƯƩƭƾƨƥƭ,’ 9 March 1935; Chronos, ‘ƔƯ ơƭơƪƯƩƭƹƨƝƭ ƴƧƲ ƊƥƱ. ƓƵƭƼƤƯƵ,’ 14 March 1935. This position was officially proclaimed in a ‘Synodal statement,’ later called ‘the Pact of Jerusalem,’ see the Church’s own journal, ƂưƼƳƴƯƫƯƲ ƃơƱƭƜƢơƲ, March 1935, III, 71-2. 11 12

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The island’s two main conservative newspapers, the Nicosia-based Phoni tis Kyprou (Voice of Cyprus) and Neos Kypriakos Phylax (The New Cyprus Guardian), whose editors were close to Leondios, were unequivocally supportive of the bishops’ stand. By contrast, smaller but active newspapers, including Paphos (from the eponymous district) and the Limassol-based Chronos (Time), began to denounce in no ambiguous terms the bishops’ obduracy: The solution of the issue should not depend, one could read in the latter, on the ‘personal whims of the two deported bishops’ who insisted on their position ‘out of stubbornness, caprice or individual interest’15; consideration should be given to the ‘Church’, understood not merely as the clergy, but in its broader sense of the ‘totality of the believers, the clergy and laity whom constituted its body’.16 This statement merits some comment: the definition of the ‘Church’ used here is rooted in the Orthodox theology according to which the Church was ‘the Body of Christ’, irreducible to the ‘institution’ or its clergy, and comprising all of ‘the sinners’ who, ‘coming together, form the infallible Church’.17 This shows that far from being a mere ‘political engine’, according to Governor Storrs’ unsophisticated definition, the Orthodox Church structured the community in a more polyvalent sense, very clearly defined by the national-agriculturalist Paphos. Paphos deplored the protracted vacancy which prolonged the corruption and squandering of the Church’s budget as ‘thousands of pounds were given by the members of the Church committees to their friends, family, or koumbarous (groomsmen)’,18 instead of being used for the main purposes of the Church, such as provision of land to the landless, philanthropy, and support of education.19 An Archbishop of ‘tried competence and value’ would remedy this deplorable situation.20 The debates in the press pushed a wedge between two increasingly conflicting parties in the Church: The intransigents, rallied around Leondios and Bishop Makarios of Kyrenia, exiled in Athens; and the moderates, rallied around Bishop Nicodemos of Kitium, exiled in Jerusalem, who favoured exploring alternative routes to speed up the election of an Archbishop. This latter trend had the unequivocal support of the Nicosia-based Eleftheria Chronos, ‘ƆƱƹƴƾƬƥƭ ƴƩ ƤƝƯƭ ƣƝƭƥƳƨơƩ;’ 7 January 1935. Chronos, ‘Ɛ ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƞƲ ưƥƱƟ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƪơƩ ƫơƯƽ,’ 11 February 1935; Chronos was a Limassol-based newspaper edited by Demetris Demetriades, 17 See John Meyendorff, The Orthodox Church. Its Past and Its Role in the World Today, New York, St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1996, 200. 18 Paphos, ‘ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴƩƪƞ ƆƮƝƫƥƣƮƩƲ,’ 9 March 1934. 19 Paphos, ‘ƑƯƵ ƵƳƴƥƱƥƟ ƥƩƲ ƤƱƜƳƩƭ Ƨ ƋƵư. ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ. ƈ ơƭƜƣƪƧ ƴƧƲ ƥƭƯưƯƩƞƳƥƹƲ ƴƹƭ ƤƵƭƜƬƥƹƭ,’ 7 December 1934. 20 Paphos, ‘ƈ ƳưƯƵƤơƩƼƴƧƲ ƴƯƵ ơƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƯƽ. ƂƭƜƣƪƧ ưƫƧƱƾƳƥƹƲ ƴƯƵ ƷƧƱƥƽƯƭƴƯƲ ƨƱƼƭƯƵ,’ 22 July 1937. 15 16

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(Freedom), the most widely diffused daily among the Greek Cypriot community.21 Nikodemos was depicted as a ‘politic and patriotic man’, willing to ‘sacrifice’ his own candidacy to the Throne, and acquiesce to being represented in Cyprus by a bishop from a sister Orthodox Church for the holding of a Holy Synod in order to end the on-going vacancy likely to cause ‘damage of tragic dimensions’.22 Nikodemos went on to denounce the ‘policy’ of ‘the Locum Tenens and those who agree with him […]’,23 and accused him of intentionally delaying the Archiepiscopal elections.24 Finally he stated that he did not feel bound anymore by the Jerusalem Pact to indefinitely postpone the elections, as his fellow bishops were not doing, he thought, their utmost to search for alternative ways for a settlement.25 By contrast Leondios opted for a defiant and confrontational attitude. On the occasion of the King of England’s birthday in June 1936, the Locum Tenens forbade any commemorative ceremonies in the Sovereign’s honour, pointing to his being ‘heretical and unorthodox’,26 and threatening the priests that ‘if they disobey and decide to hold a Te Deum [he] shall immediately dismiss them’.27 Bishop Makarios of Kyrenia offered his unconditional support to the Locum Tenens from his exile home in Athens.28 Behind this inter-episcopal clash lay two conflicting conceptions on how to deal with what may be termed the ‘colonial constraint’. The colonial administration, never mentioned as such in newspapers because of Eleftheria, ‘ƕưƼƬƭƧƬơ ƴƯƵ ƍƧƴƱƯưƯƫ. ƋƩƴƟƯƵ ƤƩơ ƴƧƭ ƫƽƳƩƭ ƴƯƵ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪ. ƇƧƴƞƬơƴƯƲ,’ 11 June 1936. 22 Eleftheria, ‘ƔƯ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƼƭ ƇƞƴƧƬơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƩ ơƩ ơƵƨƥƭƴƩƪơƟ ƣƭƾƬơƩ ƴƯƵ ƍƧƴƱƯưƯƫ. ƋƩƴƟƯƵ. ƈ ươƱƜƴơƳƩƲ ƤƧƬƩƯƵƱƣƥƟ ƴƱơƣƩƪƜƲ ƦƧƬƩƜƲ. Ɛ ƴƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƞƲ ƯƶƥƟƫƥƩ ƭ’ơƭơƫƜƢƧ ưƱƹƴƯƢƯƵƫƟơƭ,’ 20 September 1936. 23 CO 67/267/9 ocit. Letter of the Bishop of Kitium, Nicodemos, 16 June, 1936, to the Archimandrite Makarios of Larnaca, enclosure to acting governor’s secret dispatch, 18 July 1936. 24 CO 67/274/5 Cyprus. Political Situation, Quarterly Reports 1937. Report on the political situation in respect of the period ending 30 April 1937, §5, enclosure to governor’s secret dispatch, 7 May 1937. 25 Paphos, ‘ƔƯ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƼƭ ƥƩƳƝƱƷƥƴơƩ ƥƩƲ ƭƝơƭ ƶƜƳƩƭ,’ 18 February 1937. 26 CO 67/267/9 Cyprus. Archbishopric of Cyprus 1936. Extract from the February Number of the ecclesiastical journal Apostolos Varnavas entitled ‘To the Priests,’ enclosure in Governor’s dispatch, 13 March, 1936. 27 CO 67/267/9, ocit. Paphou Leondios, Locum Tenens of the Archiepiscopal Throne of Cyprus, letter to Deacon Meletios of Varosha, 12 June 1936, enclosure to acting governor’s secret dispatch, 18 July 1936. 28 Paphos, ‘ƔƯ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƼƭ ưƥƱƩưƫƝƪƥƴơƩ. ƅƩƟƳƴơƭƴơƩ ơƩ ơưƼƸƥƩƲ ƴƹƭ ƓƥƢ. ƍƧƴƱƯưƯƫƩƴƾƭ ƋƩƴƟƯƵ ƪơƩ ƋƵƱƞƭƥƩơƲ,’ 25 March 1937. 21

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censorship, was nonetheless conspicuous behind elliptical expressions such as ‘the circumstances’, ‘the existing conditions’, etc. For the ‘uncompromising’ around Leondios and Makarios of Kyrenia, settling the ‘Question’ in the ‘given circumstances’ meant acknowledging the consequences of the exile of two of the Church’s highest-ranking cadres, and thus indirectly admitting state intervention in ecclesiastical affairs. For the bishop of Kitium and his supporters, securing the election of an Archbishop through the means of representatives acting on behalf of the exiled bishops was crucial in preserving the Church’s unity and strength. By late 1936 however, Leondios abruptly changed his policy and accepted the idea of a quick settlement through the dispatch of representatives of the exiled bishops to form an electoral Holy Synod. The bishop’s change of views came about under the pressure exercised by influential men involved in the management of the Church as an institution whom it is necessary to identify in order to understand the progression of the Archiepiscopal Question. Male Orthodox Cypriots were involved in a very practical sense in the management of ecclesiastical affairs. Indeed, the financial ‘committees’ of the Church, whether parochial or diocesan, were composed of two thirds of bishop-appointed clerics, and one third of laymen indirectly elected by male Orthodox Cypriots.29 Their role was to manage Church property and revenues – hence the emoluments of clerics as well – within the jurisdiction of their committees. Most of the lay members of the Committees were representatives of the property-owners, as specific provisions of the 1914 Charter of the Church of Cyprus precluded the ‘propertyless’ and the indebted from being elected.30 Moreover, lay members of a specific committee were often linked to their counterparts on the other Church Committees, and the specific medium of this connection appears to have been the press.

29 In fact the Orthodox male laity elected three representatives who in turn elected the 4 lay members of the Committee of the Throne. See articles 95-98 of the Charter of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus adopted in May 1914. Tzortzatos, ƐƩ ƃơƳƩƪƯƟ ƉƥƳƬƯƟ, 52-3. 30 SA1/1037/1934 Throne Committees. Election of-, circular of the Archimandrite of Kyrenia –on behalf of the Bishop of Kyrenia, 12 October 1934, enclosure to the district commissioner of Nicosia’s dispatch to the Colonial Secretary, 17 October 1934. For instance, out of the nine lay members elected in December 1935 to the parochial committees of Faneromeni and Trypiotou (Nicosia district), four were merchants, four medical doctors and one lawyer, see Neos Kypriakos Phylax, 8 December 1935, ocit. and ibid., 10 December 1935, ocit.

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Thus, lawyer John (Ioannis) Clerides was the president of the Archbishopric Throne Committee in Nicosia and contributed many articles to Eleftheria which sided with the Bishop of Kitium.31 As legal adviser to the Archbishopric,32 and therefore to the Bishop of Paphos, Leondios, in his capacity of Locum Tenens, Clerides was in contact with the owner and editor of Phoni tis Kyprou, Kyrillos Pavlides, who was also an adviser of Leondios.33 Moreover, the owner of Paphos, the lawyer Loizos Philippou, was himself a member of the Church Committee of the Diocese of Paphos, therefore in close contact with Leondios in his capacity as Bishop of Paphos. Finally, one of the most influential contributors to his newspaper, Christodoulos A. Galatopoulos, a nationalist lawyer who had been jailed for four years for his activities during the 1931 uprising, had also been a co-owner of the Limassolbased Chronos, and was reported to be one of the Locum Tenens’ chief advisers.34 While deliberating the ‘Archiepiscopal Question’, the lay members of the Church committees gradually managed to seize control of these committees from the higher clergy, thereby setting themselves in a position to continue to exert influence in one of the few areas of societal importance untainted by the colonial state. The medium through which they achieved this was financial pressure. In the mid-1930s the finances of the Church – which drew its revenue from the lands it leased to farmers, the licenses it provided for marriages and divorces, and the fees collected by the Church courts35 – were by most accounts in a dire situation, because of the thousands-worth of unrefunded loans it granted, and the failed commercial attempts on behalf of some monasteries (mainly Machaira).36 Consequently the Throne Committees

Eleftheria, 10 September 1936, ocit. Neos Kypriakos Phylax, ‘ƈ ƆƮƝƫƩƮƩƲ ƴƯƵ ƥưƥƩƳƯƤƟƯƵ ƳƷƥƴƩƪƾƲ Ƭƥ ƴơƲ ƥƪƫƯƣƜƲ ƖơƭƥƱƹƬƝƭƧƲ,’ 1 December 1935. 33 CO 67/276/1 Archbishopric of Cyprus 1937. Part 1, secret report from the deputy chief commandant of police to the colonial secretary, 24 February 1937, enclosure to the Private Secretary of the Governor’s dispatch to Arthur Dawe, Colonial Office, 25 February 1937. 34 CO 67/284/1 Cyprus. Municipal Corporations (Appointment of Councils) Law 1938. Extract from report of the district commissioner of Paphos, 18 October 1938, §2, enclosure to governor’s secret (2) dispatch, 21 October 1938; CO 67/299/2 Cyprus. Political Situation. February 1939-April 1940 Governor’s secret (2) dispatch, 15 December`1939, §9. 35 Phoni tis Kyprou, ‘ƊƥƱƜ ƍƧƴƱƼưƯƫƩƲ ƑƜƶƯƵ. ƊƳƯƫƯƣƩƳƬƼƲ,’ 3 February 1934; Paphos, ‘ƊƥƱƜ ƍƧƴƱƼưƯƫƩƲ ƑƜƶƯƵ. ƊƳƯƫƯƣƩƳƬƼƲ,’ 9 February 1934 and 28 January 1937. 36 Paphos, ‘ƈ ƥƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴƩƪƞ ƥƮƝƫƥƣƮƩƲ,’ 9 March 1934; ibid., ‘ƇƧƴƯƽƬƥƭ ƥƮƝƫƥƣƮƩƭ ƪơƩ ƫƯƣƯƤƯƳƟơƭ ƥƪ ƬƝƱƯƵƲ ƴƹƭ ƥƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴ. ƩƤƱƵƬƜƴƹƭ,’ 30 July 1936; ibid., ‘Ɔƭƾ ƤƧƬƯưƱơƴƥƟƴơƩ Ƨ ƥƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴƩƪƞ ưƥƱƩƯƵƳƟơ, 25 March 1937; ibid., ‘ƄƽƱƹ ơưƼ ƴƧƭ 31 32

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came under increasing public (newspaper) scrutiny, and, according to colonial reports, the old feeling according to which the church’s property should simply be made available to the public, and more specifically to the dispossessed agriculturalists, resurfaced among the rural population.37 It was against the backdrop of this public pressure that the actions of the members of the throne committees with respect to the bishops should be reconstituted. In fact money became their principal weapon in their negotiations with the prelates. Thus, in the case of the Throne Committees of the dioceses of Kerynia and Kitium, whose bishops had been deported, de facto authority passed into the hands of their respective leaders.38 However, in the case of the Throne Committees of the bishopric of Paphos and the Archbishopric, both under the presidency of Leondios, this ‘transfer’ did not come about without clashes.39 Hence, major opposition to the insistence of the Locum Tenens on postponing the elections sine die developed at the meeting of the Archbishopric’s Throne Committee on 28 January 1937. Members of this committee passed a resolution to the effect that ‘the members of the Holy ƥƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴƩƪƞƭ ƯƩƪƯƭƯƬƩƪƞƭ ƤƩơƷƥƟƱƩƳƩƭ,’ 22 April 1937; ibid., ‘Ɔƭƾ ƳƵƭƥƷƟƦƥƴơƩ Ƨ ƥƪưƯƟƧƳƧƲ ƴƧƲ ƥƪƪƫƧƳ. ưƥƱƩƯƵƳƟơƲ,’ 27 May 1937. 37 CO 67/274/5 ocit. Governor’s secret, 21 January 1938, transmitting report on political situation during the period ending 31 December, §18; Andreas Vittis, ‘ƂƣƣƫƯƪƱơƴƟơ: ƍƟơ ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴƧ ŻƪƨƥƳƧ ƴƯƵ ŻƫƫƧƭơ ƑƱƯƮƝƭƯƵ ƌƯƵƤƯƢƟƪƯƵ ƓƪƜƱươ ƄƩơ ƴơ ŻƴƧ 1878-1935,’ ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƞ ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƆƴơƩƱƥƟơƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƾƭ ƓưƯƵƤƾƭ, ƔƼƬƯƲ ƅ’, Nicosia, 1999, 137; CO 67/279/6 Cyprus. Visit of a Cypriot Delegation to London, 1937 Part 1. Paul G. Pavlides (former member of the Advisory Council), letter to A.J. Dawe, head of the Pacific and Mediterranean Department, Colonial Office, 17 April 1937. 38 Neos Kypriakos Phylax, ‘ƔƯ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƼƭ ƪơƩ ƴƯ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴƩƪƼƭ Ƅ’,’ 17 February 1935; ibid., ‘ƓƵƭƥƤƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƉƱƯƭ. ƆưƩƴƱƯưƞƲ ƴƧƲ ƍƧƴƱƯưƼƫƥƹƲ ƋƵƱƞƭƥƩơƲ,’ 9 March 1935. 39 Thus in 31 January and 1 February 1935, on the occasion as the Locum Tenens refused to approve the annual budget, the lay members -specifically Dr. Dervis and Klerides- openly defied him imposing it nonetheless, helped as they were by the clerical members who refused to side with Leondios. See Neos Kypriakos Phylax, ‘ƉƵƥƫƫƾƤƧƲ ƓƵƭƥƤƱƟơ ƉƱƯƭ. ƆưƩƴƱƯưƞƲ. Ɛ ƓƥƢơƳƬ. ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƞƲ ƤƩƝƫƵƳƥ ƴƧƭ ƳƵƭƥƤƱƟơƭ ƪơƩ ơưƥƷƾƱƧƳƥƭ ƥƩƲ ƴƯ ƩƤƩơƟƴƥƱƯƭ ƣƱơƶƥƟƯƭ ƴƯƵ,’ 31 January 1935 and, ibid., ‘ƓƵƭƞƫƨƥ ƷƨƥƲ ƥƪ ƭƝƯƵ Ƨ ƉƱƯƭ. ƆưƩƴƱƯưƞ. ƍƥƴƜ ƴƧƭ ưƱƾƴƧƭ ƴƱƩƪƵƬƟơƭ... ƭƝƯƭ ƪƽƬơ. ƋƫƧƱƩƪƜ ƪơƩ ƌơƺƪƜ ƍƝƫƧ ƈƭƹƬƝƭơ ƪơƴƜ ƴƯƵ ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƯƽ,’ 1 February 1935. Eventually things were settled in the sense preferred by the lay members, who accepted not to hold the Locum Tenens responsible for the state of the Archbishopric’s finances, see Neos Kypriakos Phylax, ‘ƍƥƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƔƱƩƪƵƬƟơƭ Ƨ ƄơƫƞƭƧ. ƆƸƧƶƟƳƨƧ ƞƱƥƬƹƲ Ư ưƱƯƻưƯƫƯƣƩƳƬƼƲ ƴƧƲ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƞƲ ƵưƼ ƴƧƲ ƉƱƯƭƩƪƞƲ ƆưƩƴƱƯưƥƟơƲ,’ 2 February 1935.

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Synod be requested to expedite the solution of the Archiepiscopal Question’.40 The Locum Tenens, chairman of the Holy Synod, refused to sign this resolution. Later, a secret police report noted that on 7 April 1937 the Committee ‘decided to discontinue the sum of £120 per annum, as stipend to the Locum Tenens and all traveling and other expenses paid to [the Locum Tenens] from the funds of the Archbishopric’.41 Subsequently, Leondios was forced to announce publicly his intention to confer with the deported bishops.42 The important element to bear in mind here is that the politicization of the Archiepiscopal Question did not so much stem from the intrinsic rationale of the clergy’s discourse, but rather from the capture and constitution of the Church Question as a ‘question of society’ by the learned elite, notably the lay members of the Church committees, and the press.43 During the 1930s, the Church of Cyprus therefore became, in other words, a displaced and autonomous public sphere, an Ecclesia, in its ancient Athenian sense. What granted this displaced public sphere significant autonomy was the protection, which Leondios managed to secure, of a powerful ally – the Church of England. A mere six days after the death of Kyrillos III, on 22 November 1933, Leondios wrote to William Cosmo Lang, Archbishop of Canterbury (192842) and head of the Church of England, ‘remind[ing] His Grace that he preside[d] over the movement for closer relations between the Orthodox and Anglican Churches…’ and appealing for his intercession in favour of the return of the exiled bishops.44 Consequently, the Archbishop of Canterbury wrote to the Secretary of State for the Colonies to the effect that similar appeals for the return of the deported Metropolitans of Kitium and Kyrenia had been addressed to him on behalf of Meletios, Patriarch of Alexandria, 40 CO 67/276/1, ocit. Governor Palmer, secret dispatch, 17 February 1937, transmitting secret police report. 41 CO 67/274/5 Cyprus. Intelligence Reports 1937. Secret report on the political situation in Cyprus in respect of the period of two months which ended on 30 June, 1937, §9, enclosure to Governor’s secret dispatch, 11 July, 1937; Paphos, ‘ƔƯ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƼƭ. ƈ ƳƵƭƥƤƱƟơƳƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƉƱƯƭƩƪƞƲ,’ 15 April 1937. 42 CO 67/276/1, ocit. Governor Palmer, secret dispatch, 4 March 1937. 43 Indeed, Governor Battershill state that ‘the politicians resent [the Locum Tenens’s] lack of interest in their constitutional aspirations.’ See CO 67/307/8 Cyprus. Archbishopric of Cyprus. Legislation Enforcing Election 1940. Governor’s most secret letter, 13 December 1940. 44 CO 67/252/13, ocit., H. McLaughlan, postal censor, secret report to colonial secretary, 22 November 1933, enclosure to governor’s secret dispatch, 24 November 1933.

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the Ecumenical Patriarch, and the Archbishop of Thyateira ‘who [was] the representative to [him] of the Ecumenical Patriarch’. Lang thus proposed that a compromise should be found according to which the exiled bishops would be allowed to return on the triple condition that a) ‘during the Election they would take no part in any political activities’; b) they would not be allowed to be candidates; and c) that they ‘would be obliged to leave the country again immediately after the Election’.45 All three prelates mentioned in the letter were personally known to the Archbishop of Canterbury, and were present (with the exception of the Ecumenical Patriarch) at the Seventh Lambeth Conference of Anglican Bishops in 1930.46 Meletios had in fact already taken part in the Sixth Lambeth Conference in 1920 which, in its resolution 19, provided for the creation, within the Church of England, of an ‘Eastern Churches Committee on a permanent basis’.47 Under his Patriarchate, the Holy Synod of Istanbul officially acknowledged the validity of the Anglican Orders, an example followed by the Patriarchate of Jerusalem and the Archbishopric of Cyprus (under Kyrillos III).48 His apocrisary (or legate, a post created by Meletios) to the Archdiocese of the Anglican Church in Canterbury, Archbishop of Thyatira Germanos, all along remained deeply involved in the Ecumenical movement of the Anglican Church, establishing a close relationship with Canon Dr John Albert Douglas who, in 1933, became the honorary general secretary of the Church of England’s Council on Foreign Relations.49 Moreover Cosmo Lang was a popular and influential Archbishop in the second half of the 1930s, since he was generally believed to have been instrumental in the passing of the Abdication Act in December 1935 which

CO 67/252/13, ocit., Archbishop of Canterbury, letter to secretary of state for the colonies, 8 December 1933. 46 In Resolution 33 of said conference, it is stated that ‘the Conference heartily thanks the Oecumenical Patriarch (Photius II) for arranging in co-operation with the other patriarchs and the autocephalous churches for the sending of an important delegation of the Eastern Orthodox Church under the leadership of the Patriarch of Alexandria (Meletios II).’ http://www.anglicancommunion.org/acns/archive/1930/1930-33.htm 47 http://www.anglicancommunion.org/acns/archive/1920/1920-19.htm 48 Phoni tis Kyprou, ‘Ɛ ƑơƴƱƩƜƱƷƧƲ ƂƫƥƮƜƭƤƱƥƩơƲ ƍƥƫƝƴƩƯƲ ƍƥƴơƮƜƪƧƲ,’ 3 August 1935. 49 Archbishop Germanos of Thyatira, ‘Progress Towards the Re-Union of the Orthodox and Anglican Churches,’ The Christian East, Spring, 1929, 20-31 and Canon J. A. Douglas, ‘Archbishop Germanos on Anglicanism,’ ocit., 1929, 11-20; Canon J. A. Douglas, ‘The Orthodox Delegation to the Lambeth Conference of 1930,’ The Christian East, Summer, 1930, XI, 2, 49-64 and ‘The Orthodox Principle of Economy, and Its Exercise,’ The Christian East, 1932, XIII, 3, 4, 91-8. 45

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cleared the ground for the coronation of George VI.50 Traces of the archbishop’s prestige can be spotted in the fact that throughout the 1930s, the Colonial Office kept Lambeth informed of the evolutions of the Cypriot Archiepiscopal Question. The first years following the archbishop’s demise were thus marked by a double development: on the one hand, in Cyprus, the lay members of the Church Committees managed to twist Leondios’ arm into accepting in principle the settlement of the ‘Archiepiscopal Question’ through the dispatch of representatives; on the other, Leondios successfully enlisted the support of the Church of England which weighed heavily in the British power dynamics. Hence the solidarity between the Churches of Cyprus and England was a source of major concern for the government of Cyprus. In the face of this perceived threat, the Cyprus government decided to intervene legislatively in the electoral process to secure the exclusion of all three Cypriot prelates from the candidacy, and the exigency that ‘the candidates shall either be British subjects or shall undertake to become British subjects if elected’.51 In order to make their case for a state intervention, the colonial administration proceeded to systematically reconstitute the ‘political entourage’ of the three bishops. An official notice from the British Legation in Athens, where the Bishop of Kyrenia was exiled, instanced the very close relations between the latter and the ‘Cypriot Brotherhood’, an association of Cypriots residing in Greece.52 Through the Brotherhood’s president, Achilleas Kyrou, the Bishop of Kyrenia was said to be in contact with the Greek government.53 The activities of the Bishop of Paphos were easier to monitor, as he was residing on the island, and police reports frequently disclosed his regular contacts with the Greek consul in Cyprus, Loudovikos Skarpas, who was ‘endeavouring to persuade the Locum Tenens to settle the Archiepiscopal Question because the Consul ha[d] instructions from his 50 Andrew Thorpe, Britain in The 1930s. The Deceptive Decade, Oxford and Cambridge, Blackwell, 1992, 18. 51 CO 67/267/9 Cyprus. Archiepiscopal Question 1935-1937. Governor’s secret dispatch, 3 December 1935. 52 The president of the Brotherhood, Achilleas Kyrou, was also the proprietor of the newspaper ƆƳƴƟơ, and the brother of Alexis Kyrou, the consul of Greece in Cyprus, removed from the island for his role in the 1931 uprising. See George S. Georghallides, Cyprus and the Governorship of Sir Ronald Storrs. The Causes of the 1931 Crisis, Nicosia, Cyprus Research Centre, 1985, 491. 53 CO 67/252/13, ocit. ‘Cyprus. Election of New Archbishop,’ Secret Note from the British Legation in Athens, 6 December 1933.

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Government to support an immediate solution’.54 Skarpas considered the Greek consulate and the Church of Cyprus as the only two remaining vectors of enosis in Cyprus after the colonial government took over the control of education; consequently, it was the duty of the Greek government to assist the Cypriot Church in settling the ‘Archiepiscopal Question’.55 As for the Bishop of Kitium, who, of ailing health, remained in the Monastery of the Holy Cross in Jerusalem, he was said to be in contact with the Larnaca-based lawyer and president of the Kitium Throne Committee Zenon Pierides,56 while Pierides was himself in contact with Clerides.57 After the Bishop of Kitium’s death on 13 September 1937, it was reported that Lendios and Skarpas spent the latter part of October in Athens engaged in negotiations with the Bishop of Kyrenia. It was said that as a result of these discussions an agreement was reached for the settlement of the Archiepiscopal question whereby the Bishops of Kyrenia and Paphos announced that they would not stand as candidates for the vacant throne, ‘and steps were taken to carry out a revised scheme for securing the election of the Bishop of Trebizond [Chrysanthos Philippidis]’.58 And the Bishop of Trebizond, according to another report, was ‘the candidate of the Greek government who could be relied on to foster the cause of Greek

54 CO 67/276/1, ocit. Secret report of the Deputy Chief Commandant of the Cyprus Police, 24 February 1937, forwarded to Arthur Dawe, principal at the Colonial Office, by John Montgomery, Private Secretary to the Governor of Cyprus, 25 February 1937. Of particular interest to the colonial administration was for instance the privileged treatment the Locum Tenens demanded that all churches should bestow upon the consul during services, see CO 67/2761/1, ocit., Governor’s secret dispatch, 11 January 1937, transmitting a secret police report enclosing a circular to all churches issued by the Locum Tenens. 55 Andreas Vittis, ‘ƂƣƣƫƯƪƱơƴƟơ: ƍƟơ ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴƧ ŻƪƨƥƳƧ ƴƯƵ ŻƫƫƧƭơ ƑƱƯƮƝƭƯƵ ƌƯƵƤƯƢƟƪƯƵ ƓƪƜƱươ Ƅơ ƴơ ŻƴƧ 1878-1935,’ ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƞ ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƆƴơƩƱƥƟơƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƾƭ ƓưƯƵƤƾƭ, ƔƼƬƯƲ ƅ’, Nicosia, 1999, 140. 56 CO 67/267/9, ocit., Acting Governor’s secret dispatch, 18 July 1936, enclosing letter of the bishop of Kitium to the Archimandrite of Larnaca, 16 June 1936, and CO 67/276/1, ocit., Governor’s secret dispatch, 30 December 1936, transmitting district commissioner of Larnaca’s report on a conversation with D. Zenon Pierides, 30 November 1936. 57 CO 67/276/1, ocit., Secret Intelligence Report, Summary 18.3.1937-24.3.1937, 24 March 1937. 58 CO 67/274/5, ocit., Report on the political situation with respect to the period ending 30 October 1937, §IV(4), enclosure to governor’s secret dispatch, 17 November 1937.

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nationalism’.59 The bishop of Trebizond, who officiated as the Ecumenical Patriarch’s apocrisary in Athens was, according to the British Legation in the Greek capital, a ‘deeply learned scholar […]’ and a ‘strong nationalist (and indeed almost xenophobe, or at any rate Anglophobe, though the informant was not prepared to admit this)’.60 Finally, in numerous instances, the Cyprus government stressed that the Greek government was financially supporting the Patriarchates of Istanbul and Alexandria and was thereby in a position to use their intercession in order to maintain alive the enosist cause.61 On account of what could be termed the Greek parameter in the ‘Archiepiscopal Question’, the Cyprus Government seriously considered legal intervention, an initiative which Governor Palmer made his own with the Colonial Office’s reluctant support. The Cyprus government argued for the promulgation of three different laws, each one dealing with a specific feature of the Church of Cyprus. First, the law on the election of the Archbishop (soon called the Berat62 Law) should contain a permanent clause requiring official approval of the Archbishop-elect by the colonial government. Second, in order to deal efficiently with the issue of Ethnarchy, another law was proposed, the object of which would be to revise the ‘ex-officio duties, or rights, appertaining to the [office of] Archbishop’, essentially in an attempt to ‘divorce the Church as much as possible from secular affairs, qua the Central Government of the Country’.63 This supplementary law would further make it compulsory for ‘all persons who may be appointed to any Office, Committee, or other public body recognized by Government on the island’ to be British Subjects.64 Third, and finally, another law would impose a governmental audit of the CO 67/274/5, ocit., Report on the political situation with respect to the period ending 31 December 1937, §15, enclosure to governor’s secret dispatch, 21 January 1938. 60 CO 67/276/1, ocit., ‘Bishop of Trebizond,’ report transmitted by the British Legation to the Governor of Cyprus, 31 August 1937, and forwarded to Arthur Dawe, Colonial Office, 13 September 1937. 61 CO 67/286/3 Cyprus. Archbishopric of Cyprus 1938. Part 4. Governor’s private and confidential letter to Sir Cosmo Parkinson, assistant undersecretary of state, 16 December 1938. 62 Under the Ottoman administration, the ‘Berat’, roughly translated as ‘liberty’ were series of documents granted by the Sultan to the Orthodox Church which constituted the official recognition of the archbishop and his suffragans by the state and defined their administrative, judicial and protective powers and prerogatives, see Paphos 18 November 1937. 63 CO 67/276/1, ocit., Governor, 4 January 1937, ocit. 64 CO 67/276/1, ocit., Governor, private and personal letter to the Secretary of State, 27 January 1937. 59

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properties and finances of the Cypriot Orthodox Church. Neither completely ‘separationist’ nor exactly ‘Erastian’,65 the colonial administration’s project aspired to be a separation of the Church from politics rather than from the state. The laws were promulgated hastily, without even waiting for the approval of the secretary of state. Indeed the government rushed to prevent a final attempt by Leondios and Makarios of Kyrenia to settle the ‘Archiepiscopal Question’. The consensual candidacy was this time believed to be that of the Bishop of Trebizond, who would also operate as Kyrenia’s representative, while the Bishop of Sinai would represent the deceased Kitium. To justify his initiative, Palmer transmitted a police report to the Colonial Office to the effect that the Bishops of Sinai and Trebizond were expected in a few days’ time to form an electoral synod in Cyprus.66 On 27 September 1937, the Church Audit Law was passed,67 followed by the Archbishop’s Disqualifications Law68 on 12 November 1937 which prevented the two remaining Cypriot prelates, Leondios and Makarios of Kyrenia, as well as any non-Cypriot native from becoming candidates. Finally, on the same day, the Governor’s Approval Law was promulgated.69 Because expediency and urgency prevailed in their promulgation over legitimacy, be it pastoral, theological or ecclesiastical, the Church Laws were intrinsically vulnerable to multi-levelled attacks. By so drastically preventing any intervention from abroad on behalf of the other Eastern Orthodox Churches, the colonial government eliminated the possibility that a theological rationale could be offered that would give the appearance of some sort of religious legitimacy for their intervention. To the already problematic question of articulating state legality and church 65 The term ‘Erastian’ derives from Thomas Erastus, a 16th century physician to whom is attributed (wrongly it seems) a doctrine, known as Erastianism, according to which the Church should be subservient to the State. 66 CO 67/276/2: Archbishopric of Cyprus, 1937. Part 2. Governor’s semi-official letter to Arthur Dawe, 29 October, 1937, enclosing the Chief Commissioner of Police’s secret report bearing the same date. The ‘nationalists’ mentioned in the police report were Clerides, Vassiliades, Pavlides, Constantinides, Ioannides, Christodoulou, Papanicolaou and Pelides (Kyrenia’s secretary). 67 The complete title being ‘Law No. 25 to provide for the investigation of the affairs and for the auditing of the accounts of churches and monasteries of the Autocephalous Greek-Orthodox Church of Cyprus in certain cases’. 68 Full title: Law No. 33 to Disqualify Certain Persons from Being Elected to the Vacant Archiepiscopal Throne of the Autocephalous Greek-Orthodox Church of Cyprus and to Provide for the Governor’s Approval of the Person Elected. 69 Full title: ‘Law 34. To provide for the approval of the Governor of any person elected to fill a vacancy in the Archiepiscopal Throne of the Autocephalous GreekOrthodox Church of Cyprus’.

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canonicity, the laws, by setting British nationality as a non-negotiable prerequisite for candidacy to the Throne, introduced a further complication related to the varying, and potentially conflicting levels of allegiance of the Orthodox clerics. In fact the immediate interests of the Church of Cyprus appeared secondary; indeed, Governor Palmer maintained that the government should not ‘burn [their] fingers by trying to reform an institution which is spiritually dead, regards [the British] as ‘Barbari’, and is bound hand and foot to the chariot of Hellenism and political intrigue’.70 By excluding the whole Orthodox community (save the Cypriot) from applying to the position of Archbishop, the Cyprus government found themselves in the awkward position of searching for and drawing lists of suitable candidates, namely of politically acceptable British subjects.71 The whole undertaking left the secretary of state entirely sceptical: It is all most unsatisfactory. This is a time when we have a very friendly political atmosphere in Athens, and when in view of German threats it is most important that we should not offend the Orthodox church countries such as Romania, Bulgaria and Yugoslavia. I feel that [the Governor] ignores all these wider political considerations and ignores too the fact that we have a Bench of Bishops in the House of Lords and is determined to embarrass the secretary of state. I feel I have no option but to pass these drafts and hope that the governor will not go on ignoring my views. It is most unsatisfactory.72

Despite all their misgivings however, the Colonial Office officially endorsed the governor’s positions although they delayed for almost a year the authorisation of the enactment of the Berat Law.73 Meanwhile, in Cyprus, resistance to the Cyprus government’s policy took a new turn and gathered momentum as the Church appeared internationally strengthened and legitimized in its struggle. In the summer of 1939, there was genuine hope among the clergy and the learned elite that an understanding could be reached amicably with colonial authorities. Indeed it was announced that Palmer was to be replaced by Sir William Denis Battershill. Battershill had been a popular Cyprus colonial secretary between 1935 and 1937 and his disagreement with Palmer’s authoritarian methods was common knowledge. 70 CO 67/276/1, ocit., Governor, semi-official secret letter to the secretary of state, 4 January 1937. 71 CO 67/276/2 Cyprus. Archbishopric of Cyprus 1937 Part 2. Governor’s secret dispatch, 19 November 1937. 72 CO 67/285/12, ocit., Secretary of State for the Colonies William Orsmby-Gore, minute, 23 April 1937. Emphasis in the text. 73 In his 21 September, 1938 minute, the Secretary of State wrote that though he felt compelled to sign the dispatch, he ‘didn’t feel at all happy about this.’

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However the messianic expectation expressed in the press before his arrival was quickly dissipated when he refused to meet Leondios soon after he assumed his new duties.74 This downturn seemed to legitimise Leondios’ more confrontational approach, which he resumed instantly. Closely watched by the colonial state, Leondios multiplied his tours and speeches around the island, attracting increasingly large crowds.75 By late November 1939, Governor Battershill informed the Secretary of State for the Colonies that no intelligence report would be complete without reference to the activities of the Locum Tenens.76 These activities consisted mainly of speeches and sermons delivered by himself or by his preachers – Makarios Macheriotis, Iacovos Pavlou77 and Kyprianos Kyriakides78 – either to children in schools, or to church attendants. One of the bishop’s signature moves was to dedicate religious services (mainly in the form of Te Deum) to the king of Greece, Prince Paul (the heir to the Greek throne), the exiled bishops of Kitium and Kyrenia, and the Greek Army, Navy and Air Force.79 In the schools, the bishop of Paphos told children that they were ‘Greek Orthodox and not Orthodox Christians as they were told’, and stated he hoped ‘in eight days they [would] learn their descent which it has taken eight years to make them forget’.80 The church encouraged and presided over the foundation of religious clubs – such as Agapi (Love) in 1938 and The Orthodox Christian Union of Youths in late 1939 – and catechistic schools for children (excluding the children of government officials including Greek Cypriots), which organized lectures and excursions ostensibly to teach them catechism, but actually, colonial authorities suspected, to assist the dissemination of nationalist sentiment.81 74 For the messianic hopes see Phoni tis Kyprou, ‘Ɛ ơƭơƬƥƭƼƬƥƭƯƲ,’ 5 August 1938. For Battershill’s refusal to meet Leondios, Anastasia Yiangou, Cyprus in World War II: Politics and Conflict in the Eastern Mediterranean, London, I. B. Tauris, 2010, 28. 75 CO 67/285/12, ocit., Police report, 23 March 1938 and ditto, 21 March. 76 CO 67/299/2 Cyprus. Political Situation 1939. Governor’s secret dispatch, 30 November 1939, §6. 77 CO 67/299/2, ocit. Political Situation in Cyprus From the 1st July to the 30th September 1939, §17, enclosure to acting governor’s secret (2) dispatch, 13 October 1939. 78 CO 67/299/2, ocit. Governor’s secret dispatch, 15 December 1939, §12. 79 CO 67/277/15 Cyprus. Administrative and Political Reports For Various Districts 1937. J.D. Montagu, district commissioner of Nicosia, monthly administrative report, 8 February 1937, enclosure to governor’s secret dispatch, 19 February 1937. 80 CO 67/299/2 ocit. Record of incidents connected with the local Greek nationalist movement, §14, enclosure to acting governor’s secret (2) dispatch, 23 June 1939. 81 CO 67/299/2 ocit., governor’s secret dispatch, 2 November 1939, §8; same file, governor’s secret dispatch, 30 November 1939, §10.

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That they perceived the Locum Tenens as an efficient enosis proselytizer can be inferred from the tone of exasperation of some of the governors’ writings. Battershill, fresh from his experience as colonial secretary in Palestine (19379), stated that he was ‘quite impossible’, and ‘in many ways a very pale edition of Haj Amin’.82 In these conditions, the colonial administration’s efforts aimed at restricting as much as possible the audience of the Bishop of Paphos. Hence the colonial government imposed a restraining order on him in April 1938 under Crime Law 30 of 1935,83 and subsequently prosecuted him on more than 20 charges of ‘subversive’ speeches and actions in a variety of villages, mainly in the district of Paphos.84 Exactly a year later, on 3 April 1939 (Holy Orthodox Easter Monday), after being tipped off by a Cypriot informer, a party of fourteen policemen raided the Archbishopric looking for guns and seditious writings. This action, which took place during Easter, and the fact that priests were body-searched, rather shocked Orthodox feeling,85 especially as it was said that the policemen had opened the tabernacle (skevofylakion) of the Archbishopric without Leondios’ authorisation.86 The Locum Tenens himself lost no time in protesting in a letter to the Secretary of State for the Colonies, to the effect that the police raid illustrated a total lack of respect for the Church on the part of the British administration, unworthy even of the precedent Ottoman government. Leondios forwarded this protest to the Ecumenical Patriarch, the Patriarchs of Jerusalem, Alexandria and Antioch, the Archbishop of Athens, the Patriarchs of Romania and Serbia and the leaders of the Autocephalous churches of Georgia, Albania, Poland, and of course to the Archbishop of Canterbury.87 The pinnacle of the confrontation between the Locum Tenens and colonial authorities was reached in May 1939 when the former was summoned to court in Limassol for what would become a mammoth threeday trial (15-17 May).88 Leondios was charged under clauses 14 and 15 of the CO 67/297/4, ocit., Governor’s semi-official dispatch, 29 December 1939. CO 67/285/12, ocit., Governor’s secret telegram No. 39, 19 April 1938. 84 CO 67/286/1 Cyprus. Archbishopric of Cyprus 1938. Part 2, Governor’s secret dispatch, 27 April 1938. 85 CO 67/299/2, ocit., Extract from the monthly report of the assistant commissioner of Larnaca report, April 1939, §3, enclosure to acting governor’s secret dispatch, 11 May 1939. 86 Phoni tis Kyprou, ‘ƂƳƴƵƭƯƬƩƪƞ ƝƱƥƵƭơ ƥƭ ƴƧ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƞ,’ 8 April 1939. 87 Anexartitos, ‘ƅƩơƬơƱƴƵƱƟơ ƴƯƵ ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƯƽ ưƱƯƲ ƴƯƭ ƕưƯƵƱƣƼƭ ƴƹƭ ƂưƯƩƪƩƾƭ,’ 3 May 1939; Phoni tis Kyprou, ‘ƅƩơƬơƱƴƵƱƟơ ƴƯƵ ƓƥƢ. ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƯƽ ƴƯƵ ƂƱƷƩƥư. ƉƱƼƭƯƵ ưƱƯƲ ƴƧƭ Ƃ.Ɔ. ƴƯƭ ƋƵƢƥƱƭƞƴƧƭ ƪơƩ ƴƯƭ ƆƭƴƩƬƼƴơƴƯƭ ƕưƯƵƱƣƼƭ ƴƹƭ ƂưƯƩƪƩƾƭ,’ 6 May 1939 88 Except when otherwise specified, the reconstruction of the trial is based on the following press articles: Anexartitos, ‘ƈ Ƃ.Ɠ. Ư ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƞƲ ưƱƯƳƜƣƥƴơƩ ưƱƯ ƴƯƵ ƤƩƪơƳƴƧƱƟƯƵ ƥưƟ ƴƧ ƢƜƳƥƩ ƴƯƵ ưƥƱƟ ưƱƯƫƞƸƥƹƲ ƥƣƪƫƧƬƜƴƹƭ ƭƼƬƯƵ,’ 2 May 1939; ibid., 82 83

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Prevention of Crime Law (No. 30 of 1935) on seven counts of disturbing or threatening to disturb the peace in the districts of Paphos, Limassol, Larnaca and Nicosia, between 22 May 1938 and 30 April 1939, through actions, words or publications seeking to promote enosis, anti-British feelings or to reassert the Archbishop’s (or acting Archbishop) Ethnarchy. He was subsequently convicted and sentenced to be committed for one year starting 18 May 1939 to remain within the strict confines of the municipality of Paphos, which he was prohibited to leave without the written authorisation of the local commandant of police. Some features of the trial need to be stressed as they touch the heart of the conflict (and perennial misunderstanding) between the Church and colonial authorities. First of all, on the organizational level, the Locum Tenens’ defence team was comprised of the very best lawyers and political activists of the time: from Limassol came Criton G. Tornaritis, Alekos Zenon (a volunteer for the Greek army during the Balkan Wars), Lefkios Zenon (a former member of the extremely short-lived ultra-nationalist Radical National Union of Cyprus, (EREK))89, and Phidias I. Kyriakidis; from Nicosia came Vias I. Markides (co-director of the Neos Kypriakos Phylax); from Paphos, Christos Galatoupoulos and Sotiris Markides (also a veteran of the Balkan Wars); from Larnaca came George S. Vassiliades90; from Varosha, Andreas Gavrielides (former member of the EREK);91 and finally Savvas Th. Christis was the president of the Kyrenia bar, a former councillor at the municipality of Kyrenia, and co-founder and vice-president of the Society for Cypriot Studies.92 In other words, the defence team was comprised of representatives of the whole Cypriot political spectrum, from die-hard nationalists such as Gavrielides, to sympathizers of left-wing ideas such as Kyriakides, through ‘żƱƷƩƳƥ ƷƨƥƲ ƥƩƲ ƌƥƬƥƳƼƭ Ƨ ƤƟƪƧ ƴƯƵ ƓƥƢ. ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƯƽ,’ 16 May 1939; ibid., ‘ƆƳƵƭƥƷƟƳƨƧ ƷƨƥƲ ƥƩƲ ƌƥƬƥƳƼƭ Ƨ ƤƟƪƧ ƴƯƵ ƓƥƢơƳƬƩƹƴƜƴƯƵ ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƯƽ,’ 17 May 1939; ibid., ‘ƈ ƷƨƥƳƩƭƞ ƧƬƝƱơ ƴƧƲ ƤƟƪƧƲ ƴƧƲ Ƃ.Ɠ. ƴƯƵ ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƯƽ,’ 18 May 1939; Phoni tis Kyprou, ‘ƈ ƥƪƤƟƪơƳƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƵưƯƨƝƳƥƹƲ ƴƯƵ ƓƥƢ. ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƯƽ ƴƯƵ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƯƽ ƉƱƼƭƯƵ ưƱƯ ƴƯƵ ƤƩƪơƳƴƧƱƟƯƵ ƌƥƬƥƳƯƽ,’ 20 May 1939; Paphos, ‘ƈ ƤƟƪƧ ƴƯƵ Ɠ. ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƯƽ,’ 18 May 1939. 89 CO 67/243/1 Cyprus. Report on the Disturbances of October 1931. Part 1. ‘The Cyprus National Radicalist,’ enclosure No. 5 to governor’s official dispatch No. 80, 11 February 1932. 90 CO 67/299/2, ocit. Political Situation in Cyprus From the 1st July to the 30th September 1939, §18 (for his connection with the Locum Tenens), enclosure to acting governor’s secret (2) dispatch, 13 October 1939. 91 CO 67/243/1 ocit.. 92 Details on the defence team were taken from archival sources, and also from Aristidis L. Koudounaris, ƃƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƼƭ ƌƥƮƩƪƼƭ ƋƵưƱƟƹƭ, 1800-1920, Nicosia, 5th Augmented edition, 2005, 58, 110-1, 197, 247, 249, 427, 485-6.

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‘crossover’ personalities such as Vassiliades and Galatopoulos. Kyriakides and Vassiliades, though they never joined the Communist Party of Cyprus, were present at the conference of Skarinou (Larnaca district), on 14 April 1941, which founded the Anorthotiko Komma tou Ergazomenou Laou (AKEL) (Progressive Party of the Working People).93 Moreover, the defence team sought to give an unmistakable political significance to their cross-examination of the public prosecution’s witnesses – eight out of twelve of whom were policemen – and to the examination of their own witnesses. For instance, when Justice Wilkinson inquired into the relevance of the defence’s questions to the witnesses, Galatopoulos replied to the effect that since it was the ‘Ethnarch’ sitting in the dock, the defence was entrusted with ‘a great national responsibility.’ Indeed, the ethnarch, by virtue of the ‘ecclesiastical canon,’ was ‘elected by the people’ and responsible, according to the powers entrusted him by the Berat, with the duty to ‘defend the autonomy of the Church and of national education.’ Technically Leondios was not the archbishop and had not been elected by the people; but Galatopoulos’s choice of words was not mere slippage; he availed himself of his examination to resuscitate the millet system and clearly portray the church as a ‘state within the state’, with its own leader, its own rules and regulations, its own elections. Finally, another important feature of the trial was Leondios himself. In his various interventions he did not refrain from using flowery and grandiloquent language in a court by most accounts packed from the early hours with journalists, scholars, clerics and ‘some women.’ During the crossexamination of one the prosecution’s witnesses, the Locum Tenens erupted declaring that he ‘preferred to go to prison rather than abandon so cowardly the defence of Cyprus’ youth and of their education.’ Similarly, in his closing speech, he likened himself to ‘tiny David facing mighty Goliath [the colonial administration]’ or to Antaeus, a giant in Egyptian and Greek mythology who grew stronger every time he fell. Of course the Locum Tenens did not forget to mention that he was, ‘by tradition, the Ethnarch,’ and that he had sworn, at the time of his enthronisation as Bishop of Paphos in 1930, ‘to uphold and protect the national and sacred traditions of the Greek Cypriot people’, including education. Nonetheless he underscored that he did not wish to provoke the government because he was Greek and a British Cypriot subject, and that no Greek could harbour anti-British feelings. The newspapers reported that Leondios’ words moved those present in court, and that Justice N. Peristianis (ed.), Ɛ ƖƟƶƧƲ ƊƹƜƭƭƯƵ, Ƨ ƂƱƩƳƴƥƱƜ ƪơƩ ƴƯ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼ, Nicosia, Mass Media Institute, 2004, 20.

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Wilkinson himself acknowledged his eloquence, even if he believed that Leonios tended to get carried away by it. The whole image of Leondios had been carefully studied. When he arrived at court on the first day of the trial, Leondios was accompanied by 200 clerics, forming an imposing procession with their black robes and tiaras as they made their way through the crowd of Limassolians, local shopkeepers who had closed their stores for the occasion, and villagers from the wider region who had flocked in from the surrounding streets in the early morning; the crowd in fact reached such proportions that on the following day the police had to cordon off the courts’ square. During the proceedings of the trial: badges exhibiting flags of the Greek Army and Navy were worn by schoolboys in the streets near court. Large crowds gathered in the streets and every appearance of the Bishop and his attendant priests was met with cheering and applause. Occasional cries of ‘Zito Enosis’ (Long Live Union) were heard among the crowd. Bouquets tied with blue and white [the colours of the Greek flag] ribbons were prominent on the day of the return of the Locum Tenens to Paphos (17 May). On his return to Paphos the Locum Tenens preached two sermons in which he declared that Greek education was in danger as was also the independence of the Church, and said: ‘if the necessity arises, sacrifice even your lives.94

Leondios’ trial was an important turning point because it encompassed most of the dimensions of the conflict between church and state. First and foremost was the clash between law and tradition, and more specifically the attempts of the church to define and keep out of the reach of the law a traditional sphere, the repository of the Greek Cypriots’ identity presented as timeless, existing before and bound to live on after British rule; conversely, the state’s main objective of the trial was to assert, in the words of a judge, the ‘primacy of law over tradition’.95 In these three days an important and very subtle debate took place around notions such as faith, national identity, political allegiance, or civic duty, which the defence explicitly presented as compatible, and the prosecution as irreconcilable. Secondly and consequently, the trial and the preliminary search of the Archbishopric illustrated a contest about spaces, the concrete borders between reason of state and sacred sanctuary. The stakes for the church to CO 67/299/2, ocit. Record of incidents connected with the local Greek nationalist movement, §7, enclosure to acting governor’s secret (2) dispatch, 23 June 1939. 95 Anexartitos, ‘ƋơƴơƤƟƪơƩ ƥƭ ƌƜƱƭơƪƩ ƤƩơ ƴơƲ ƪƹƤƹƭƯƪƱƯƵƳƟơƲ ƥưƟ ƴƧ ƥưƟƳƪƥƸƥƩ ƴƯƵ ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƯƽ,’ 5 March 1939. 94

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preserve, or at least to make a strong public case for the inviolability of this sanctuary, were extremely high; indeed, under Leondios’ sometimes controversial leadership, the Church of Cyprus systematically laboured to present itself as the hearth of the eternal values and the Greek essence of the Cypriot Hellenophones. Characteristic of this stand was Leondios’ statement according to which the Greek Cypriots’ ‘national anthem is Christ has risen [Hristos Anesti a Greek-Orthodox wish on Easter Sunday]; the national centre of the Cypriots is Athens, their religious centre is Jerusalem, their ecclesiastical centre is Constantinople’. This statement is interesting as it highlights the intersecting, imagined geographies which, as Paschalis Kitromilides showed, constituted but also accounted for the divisive nature of Greek nationalism and explains the protracted rivalry between the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the new-born Archbishopric of Athens. In fact, as will be evinced later on in this chapter, Leondios’ attempt to synthesise the Orthodox-centric and national-populist tendencies in Greek nationalism failed to convince the Cypriot bourgeoisie. Finally, from the viewpoint of the defence team, the trial was a showcase of political unity and communicational skills, all mobilized for the purpose of presenting the bishop as a national leader. The defence did not seriously expect to exculpate Leondios, but it did use the tribune of the court room to foster sympathy for and allegiance to the Locum Tenens within the Greek Cypriot community. By summer 1939 the colonial authorities readily acknowledged that the Church, particularly in the wake of Leondios’ trial, had become highly popular.96 At the end of the trial, the Greek Cypriot learned elite formed a block behind Leondios, although the latter’s agency was restricted, as shown, by his financial dependence on the Church committees. The Second World War somewhat changed the configuration of the relations between Leondios, the Greek Cypriot community and colonial authorities. The most important development concerned the further marginalization of Leondios in the context of a growing rivalry between the conservative right and the rising Left. But in September 1939, Leondios experienced the zenith of his popularity. As Italy declared war on Greece in October 1940 and was subsequently pushed back by the Greek army, the Governor noted a ‘spirit of excitement bordering on hysteria’ among Greek Cypriots.97 Leondios was reported to have proclaimed a truce with the 96 CO 67/299/2, ocit. Extract from the report of the district commissioner of Paphos, 19 June 1939, enclosure to acting governor’s secret dispatch, 23 June 1939. 97 CO 67/307/8, ocit., Governor, ciphered and secret telegram No. 539, 1 November 1940.

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Cyprus Government, ‘apparently bec[oming] pro-British overnight’ while displaying a ‘sudden burst of activity and energy’ leading people to believe ‘that he is indeed their Ethnarch and…definitely emerg[ing] as a leader during the past month.’ This popularity would have declined, it was reported, ‘if it had not been for the fact that it was felt locally that the Anglican Church was in some respects supporting the Locum Tenens’ view.’98 But the colonial administration had no means to combat it, as the Locum Tenens, in his speeches, aptly entwined the Greek nationalist feeling with his exhortations for the British army, at a time when colonial authorities themselves, were actively working to constitute a Cyprus Regiment.99 Leondios’ popularity had always been somewhat of a riddle for colonial authorities and Palmer’s depiction of him as ‘entirely treacherous, unscrupulous, fickle and fanatical as a politician, [and] impossible to trust…in any way’ illustrated the governor’s feeling of impotence more than it provided a fair account of the prelate.100 In fact on numerous occasions, colonial authorities were forced to acknowledge his rhetorical skills. Thus a colonial official noted, somewhat mischievously, ‘the effect of his [Leondios’] personality and preaching over women, who are said to be particularly moved by his undoubted powers of oratory.’101 Indeed, for a brief moment colonial authorities caressed the idea of cajoling rather than confronting Leondios. Hence to the Colonial Office’s astonishment, Governor Battershill went as far as to write that he felt, along with His Majesty’s Ambassador in Greece, that the Greek government should be directly approached to settle the ‘Archiepiscopal Question’.102 However plans to solicit the help of either the Greek government or sister Orthodox Churches were shelved in the wake of the German invasion of Greece in April 1941.103 Soon after, the usual mistrust took over. To illustrate this, historians often narrate an episode reported in the memoirs of Percy Arnold, who served as the editor of an English language newspaper in Cyprus. Arnold met with Leondios who asked 98 CO 67/307/8, ocit., Governor, semi-official letter to A. B. Acheson, Most Secret, 13 December 1940. 99 For British colonial initiatives in Cyprus during the Second World War, see Tabitha Morgan, Sweet and Bitter Island: A History of the British in Cyprus, London, I.B. Tauris, 2010, 161-195. 100 CO 67/297/4, ocit., governor’s private and personal letter to Assistant Undersecretary of State for the Colonies Sir Cosmo Parkinson, 29 December 1939. 101 CO 67/299/2, ocit. Secret. The Political Situation in Cyprus from the 1st April to the 30th June 1939, §12, enclosure to acting governor’s secret dispatch, 7 July 1939. 102 CO 67/307/8, ocit., Most Secret letter of the Governor to A. B. Acheson, principal at the Colonial Office, 13 December 1940. 103 Yiangou, Cyprus in World War II, 51.

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him to convey his feelings of unfailing loyalty to the Crown to the colonial governor. When Arnold delivered the message to Battershill’s successor, Sir Charles Woolley, the latter raised an eyebrow and replied: ‘He said that, did he?’104 Leondios extravagant manifestations of patriotism through his speeches on the occasion of Greek national holidays, or his fund collecting campaigns for Greeks did nothing to abate such feelings of distrust. Shunned by colonial authorities, Leondios soon faced the consequences of the bitter rivalry between the left- and right-wings, duplicating the emerging Civil War in Axis-occupied Greece. The Communist Party of Cyprus, which had been wiped out in the wake of the 1931 uprising, managed to patiently reconstitute and consolidate its influence through the creation of trade unions.105 Leondios was himself very sympathetic to the plight of workers and not hostile to left-wing ideas as far as their social implications were concerned.106 Leondios did not change his views even when the Communist Party of Cyprus re-emerged as AKEL on 14 April 1941 and he consequently incurred the growing hostility of the conservative right-wing whose anticommunism was manifestly much stronger than its anti-colonialism.107 In view of the municipal elections that colonial authorities had agreed to reintroduce given the war circumstances and Greece’s status as war ally, slated for March 1943, conservative politicians created the Kypriako Ethniko Komma-KEK [Cypriot National Party-KEK]) and used it to pressure Leondios into taking a clear stand against the left-wing.108 As it may have appeared throughout this chapter, Leondios was not one to be forced into doing something he disagreed with. During the municipal elections, which saw AKEL win two of the island’s main cities, Limassol and Famagusta, he refrained from supporting any of the candidates.109 Instead he presided over reconciliation efforts between left-wing and right-wing in autumn 1944 which were nullified by the bloody episodes known as the Dekemvriana in Athens in December of that year.110 Leondios was more Ibid., 74. Alexis Rappas, ‘The Labor Question in Colonial Cyprus, 1931-1941: Political Stakes in a Battle of Denominations,’ International Labor and Working-Class History, LXXVI, 1, 2009, 194-216. 106 Anexartitos, ‘ƈ ƷƨƥƳƩƭƞ ƳƵƭƝƭƴƥƵƮƩƲ ƴƧƲ ƥưƩƴƱƯưƥƟơƲ ƴƹƭ ƳƵƭƴƥƷƭƩƾƭ ƬƥƴƜ ƴƧƲ Ƃ.Ɠ. ƴƯƵ ƔƯưƯƴƧƱƧƴƯƽ ƴƯƵ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪ. ƉƱƼƭƯƵ,’ 14 September 1940. 107 Rolandos Katsiaounis, ƈ ƅƩơƳƪƥưƴƩƪƞ 1946-1948. ƍƥ ƂƭơƳƪƼưƧƳƧ ƴƧƲ ƑƥƱƩƼƤƯƵ 18781945, Nicosia, Cyprus Research Centre, 2000, p? 108 Eleftheria, ‘ƂưƥƶơƳƟƳƨƧ Ƨ ƟƤƱƵƳƩƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƯƽ ƆƨƭƩƪƯƽ ƋƼƬƬơƴƯƲ,’ 7 June 1943. 109 Yiangou, Cyprus in World War II, 97. 110 Ibid., 139-146. 104 105

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successful in his efforts to have the Church laws repealed and to consolidate the Orthodox Church’s institutional power. In 1943 he took an initiative which was widely supported in the press when he addressed to colonial authorities a memorandum wherein he requested the repeal of the Church laws, and the return of Bishop Makarios of Kyrenia.111 And in December 1944 he presided over the creation of a Bureau of Ethnarchy, comprising eminent lawyers and notables.112 Although this consolidated his ethnarchic role, the Bureau could not live up to its non-partisan promise and was soon embroiled in the left-right quarrel. The Church laws were repealed in 1946 and Leondios was elected archbishop on 6 June 1947. He passed away a little over a month later.

Conclusion Leondios’ legacy was one of consolidation of the Church’s institutional power at the cost, however, of its political independence. His own, personal understanding of his ethnarchic role was unique, uneasily poised between the two tendencies that had clashed during the first ‘Archiepiscopal Question’ (19009).113 While Leondios shared Kyrillos II’s uncompromising nationalism and likewise portrayed himself, in populist fashion, as a leader of a supposedly classless society, he nonetheless was profoundly committed to his faith and was ultimately, and similarly to Kyrillos III, more of a prelate than a national leader. This stand alienated most of the conservative elite and Leondios was eventually ‘fabricated’ into a symbolic, more than an effective, nationalist leader. The causes entrenching the Church’s power were multiple, but three of them appeared to have been decisive: the taking-over of Church control by the lay leadership, Leondios’ determination in face of repression, but more importantly, the successful appeal to non-Cypriot religious authorities – Anglican and Orthodox – whose reaction firmly instilled doubt in British Ibid., 120. Ibid., 146. 113 Numerous analyses have been written on the first Archiepiscopal Question and all of them offer a different and important perspective on the issue. Outside of its treatment in this volume, one can refer to: Andrekos Varnava, British Imperialism in Cyprus 1878-1915: The Inconsequential Possession, Manchester, Manchester University Press, 2009, 179-185; Michael N. Michail, ‘ƔƯ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƩƪƼ ƦƞƴƧƬơ (1900-1909), ƔƯ ƩƤƥƯƫƯƣƩƪƼ ƴƯƵ ưƥƱƩƥƷƼƬƥƭƯ ƪơƟ Ƨ ơƭƜƤƥƩƮƧ ƴƧƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƹƲ ƥƨƭƩƪƞƲ ơƱƷƞƲ ƳƴƯ ƢƱƥƴƜƭƩƪƼ ưƫơƟƳƩƯ ƤƩƯƟƪƧƳƧƲ’, ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƤơ ƴƯƵ ƋƝƭƴƱƯƵ ƆưƩƳƴƧƼƭƩƪƾƭ ƆƱƥƵƭƾƭ, XXXI, 2005, 307-360; Rebecca Bryant, Imagining the Modern. The Cultures of Nationalism in Cyprus, London, I.B. Tauris, 2004, 79-97; Rolandos Katsiaounis, Labour, Society and Politics in Cyprus during the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century, Nicosia, Cyprus Research Centre, 1996, 225-44. 111 112

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official circles with regard to the wisdom of the measures taken by the Cyprus government. This was of course of special importance in a rapidly deteriorating context in the eastern Mediterranean, where Greece appeared as one of Britain’s allies in the face of the threats posed by the insatiable ambitions of fascist Italy. But the successful consolidation of the Church’s power came at the price of a personal failure for Leondios. His dream of maintaining the Church above politics foundered in the context of an increasingly bitter rivalry between the conservative Right and the emerging Left.

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Figure 16: Portrait of Archbishop Leondios at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus.

CHAPTER TEN MAKARIOS III, 1950-77: CREATING THE ETHNARCHIC STATE SIA ANAGNOSTOPOULOU

This chapter explores the political role of Archbishop Makarios III as ethnarch. In the bibliography of Makarios, too little attention has been paid to this role, which he laid claim to and even placed above that of the President of the Republic of Cyprus. The hypothesis of this chapter is based on the contradiction between the adoption and subsequent identification of the title of ethnarch, based on the Ottoman modernity of the millets of the 19th century1 and the irredentist ideology of the Greek state (i.e. the Meghali Idea2), with that of the President of the Republic of Cyprus, a title which refers to a modern, secular, bi-communal state. The term ‘ethnarch’ then, of Ottoman origins (millet baûÖ), has a double historical meaning. First, it was a product of the authoritarian, fragmentary (communal) Ottoman transition to modernity (Tanzimat), in the framework of which the peoples of the Empire were not liberated on a personal basis, but on a collective one (millet). The notion of ‘subject’ was replaced by the notion of ‘a member of an ethno-religious community’ – millet-i Rum – under the leadership of an ethno-religious leader – the ethnarch – who guaranteed the loyalty of the millet to the Sultan. Second, it was a result of the irredentism of the Greek state, which propagated a sense of ownership over the millet of the Rum in the fragmenting Ottoman Empire, which resulted in the mission of the Greek state being the ‘liberation’ of the Ottoman Rums. In this irredentist framework, the ethnarch had the duty of retrospectively legitimizing the Greekness of the millet and to express 1 Sia Anagnostopoulou, ƍƩƪƱƜ ƂƳƟơ, 19ƯƲ ơƩƾƭơƲ-1919: ƂưƼ ƴƯ ƬƩƫƫƝƴ ƴƹƭ ƒƹƬƩƾƭ ƳƴƯ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƼ ƝƨƭƯƲ (Asia Minor. From the millet of Rum to the Greek nation), Ellinika Grammata, Athens 1997, 276-317 and 283-318. 2 For the influence of the irredentist policy of the Greek state to the term ethnarch, see Sia Anagnostopoulou, ‘The terms Millet, Genos, Ethnos, Oikoumenikotita, Alytrotismos in Greek historiography’, in Sia Anagnostopoulou, The Passage from the Ottoman Empire to the Nation-States, Isis, Istanbul 2004; also Anagnostopoulou, ƍƩƪƱƜ ƂƳƟơ.

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synchronically its will for enosis. Finally, in the framework of Greek irredentism, the term ‘ethnarch’ acquired the content of the natural-spiritual leader of the unredeemed Greek nation, whose political centre was Athens.3 The ethnarch, then, was the leader of an unredeemed ‘ethno-religious people’, whose political authority was alien and forced, and he had to lead his people to enosis with its ‘national centre’. As the previous chapters have shown, the Cypriot Church gradually claimed an irredentist ethnarchic role during the colonial transition to modernity.4 The Cypriot Church developed during the British colonial period as an ethnarchic Greek nationalist church, and the archbishop, at least in his rhetoric and that of other political elites, became the leader of an ‘ethno-religious people’ struggling for their incorporation into the ‘national body’. The archbishop of Cyprus had been the ethnarch to the extent that the church was ethnarchic, but it emerged after the Great War as an ethnarchic Greek nationalist church in opposition to British colonial rule. With Makarios, however, the ethnarchism of the archbishop became gradually more autonomous from that of the Church. This chapter focusses on how the role of ethnarch changed even further during the period when Archbishop Makarios III became archbishop, first as anti-colonial and pro-enosis leader, and then as president of a post-colonial republic.

Makarios before he became Archbishop Archbishop Makarios III, whose lay name was Michael Mouskos, was born in Pano Panayia village of Paphos on 13 August 1913.5 Soon he entered one of the most important institutions of ecclesiastical authority in Cyprus, the Monastery of Kykkos, earning him the nickname Kykkotis. In an era, in which the Church of Cyprus was completely disorganized, the Monastery of Kykkos ‘invested’ in young men in order to revitalise the church hierarchy. Thus, in Sia Anagnostopoulou, ‘1919-1922: Ɛ ƥƨƭơƱƷƩƳƬƼƲ ƴƯƵ ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƯƽ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƥƟƯƵ ƳƴƯ ưƫơƟƳƩƯ ƴƧƲ ƍƥƣƜƫƧƲ ƊƤƝơƲ’, (1919-1922: The ethnarchism of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in the framework of the Great Idea), Istorika, 25/47, 2007, 373-420. 4 Sia Anagnostopoulou, ‘Millet, Ethnicity, Colonial Community: Views of the Authoritarian Transition to Modernity, 19th to the Beginning of the 20th Century. From the Ottoman Empire to the British Empire’, in Michalis N. Michael, Tassos Anastassiades, Chantal Verdeil (eds.), Ottoman Religious Communities, State and Colonialism in the second half of the nineteenth century, Klaus Schwarz Verlag, Berlin (forthcoming 2013). 5 For biographical information on Makarios ƊƊƊ, see P. N Vanezis, Makarios: Life and Leadership, Abelard-Schuman, London 1979, 11-26; Andros Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ (Makarios), I, Andreou Publications, Nicosia, 1981, 10-79. 3

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September 1938, Makarios, aged 25, and after being ordained as deacon (August 1938), left for Athens with a scholarship from the Monastery to pursue university studies. Parallel to his studies in the School of Theology (graduated in 1942) and the Law School of the University of Athens, Makarios entered the Greek clergy as a priest (ordained on 13 January 1946). In September of the same year, he left for Boston with a scholarship from the World Council of Churches. His overseas studies allowed Makarios to broaden his horizons in a world in which the conflict with Fascism was coming to a conclusion, and the clash between Capitalism and Communism was intensifying. His stay in Athens, in the theological and ecclesiastical environment to which he belonged, in the difficult years of the Nazi Occupation, and especially in the beginning of the Greek Civil War, sharpened his political acumen and showed him political choices. His stay in the US, his contacts there with ecclesiastical and lay circles of Americans and Greek immigrants, shaped Makarios’ political choices.6 In an era, then, when in Cyprus the largest part of the clergy – even of the highest clergy – was suffering from ignorance and ‘provinciality’,7 Makarios, with his studies and experiences overseas,8 familiarised himself with international problems, particularly those of the colonised or recently de-colonised world. Makarios returned to Cyprus in 1948 in order to occupy the Bishopric of Kitium (13 June 1948), to which he was elected (to his surprise) while he was still in Boston. With his election, the Synod of the Church of Cyprus was completed for the first time since 1931 (see previous two chapters). At the time of the reorganisation of the Church, the political situation in Cyprus was quite complex. The only political party with a great penetration In Athens he joined ecclesiastical circles and organisations and met Spyridon, Archbishop of the Church of Greece. In the US he met Athenagoras, who would soon become Patriarch of Constantinople. In Boston, Makarios officiated in the church of the Evangelists of Boston, and became friends with Rev. George Journas, Director of the Seminary and editor of the ‘Ellinika Chronika’. His stay in the US and his acquaintances there led the British to believe that Makarios was an American agent: ‘According to the British services, Makarios received aid amounting to 300,000 dollars, which was given to him through the American Embassy in Athens’. See: AMAE (Archives du Ministère des Affaires Etrangères), Europe-Grèce, vol. 125 : Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques’, 9/9/1955. 7 See ‘ƆƭƨƱƯƭƩƳƴƞƱƩƯƲ ƌƼƣƯƲ, ƌƥƵƪƹƳƟơ, 20. 10. 1950’, Pavlidis, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ (Makarios), III, (ƂưƼƱƱƧƴơ ƝƣƣƱơƶơ ƪơƩ Ɯƫƫơ ƭƴƯƪƯƵƬƝƭƴơ-Confidential Papers and other Documents), 42. 8 ‘Young, handsome…Makarios is smart. Educated in the western way, he imposes himself on his interlocutor’. AMAE, Europe-Grèce, vol. 125 : Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques’, 9/9/1955. 6

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into society,9 and with an organised structure and ideology, was the left-wing AKEL.10 Opposite AKEL, the right-wing Kypriakon Ethnikon Komma (KEK – Cyprus National Party) was founded in 1943, with Themistokles Dervis, Mayor of Nicosia, as its general secretary. In this were incorporated the most diverse elements, with antagonistic interests, which, however, were unified under a common ideological umbrella: nationalism, Christianity and anticommunism.11 To the class struggle of AKEL, KEK juxtaposed the ‘nation’ and its national aspirations – enosis – which was above social divisions and struggles. Enosis constituted the symbolic and moral capital for the political legitimisation of the right-wing, which, in its largest part, collaborated closely with the colonial administration.12 Enosis was no longer framed as a critique of British rule as such, nor did it evolve into an anti-colonial movement with social and political references, but was a moral, anti-communist crusade,13 as it was being formulated in Greece, in a framework of extreme right or even fascist references,14 whose ideological garb would become, in the following years, nationalism (ethnikophrosyne).15 Since 1947, the weak front of the right

Dimitris Protopapas, ƈ ƜƴƵưƧ ƳƵƣƪƱƼƴƧƳƧ ƥƭƼƲ ƤƩươƱơƴơƮƩƪƯƽ ƳƵƳƴƞƬơƴƯƲ ƪƯƬƬƜƴƹƭ: ƪƼƬƬơƴơ ƪơƩ ƤƧƬƯƴƩƪƝƲ ƥƪƫƯƣƝƲ, ƋƽưƱƯƲ 1940-1955 (The Informal Formation of a Bipolar System of Political Parties: Political Parties and Municipal Elections), unpublished MA, University of Athens, 2002, 168. 10 On the founding of AKEL, its first congress, as well as its program, see ƂƋƆƌ, ƑƱƼƣƱơƬƬơ ƪơƩ ƪơƴơƳƴơƴƩƪƼƭ ƴƯƵ «ƂƭƯƱƨƹƴƩƪƯƽ ƋƼƬƬơƴƯƲ ƴƯƵ ƆƱƣơƦƼƬƥƭƯƵ ƌơƯƽ», Limassol, 1941; Also, Rolandos Katsiaounis, ƈ ƅƩơƳƪƥưƴƩƪƞ 1946-1948, Research Center of Cyprus, Nicosia, 2000, 68. 11 For KEKs program see ‘ƂƩ ưƱƯƣƱơƬƬơƴƩƪơƟ ƨƝƳƥƩƲ ƴƯƵ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƯƽ ƆƨƭƩƪƯƽ ƋƼƬƬơƴƯƲ’, Elefteria, 10 August 1943. 12 The most characteristic case was Themistocles Dervis himself, a close collaborator of the colonial administration, who had been decorated by the British. See: ƂƍƂƆ, Europe-Grèce, vol. 125 : Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques’, 9/9/1955. 13 ‘After the…organized movement of the Communist Party, there has been founded already…a new “National” party, aiming at the co-operation and concert with the British and the pursuit of enosis through legal means’, ƅƊƂƕƆ (ƅƩưƫƹƬơƴƩƪƼ ƪơƩ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƼ ƂƱƷƥƟƯ ƕưƯƵƱƣƥƟƯƵ ƆƮƹƴƥƱƩƪƾƭ), 126/3, ƂưƼƱƱƧƴƯ (1946), ƓƧƬƥƟƹƬơ ƳƵƭƴơƷƨƝƭ ƵưƼ ƴƯƵ ƓƬƧƭƜƱƷƯƵ ƪ. ƖƟƫƩưươ, (ơƷƱ). 14 For the extreme right in Greece, see Spyros Marketos, ‘ƈ ƥƫƫƧƭƩƪƞ ƜƪƱơ ƤƥƮƩƜ ƳƴƧ ƤƥƪơƥƴƟơ ƴƯƵ 1940’ (The Greek Extreme Right in the 1940s) in Christos Hadjiiosif (ed.), ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƆƫƫƜƤơƲ ƴƯƵ 20ƯƵ ơƩƾƭơ. ƂƭơƳƵƣƪƱƼƴƧƳƧ, ƆƬƶƽƫƩƯƲ, ƑơƫƩƭƼƱƨƹƳƧ 19451952 (History of Greece in the 20th century. Civil War, Reconstruction, Restoration), v. D2, Vivliorama, Athens, 2009. 15 For ethnikophrosyne as a product of the Greek Civil War, see Angelos Elefandis, ‘ƆƨƭƩƪƯƶƱƯƳƽƭƧ. ƈ ƩƤƥƯƫƯƣƟơ ƴƯƵ ƴƱƼƬƯƵ ƪơƩ ƴƧƲ ƥƭƯƷƯưƯƟƧƳƧƲ’ (Ethnikofrosyni. The ideology of terror and culpabilisation), in ƈ ƥƫƫƧƭƩƪƞ ƪƯƩƭƹƭƟơ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ưƱƾƴƧ 9

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was considerably reinforced by the election of the Metropolitan of Kyrenia to the Archiepiscopal Throne as Makarios II, a former exile to Athens, extreme anti-communist and pro-enosis, and who had close connections to the extreme right-wing organisation ‘X’ of George Grivas in Athens.16 The Greek Civil War was transferred to Cyprus, where, adapted to local conditions, it nourished the intense clash between the left and right, which was focused on the appropriation of the content of enosis – ownership of which the left also claimed after 1948.17 The enosis of the right, a by-word of nationalism in Cyprus and Greece, reproduced the irredentism of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, and legitimised, in the framework of the Greek Civil War, an anti-communist and anti-socialist climate, and the national and political role the authoritarian ‘national forces’ laid claim to: the Church and paramilitary organisations with fascist ideology, like ‘X’.18 Members of the latter visited Cyprus in order to reinforce the anticommunist front, and they infiltrated the right-wing labour unions, the sports clubs, as well as the peasantry.19 The enosis of the left-wing was anti-colonial and radical, aiming at the mass unification of all of the peoples of Cyprus against colonialism and imperialism. Thus, it was legitimising enosis as the unique right of the Cypriots, even of those who were not Greek Cypriots.20 Makarios appeared in this political climate, where nationalism in Cyprus was gaining ground,21 without, however, being able to control the Greek Cypriot community in a universal and in an unambiguous way. The struggle against the communists, as well as the imposition of enosis as a nationalist and ƬƥƴơưƯƫƥƬƩƪƞ ưƥƱƟƯƤƯ (1945-1967) (Greek society during the first postwar period), Sakis Karagiorgas Foundation, Athens, 1994, 645-54. 16 Alexis Alekou, ƐƩ ưƯƫƩƴƩƪƝƲ ƥƮƥƫƟƮƥƩƲ ƳƴƧƭ ƋƽưƱƯ, 1945-1955 (The Political Developments in Cyprus, 1945-1955), unpublished PhD, Panteio University, Athens 2012, 96. For the Organisation ‘X’ see Spyros Papageorgiou, Ɛ ƄƱƟƢơƲ ƪơƩ Ƨ «Ɨ». ƔƯ ƷơƬƝƭƯ ơƱƷƥƟƯ (Grivas and ‘X’. The Lost Archive), Athens, 2004. For its founding, the activity of ‘X’ during World War II and the Civil War, as well as for its ideology, see Alexis Alekou’s thesis, 94-104. 17 This position is officially adopted in the 6th AKEL Congress of 27-8 August 1949. 18 For the slogans and the content of enosis for organisations like ‘X’, see Papageorgiou, Ɛ ƄƱƟƢơƲ, 640. 19 For the relations of the Confederation of Cyprus Workers (SEK), which had been founded by KEK as a response to the leftist PEO, with ‘X’, see ibid, 640-8. 20 See Alekou, ƐƩ ưƯƫƩƴƩƪƝƲ ƥƮƥƫƟƮƥƩƲ, 177. 21 In the Municipal Elections of 1949, the right-wing defeated AKEL, which lost most of the municipalities it had won in 1946. See ASKI (Archives of Contemporary Social History), Archive of KKE (Greek Communist Party), box 371, File 20/21/20: ‘The municipal elections of May 1949’.

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anti-communist sentiment, required the formation of a powerful ‘national political entity’ – an ethnarchic institution – which would be able to unify the Greek Cypriots under its leadership in a politically unified community, while marginalizing AKEL. In the political, colonial system of Cyprus, which had been founded on the communal differentiation of the population based on religion,22 the Church of Cyprus had found already since 1878 fertile ground, in order to claim the political role that the British authority did not allow. The enosis claim had then constituted, in the framework of the Meghali Idea, the vehicle with which the Church circulated the historical legitimisation of its role as a pro-enosis and Greek ethnarchic church. Thus, as an earlier chapter mentioned, he ‘National Council’ had been founded in 192123 under the leadership of the Church, which aimed to promote enosis. This functioned occasionally until 1931,24 and then disappeared. In 1946, at a time when the reorganisation of the Church coincided with the beginning of the battle against communism, the founding of an ‘ethnarchic’ party was deemed necessary. The non-existence of representative institutions in Cyprus, like the Legislative Council, which had resulted in a generation without political representation,25 the transferring of the Civil War of Greece to Cyprus, and the rise of enosis as an irredentist claim as well as a claim that had different meanings across the ideologies, gave the opportunity for the revival of the political role of the Church as ethnarchic and nationalist, and for the creation of an ethnarchic party under its leadership. Makarios, Bishop of Kitium then, 22 For an analysis of the ‘Ethnarchic role’ of the Church of Cyprus in the context of British modernity, see: Sia Anagnostopoulou, ‘ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƩ Ư ƥƨƭơƱƷƩƪƼƲ ƴƧƲ ƱƼƫƯƲ’ (The Church of Cyprus and its Ethnarchic Role), Syghrona Themata, 68-69-70, 1998-199, 198-227. For the colonial, communalist system, see: Anagnostopoulou, ‘Millet, ethnicity, colonial community’. 23 The Archbishop acted as president of the council, while the Bishops and the Abbots of the Monasteries of Kykkos and Machairas acted as ex officio members. Some laymen were also included. 24 In fact, on 26 January 1930, a large assembly took place in the Archbishopric, which founded the National Organisation of Cypriots (EOK), with the aim of achieving enosis. After Palmer’s authoritarian government was instituted, this party ceased to operate. 25 Andrekos Varnava & Christalla Yakinthou, ‘Cyprus: Political Modernity and the Structures of Democracy in a Divided Island,’ in The Oxford Handbook of Local and Regional Democracy in Europe, (eds.) John Loughlin, Frank Hendriks and Anders Lidstrom, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2011, 455-77. When the British proposed the granting of a constitution and invited the Cypriots to the Consultative Assembly in 1947, the right-wing, with the guidance of Greece, refused, despite its pro-British sentiment, because the democratic processes contained the danger of the political domination of AKEL. Enosis, then, as an irredentist and not as an anti-colonial claim, legitimized the rejection of the constitution. See Katsiaounis, ƅƩơƳƪƥưƴƩƪƞ.

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was the first one to realise that a precondition for the national-religious political domination of the Church on Orthodox society was the reorganisation and the modernisation of its ethnarchic role. In fact, in the meeting of the Holy Synod, on 13 July 1948, when the formation of the Ethnarchy Council was decided, with the Archbishop at its head, Makarios III proposed the creation of a much more flexible executive instrument, on the model of a modern political party. Thus, the Office of the Ethnarchy (Political Office or Committee of the Ethnarchy) was created, with Makarios III himself as President, the Bishop of Kyrenia, Kyprianos, as Vice-President, Xenophon Koumbarides as Secretary, and eight more lay members,26 exclusively from the right-wing. The ideological references of this peculiar ethnarchic party were clear: conservative, anti-communist, nationalist, to which both the extreme and moderate nationalists and even Anglophile conservatives converged. Makarios began his political activity in this ‘party’ and contributed to its organisation, imitating its rival, AKEL (as well as the Fascist examples of Europe of the 1920s and 1930s), in creating a party instrument of expression, the journal ‘Elliniki Kypros’ (‘Greek Cyprus), which was published for the first time in November 1949 under the direction of Nikos Kranidiotis, and in organising an ethnarchic youth, Orthodox Christian Union (OHEN), to rival the leftist youth of AKEL. In a rally, organised on 3 October 1948 by the Ethnarchy, Makarios made his first public speech, in which he offered his political and ideological positions, as well as the political principles of the Ethnarchy. Today’s popular rally, the outburst of an enslaved people with unenslaved souls, is… the beginning of new struggles for our national restoration… The Ethnarchic Church, which, in our turbulent national history, with its black robes, became the blue and white flag in all our noble struggles, has called you today…to give an oath of immovable faith to the unionist banner, which it raised… Organized and disciplined under the flag of the Ethnarchy, let’s continue our noble struggle until goddess liberty lights up these enslaved skies… and the Cypriot ship reaches the port of enosis.27

Thus the Ethnarchy, under the leadership of the Church, tapped its ideological arsenal from enosist irredentism, as well as from anti-

For the lay members, see Nicos Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƗƱƼƭƩơ. ƋƽưƱƯƲ 1950-1960 (Difficult Years. Cyprus 1950-1960), Estia Athens, 1981, 28. For a detailed presentation of the members of the ethnarchic council, see ƂƍƂƆ, Europe-Grèce, vol. 125: Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques’, 9/9/1955. 27 See speech in Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, III, 12-4. 26

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communism,28 to which Makarios absolutely subscribed.29 With this ideology and after a trip to Athens, where the climate for enosis was considered auspicious,30 in 1950, Makarios led the organisation of a referendum (15 January 1950) on enosis. The Ethnarchy undertook to express in a homogenising way the claims of the most radical part of the right, CoOrdinating Committee of the Cyprus Struggle (SEKA),31 and to ‘cleanse’ the community from the influence of AKEL, which had first mooted a referendum. Through the Ethnarchy, the Church of Cyprus attempted to position itself as the only ‘national and political’ agent of the will of the people. Its role was defined as that of ‘the natural leader of this unredeemed Greek island’. Reinventing a historical past, which it did not have, the ethnarchic Church received retrospectively the mission of the historical spokesman ‘of the Free Motherland’: The Church in slave Hellenism has, in addition to its religious, also a political duty. This is an ancient tradition for the Church to substitute for Free Motherland… Since the time of Fatih Mehmed… the Turkish Governments, through berats, recognized the ethnarchic rights of the Church and the British Government, since the Occupation of Cyprus, has respected these and has never questioned them.32

The Referendum was a decisive step in the political predominance of the Ethnarchy, around which was being unified the Right of authoritarian and nationalist populism, with which the Church made common cause, in order to consolidate a political role.

The Holy Synod of 13 July 1948 denounced Communism as ‘a materialist and atheistic theory’ and issued a relevant encyclical to the people. 29 His article entitled ‘ƂƩ ƨƵƳƟơƩ ƴƧƲ ƆƫƫƜƤƯƲ ơươƩƴƯƽƭ ƤƩƪơƩƯƳƽƭƧƭ’, ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƞ ƋƽưƱƯƲ, 8, 1949, published in Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, III, 16-7. Also, for his declarations after his visit to Makronissos, an island where Communists were being exiled, see Georges Pikros, ƔƯ ƗƱƯƭƩƪƼ ƴƧƲ ƍơƪƱƯƭƞƳƯƵ (The Chronicle of Makronissos), Athens 1975, 204. 30 ‘The whole of Hellenism, in one body, from our Kings to the last citizen…of free Motherland…are participating in our struggle for liberation’, ‘ƆƣƪƽƪƫƩƯƲ ưƥƱƟ ƤƩƥƭƥƱƣƥƟơƲ ƤƧƬƯƸƧƶƟƳƬơƴƯƲ, 8 ƅƥƪƝƬƢƱƧ 1949’, in Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, III, 19-20. 31 On 23 June 1949 the Co-Ordinating Committee of the Cyprus Struggle (SEKA) was founded by the parties and other organisations of the Right. Panagiotis Papadimitris, ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƞ ƆƣƪƵƪƫƯươƟƤƥƩơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 1878-1978 (Historical Encyclopaedia of Cyprus, 1878-1978), VIII, Epifaniou, Nicosia, 1980, 234. 32 The Press Conference (Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, III, 27-30), in which the ethnarchy triumphantly announced the results: Enosis had received 96% of the vote, in this open voting. 28

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The Reinvention of Ethnarchism The election of Makarios to the Archiepiscopal Throne, on 20 October 1950, as Makarios III, came when the Ethnarchy was in its infancy but also on the ascendency. Unified for the first time to such a degree, the right-wing fanatically supported this vigorous, modern and educated prelate,33 whom they regarded as the most able to impose the ethnarchic space vis-a-vis AKEL.34 Makarios, elected, according to the system of the Church of Cyprus, with a mixed electoral process (participation of both clerics and laymen), became ex officio the head of the Ethnarchy. At the same time, he was taking over the leadership of one of the most important economic forces of the island, the Church, which possessed ‘5.5% of the total of arable lands and an important rate of forest and urban property’,35 and controlled education, charitable organisations, and communal institutions in general. Already in his speech upon his enthronement, Makarios displayed full consciousness of his ethnarchic role: …I know which expectations the pious people of this Greek island lay on me. The clergy expects spiritual and moral elevation, improvement of its living conditions. The laymen hope… for the rebuilding of the moral ruins… and for the understanding of their problems. As for our enslaved Motherland, it requires a forceful struggle for national restoration.36

This triptych of his ethnarchic program, the unity of the people, which had been ruptured by the Communists, the moral and economic elevation of the lower clergy,37 and the national restoration, expressed his conception of the mission that he was undertaking. A charismatic man because of the moral power of enosis, and the economic power of the Church, it was not difficult 33 Makarios’ opponent was the Bishop of Kyrenia, who led an extreme nationalist group. For Makarios III’s election see Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, II, 145-7. 34 For AKEL’s reaction to Makarios III’s election, see ‘ƓƞƬƥƱơ Ƨ ƴƥƫƥƵƴơƟơ ưƱƜƮƧ ƴƧƲ ƥƪƫƯƣƩƪƞƲ ƶƜƱƳơƲ ƣƩơ ƴƧƭ ơƭƜƤƥƩƮƧ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ’ (Today, the Last Act of the Electoral Farce for the Archbishop’s Election), Neos Demokratis, 20 October 1950. The French Archives indicate that there may have been fraud in the Archiepiscopal Elections. See ƂƍƂƆ, Europe-Grèce, vol. 125: Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques’, 9 September 1955: ‘His election was triumphant, with several frauds. The electoral lists in the villages were cleansed of Communists and anti-clericals’. 35 Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 16. 36 ‘ƆƭƨƱƯƭƩƳƴƞƱƩƯƲ ƫƼƣƯƲ, ƌƥƵƪƹƳƟơ, 20/10/1950’, Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, III, 41-2. 37 Around 30% of the lower clergy were under the influence of AKEL, see, ƂƍƂƆ, Europe-Grèce, vol. 125: Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques’, 9 September 1955.

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for him to dominate a predominantly rural society, the leadership of which, on the right and left, possessed neither his education and prestige nor his acumen. On the other hand, the turbulent era, in which he was elected archbishop, necessitated the appearance of a charismatic leader,38 with a salvation mission. As enosis, the timeless irredentist claim of the ethno-religious community, elevated the role of Makarios to that of a saviour, equally the leader of the Ethnarchy elevated enosis into a sacred claim. The mutuality between enosis and ethnarchism constitutes the core in any analysis of Makarios’ politics. However, in this first phase of his ethnarchic career (1950-9), Makarios was not the undisputed leader of the community. The altering of the meaning of the 19th and early 20th century concept of ethnarchism in the second half of the 20th century was not easy. Firstly, the Church of Cyprus, in order to exercise unchallenged authority as the natural spokesman of the ‘national centre’ (Greece) in Cyprus, had to form, in conjunction with Athens, a common national program, whose spiritual representative would be the Church itself and the political agent would be Athens. In the middle of the 20th century, when Cypriot society had been radicalised and various groups39 or parties laid claim to authority within the community, in concert with the Church or against it, and at a time when Greece had long ago abandoned the Meghali Idea as the official mission of the Greek State, Makarios reinvented ethnarchism. Until 1940, when most of the Cypriot rural society was being sold the enosis policy as part of its faith in God, and Greece was the paradise of the afterlife, the Church, with its ethnarch at its head, reproduced an eternal mission, which had been assigned to it by nature and by the national centre. However, in the second half of the 20th century, enosis had been transformed into a radical claim with various ideological and political references. The refashioned ethnarchic role of the Church was again finding a political role, but the archbishop was still not considered the only leading political figure. The antagonisms and disputes as to the political tactics for enosis were great, from extreme to moderate, while the traditional mechanisms of the Church were proving to be absolutely inadequate for the claim to enosis, in a world divided 38 For an analysis based on Max Weber, see Kyriakos Markides, The Rise and the Fall of Cyprus Republic, Yale University Press, 1977, 35. See also, Chrysostomos Pericleous, ƔƯ ƅƧƬƯƸƞƶƩƳƬơ ƴƯƵ 2004. ƔƯ ưƥƱƩƶƥƱƥƩơƪƼ ƪơƩ ƤƩƥƨƭƝƲ ưƥƱƩƢƜƫƫƯƭ. (The Referendum of 2004. The Regional and International Environment), Papazissis, Athens 2007, 189-91. 39 The Bishop of Kyrenia, an extreme pro-enosist, the Bishop of Paphos, a moderate, and various opponents of Makarios, like Themistoklis Dervis and Michalakis Pissas (General Secretary of SEK), as well as nationalist groups, undermined the unity of the Ethnarchy, see ƂƍƂƆ, Europe-Grèce, vol. 125 : Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques’, 9 September 1955.

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into two camps and with an international organisation, the United Nations, in which the problems of decolonisation were resolved. First of all, the union of Cyprus with another country, Greece, presupposed both the consent of that country, as well as the international legitimisation of its claim in the framework of the UN. The irredentist patterns of the early 20th century did not fall into the anti-colonial principles of the international community. Second, enosis needed legitimising as a democratic, anti-colonial claim of the Cypriot people, which demanded its right to self-determination. Given these realities, the Church’s and Makarios’ ethnarchism depended on their ability to modernize the traditional patterns, in a way that enosis would be nationally and internationally democratically legitimized and acceptable. In the beginning of the 1950s, Makarios did not have any clear mandate from the ‘national centre’. Although the Greek State did not include enosis in its official foreign policy,40 it also did not reject it: ‘It is not possible for Free Greece to turn a deaf ear, when the desire of any part of unredeemed Hellenism, which constitutes a majority within its geographic space, to be unified with the Motherland is expressed’, stressed a resolution of the Council of the Greek political parties at the end of 1951.41 This fundamental contradiction of Greek policy allowed various centres of authority – the Palace, the Church of Greece, nationalist groups – to legitimise their activity in the name of Cyprus, an unredeemed part of Hellenism.42 Since Makarios could not receive a clear mandate from the ‘national centre’, he sought it from the Panhellenic nation. Retaining his official contacts with the Greek government, as required by his ethnarchic role, simultaneously he developed another network of alliances with the nationalist groups and organisations, which were able to mobilise, in the name of enosis, large parts of the Greek people. Already in his first trip to Athens (March40 On 13 May 1951, Makarios made his first visit to Athens as archbishop and met Prime Minister Sophocles Venizelos, who made clear Greece’s position: Cyprus would be incorporated in the framework of Greece’s alliance with Britain and British strategic needs. This was also confirmed in 1952, when Nikolaos Plastiras became Prime Minister, and Greece and Turkey joined NATO, and so he told Makarios that enosis could undermine this process. 41 Text in Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 53-4. 42 Enosis enjoyed the support of the Greek monarchy under King Paul, the Church of Greece, the para-religious organisations and the ‘national clubs’. This distance between the official Greek Government and the various national forces became apparent, when the ‘ethnarchic embassy’ arrived in Greece, in order to hand the results of the referendum on enosis. Papadimitris, ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƞ ƆƣƪƵƪƫƯươƟƤƥƩơ, IX, 21-9.

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April 1951), with the network of the Church of Greece, the para-religious groups and various trade unions at his disposal, he addressed, in a public speech on 15 March 1951, the Panhellenic nation, and in his press conference on 6 April 1951, he set the Cyprus question as a matter concerning ‘the just struggle of the Greek Cypriot people for its national restoration’. And as such, it was a matter between Greece and the UN. In this first public appearance in Athens, he delimited the content of the Cypriot people and in it the Turkish Cypriots were not included: ‘the Greeks of Cyprus gave the opportunity… to understand that, even with Cyprus unified with Greece, they will live in peace with us, just like the Turks of Western Thrace live’. Also excluded were the Communists: ‘the [British] Government did not take any measures against them, as it does not take any now. On the contrary, it has suspicious dealings with the Communists. Perhaps it is doing this because it suits the British Government that the Cypriot people remain divided’.43 In the same year, he came into contact with extremist nationalist networks in Athens,44 in order to investigate the possibility of the radicalisation of the enosis demand in a dynamic manner. He met with Colonel George Grivas, the leader of the extremist anti-communist and nationalist organisation ‘X’, who was of Cypriot birth, and the decision for the coming of the latter to Cyprus on 10 June 1951 to undertake reconnaissance in preparation for an armed struggle. Thus, Makarios followed two paths in his attempt to re-historicise the ethnarchism of the archbishop in the second half of the 20th century: on the one hand the political and on the other the conspiratorial and radical. As for the political one, he formed a ‘national council’, the Pancyprian National Assembly (1952) under the aegis of the Ethnarchy. This supposed national instrument of expression of Cypriot nationalism, in which ‘were elected in a common meeting of the members of the administrative councils of the nationalist groups and organisations of each community and based on the declaration of one representative for each one thousand inhabitants’, was convened ad hoc, so that the people would legitimise the decisions and actions of the Ethnarchy. According to the resolution of the First Pancyprian National Assembly (25 March 1952):45 a) Enosis expressed the popular will, b) the devotion and loyalty of the people to the Ethnarchy was democratically legitimised, c) the rejection of any proposal by the British for a Constitution constituted a patriotic duty, d) the Greek state was recognized as a spokesman of the will of the unredeemed part of the nation, and e) recourse ‘ƅƧƬƯƳƩƯƣƱơƶƩƪƞ ƅƩƜƳƪƥƸƧ, Ƃƨƞƭơ, 6/4/1951’, Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, III, 63-6. For the effect on Makarios of veteran officers of the Greek Army and of extreme right-wing circles of Athens, see Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 55. 45 Text in Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, I, 170. 43 44

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to the UN for enosis constituted the popular demand for the freedom of the Cypriots. At the same time, the Ethnarchy started a Panhellenic and international campaign of propaganda for the justice of enosis. The network used in this first phase was the ecumenical and ecclesiastical, as well as Greek diaspora networks. In 1952, the Patriarch of Alexandria in Egypt and the Patriarch of Antioch in Syria facilitated Makarios’ contacts with the leadership of each country,46 he appealed to the Greek Cypriots and the Greeks in those countries to form organisations of ‘Cypriot Struggle’ for the promotion of enosis. Also, Cypriot and Greek diaspora organisations in the US were placed at the service of the ‘struggle’: ‘the Cypriots are Greeks, but they are slaves. They are slaves and they are seeking freedom. They are Greeks and they are asking for their Union with Greece… We will claim our national rights in every possible way’,47 he declared to the Greek journalists of New York on his US tour in 1952. However, Makarios mainly focused his activity on Greece. The registering of the Cypriot question on the agenda of the UN General Assembly constituted his first aim, which the Greek government hesitated to adopt. The mobilisation of the Panhellenic nation was the only weapon of pressure that Makarios could use vis-a-vis the Greek government. Makarios underlined emphatically in his speech in Athens on 25 July 1952, assigning thus to the Greek people the great national duty: People of Greece…I know that you did not want to be thanked, because… you feel your participation in the Cypriot struggle as your National duty. For me, however, whom the will of God and the love of the Cypriot people designated as head of the struggle, it is a duty… to express to you my thanks… You did all that was possible up to now, people of the Free Motherland… There is something… that you should still do… To render legitimate and possible your demand for recourse to the United Nations. In a democratic country, like Greece, you are the spokesmen, you are sovereign… Therefore I am entrusting to you the handling, on the Greek side, of the sacred cause of Cyprus.48

With the Church of Greece at his side, which pulled the strings in Greece for the national question of Cyprus, between 1952 and 1955, Makarios travelled throughout Greece, while with the Panhellenic Committee for the Union of Cyprus, under the leadership of Spyridon, Archbishop of Greece, the religious leadership undertook the role of the national religious expression of Ibid., 170-1. Ibid., 186. 48 Makarios’ speech in Athens, transmitted on the radio on 25 July 1952, in ibid., III, 108-9. 46 47

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the will of the Panhellenic nation.49 Makarios, appropriating the historical role that the Patriarchate of Constantinople had definitively abandoned,50 was becoming the emblematic figure of the ethno-religious leadership of the nation. Besides his political approach, Makarios also developed activity of a conspiratorial nature, with extremist groups, preparing an armed struggle in Cyprus.51 In fact, in secret contact in Athens with the Committee of the Struggle of Cyprus (EAK), which constituted the organisational nucleus of armed struggle in Cyprus,52 he gave, on 7 March 1953, the oath of fidelity to the organisation, which resolved to undertake an armed struggle in Cyprus. The leadership of the struggle was assigned to George Grivas. The question, thus, which has occupied historiography, mainly in Greece, concerning the position of Makarios vis-a-vis armed struggle, is a moot point. The role of the ethnarch, which Makarios claimed, forced him into alliances with the entire nationalist spectrum. Enosis and the Cyprus question brought together Greek and Greek Cypriot nationalist groups. Makarios was legitimising, through enosis, the historicity of his ethnarchic role and, through the Church of Greece, the legitimisation of his activity in Greece. The latter, through Makarios and enosis, was legitimising its involvement in Greek politics. On the other hand, personalities like Grivas, whose activity in the leadership of the extremist organisation ‘X’ had demeaned him in Greek society, despite being anticommunist, found a national role in the name of Cyprus, and Makarios saw in Grivas the ‘ultimate weapon’ of pressure for the delimitation of his authority. This relationship of mutuality, however, was also creating mutual 49 For the role of the Church of Greece in the mobilisation of Greeks, especially in Northern Greece, see: AMAE, Europe/Grèce, vol. 141, Consulat General de France à Salonique, Salonique le 21 September 1955. 50 Makarios’ visit to Rhodes, where he spoke at a meeting of the local ecclesiastical authorities, angered Turkey. Rhodes belongs, ecclesiastically, to the Patriarchate of Constantinople and Turkey regarded the Patriarchate as responsible. See AMAE, Europe/Grèce, vol. 140, Ambassade de France en Turquie, Ankara, le 22/1/1954. On the other hand, the Patriarch of Constantinople, Athenagoras, was pressured by both sides, by the Turkish Government to which he was supposed to owe his allegiance, and by the Greeks of Istanbul, who considered his stance on enosis lukewarm, see AMAE, Europe/Grèce, vol. 140, Ambassade de France en Turquie, Istanbul, le 7/9/1954. 51 On 21 July 1952, Makarios chaired a secret meeting in Athens, which decided on the formation of two wings, one military and the other political. Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 58. 52 The fact that the armed struggle in Cyprus was prepared in Athens was not a secret, not even for foreign diplomats, see AMAE, Europe/Grèce, vol. 125, Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques, le 9/9/1955’.

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pressures, particularly since Grivas was of a deeply authoritarian and rightwing extremist ideology. His visits to Cyprus, sometimes secretly from Makarios, sometimes not, the recruitment of young Cypriots for the ‘struggle’, and the transfer of weapons to the island, forced Makarios to increasingly radicalise his politics within Cyprus. Makarios, however, sought new, modern tools for exercising his ethnarchic policies, compatible with the international environment. He broadened his alliances in the international community, particularly in the UN, where former colonies exercised important influence. The first article of the resolution of the plenary session of the 7th General Assembly of the UN on 16 December 1952 for the rights of the colonised territories, with which ‘the right of self-determination of peoples’ was recognized, paved a new road, which Makarios did not leave unexploited. This was testified by the ‘crusade’ of information that he undertook, both directly to the UN, as well as in Greece, for the inclusion of the enosis question on the agenda of the UN General Assembly,53 as well as by the contacts with the representatives of the UN member-states, and with the leaders of former colonies. Enosis was now claimed within the framework of the UN principles, as the expressed will of the Greek Cypriot people, in the framework of exercising its right for selfdetermination. However, as it appears from letters of both Prime Minister Papagos to the UN General Secretary (on 16 August 1954),54 as well as of Makarios in support of the Greek claim (on 22 August 1954), the arguments presented to prove the Greekness of Cyprus displayed enosis as an irredentist claim – and not an anti-colonial one. The argument that Cyprus was ‘itself Greece’, and that it was in ‘natural solidarity, which unites one and the same people, the people of free Greece and the people of Cyprus’,55 hampered the claim to enosis as an anti-colonial right to self-determination. On the Cypriot level, enosis, as the right to self-determination of the Greek Cypriot community, represented by an ethnarchic (ethno-religious) agent, sharpened the colonial communalism imposed by the British. The claim for self-determination in the name of the people presupposed anticolonial struggle, in the framework of which the people would be designated as Cypriot (neither Greek nor Turkish) in secular terms. Ethnarchic, irredentist enosis radicalised nationalistically the colonial communal distinction, which 53 After many hesitations the government of Alexandros Papagos asked, on 16 August 1954, the UN General Secretary to include the Cyprus question in the agenda of the next General Assembly. Makarios as ‘national leader’ of the Greek Cypriots supported this in a letter to the General Secretary on 11 February 1954. 54 The full text of Papagos’ letter is in Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, I, 244-7. 55 Ibid.

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was also reinforced by the Turkish Cypriot community. Under the influence of the Müfti, as religious leader, and Dr FazÖl Küçük, as political leader, and adopting the weapons of the other community, a ‘national instrument’ of propaganda outside of Cyprus, an organisation of youth and of the labour unions, to politically homogenise the community,56 the Turkish Cypriot community became a ‘rival’ of the Greek Cypriot one. Its leadership, just like that of the Greek Cypriots, was inspired by the extremist nationalism and anti-communism, which flourished in Turkey in the 1940s and was reinforced in the 1950s, in the framework of the Cold War. With this ideology, every bi-communal political institution or mechanism was denounced as anti-national and communist. Thus, the struggle of the Turkish Cypriot community against enosis was identified with British interests and delegitimised enosis as a Cypriot, anti-colonial claim.

From Irredentist Ethnarchism to Independence The continuous radicalisation of the two communities forced Makarios into a constant radicalisation of his ethnarchic role. With the ‘oath of Phaneromeni’, which he gave on 22 August 1954 in front of God and the people of the Church, Makarios was self-proclaimed leader of the struggle against tyranny, with enosis as his banner: Under these sacred cupolas, let’s take today the sacred oath. We will remain faithful until death to our national claim. Without concessions or any deals, we will despise violence and tyranny. With courage, we will raise our moral posture above the little temporary setbacks, seeking one and only goal, targeting one and only goal, Enosis and only Enosis.57

This direct and radical redefinition of ethnarchism and enosis was dictated, among others, by the visible danger that the granting to Cyprus of a constitution and a representative system by the British was posing for ethnarchism. In 1954, the new British Governor of Cyprus, Sir Robert Armitage, dynamically brought back the discussion concerning the granting of a constitution, which had restarted in 1953.58 However, the democratisation of political life in Cyprus, through a constitution and representative 56 For a detailed report on the Turkish Cypriot community, its leadership and its activity, see AMAE, Europe/Grèce, vol. 125, Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques, le 9/9/1955’. 57 Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, III, 156-8. 58 On 28 July 1954, the new governor, Sir Robert Armitage, declared on radio the British government’s intention to grant a constitution and to take measures for the island’s economic recovery. See ibid., I, 232-3.

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institutions, would potentially undermine the vertical communal distinction and, consequently, the sacredness of roles and institutions like the Ethnarchy. In fact, the social and political realities in Cyprus favoured democratisation and threatened intra-communal unity59 based on religion, which he was trying to impose. Enosis ran the danger of taking on the character of a partisan and not a sacred claim. The categorical rejection of the constitution, as a national act of resistance against the tyrant, was a major precondition for the salvation of ethnarchism. We, as Archbishop and Ethnarch of the Greek Cypriot people, agent of its will and appointee for the safeguarding of its inalienable national rights, are strongly protesting against the application in our Island of such a policy and we are declaring once more categorically that the Cypriot people will never cease to aspire with all its strength, and according to the principles of justice and self-determination of peoples, to its national liberation, through its Union with Mother Greece.

In this way, Makarios gave the definition of his ethnarchic role, and according to him, he was delegitimising the constitution as an anti-national, tyrannical act,60 while those who supported it were branded as traitors.61 At the same time, with the convocation of a Pancyprian National Assembly, he laid the boundaries of the national legitimacy of democratisation in Cyprus: any claim for democratisation which did not include enosis, with the Ethnarchy as agent, would constitute treason against the motherland. A new national-religious dogma was born: the dogma of ethnarchism, a canon, according to which democracy and freedom were characteristics innate to the community, as long as it was devoted to the Ethnarch, the unique legitimate agent of enosis. At the same time, a new ethnarchic principle was being consolidated: the ethnarchic enosis, a democratic, and potentially revolutionary, anti-colonial principle. In this framework, the radicalisation of enosis towards the direction of a struggle limited in scope was absolutely legitimate, for Makarios, as well as

59 According to the estimation of the French diplomatic authorities, a parliament in Cyprus would have the following composition: 25% Turkish Cypriots, 25% Communists, 10% constitutionalists against Enosis, 40% nationalists ‘probably divided into two groups’. AMAE, Europe/Grèce, vol. 125, Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques, le 9/9/1955’. 60 Extract from Makarios’ letter to the Colonial Secretary, 7 August 1954, on the occasion of the intention of the British to bring back the ‘Resistance Law’. Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, III, 153-4. 61 Makarios’ proclamation on 29 July 1954, against the constitution, in ibid., 151-2.

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for the Greek government,62 both as a weapon in the UN against the British government, as well as for its influence on international public opinion.63 However, the armed struggle of EOKA, which began on 1 April 1955, led by Grivas (Dighenis Akritas), and with the consent and support of Makarios, was a peculiar irredentist struggle, whose ideological preconditions were set from the outset by Grivas. The struggle brought out values of conspiratorial nationalism, which not only were anti-democratic, but also undermined the ethnarchic unity of the community.64 The goal of the struggle itself – enosis – which for most Cypriots was the certificate of their ethnarchic identity, became, in the framework of the ideology of its leader, a criterion of nationalism, as it was clearly defined by his declared anti-communism.65 The conscription of youths, who belonged ‘to ecclesiastical organisations and religious clubs, and who were, therefore, imbued with right-wing nationalist ideals and the meghali idea traditions of the Church and the Nation’,66 as well as the cutting off of the struggle from its social references,67 radicalised it towards a direction which surpassed the capabilities of control by a religious authority. However, the EOKA struggle, despite its peculiarities, was taking on the character of an anti-colonial struggle, in the framework of which, especially the youth, were acquiring a radical, anti-colonial conscience. The violence with which the British confronted its fighters, contributed decisively towards this direction, while, at the same time, it imposed EOKA internationally as an anti-colonial movement, at least during the first phase of the struggle.68 Thus, in the course of its development, the struggle of EOKA 62 On the role of Greek politics on the organisation of the EOKA struggle, see AMAE, Europe/Grèce, v. 125, Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques’, 9/9/1955. 63 For Makarios’ aims in relation to the EOKA struggle, see Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 79-82. 64 According to Spyros Papageorgiou, a member of ‘X’ and of EOKA, the latter ‘was a subsidiary organisation of ‘X’’. ‘Men, things, ideals…bind “X” with Cyprus and EOKA…The leader himself is of Cypriot extraction. His collaborators were the same in both struggles. The dominant ideal of both organisations were the aggrandizement and the glory of Greece. But there were also the weapons. The weapons, with which EOKA started its struggle in 1955, were the weapons of “X”, which had been hidden ten years earlier in Athens’, Papageorgiou, Ɛ ƄƱƟƢơƲ ƪơƩ Ƨ ‘Ɨ’, Athens 2004, 17. 65 For Grivas’ view of the Communists, see Spyros Papageorgiou, ƂƋƆƌ, ƴƯ ƜƫƫƯ ƋƋƆ (AKEL, the other KKE), Athens 1984, 335-6. 66 Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 74. 67 For the reasons that did not allow for social massification through the EOKA struggle, see Markides, The Rise and Fall of Cyprus Republic, 17. 68 The Political Committee of the Arab League (3 September 1955) decided that at the next UN General Assembly Arab representatives would support enosis. Cf. AMAE, Europe/Grèce, 1955, Cairo, 4 September 1955.

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moulded a new reality, which surpassed the initial goals of the political authorities of Greece and Cyprus and forced them to change their stance, according to Grivas’ aims. The struggle of EOKA claimed its place next to the Revolution of 1821 or the great heroic moments of Greek history, and Grivas claimed the role of an emblematic figure, which embodied not only enosis, but also the ideals of the nation. EOKA’s enosis, then, included the ethnarchic, but also surpassed it. It was taking an irredentist-military character, not easily managed by the ethnarch. The underground antagonism between Grivas and Makarios was not long in coming. From 1955 onwards, Makarios, with the EOKA struggle as a weapon, intensified his attempts to impose enosis as an international anti-colonial problem. His participation in the first Afro-Asian Conference, which took place in Bandung, Indonesia, in April 1955, where the foundations were laid for a Third World movement (Conference of the Non-Aligned in Belgrade in 1961), as well as his visit to Gamal Abdel Nasser in Egypt, which for years served as a source of inspiration for Makarios, fashioned a profile of an anticolonial leader. However, the internationalisation of enosis in the UN as an anti-colonial claim was undermined by the claim itself. Greece, ‘as the agent of the Panhellenic will’, incorporated enosis in its own political agenda, depending on its obligations and alliances. Makarios’ attempt to turn enosis into a Cypriot matter, i.e. as a matter which was ‘non-political…but clearly a question of self-determination’, which only had to do with the British government and the Cypriot people, ran against the claim the Greek government had, in the framework of enosis, the role of the political agent of the will of the Greek Cypriot people. Makarios, already since the summer of 1955, had started to formulate a peculiar form of ethnarchism – that of the political authority over Hellenism shared with the ‘national centre’. ‘The Ethnarchy is facing the situation without any obligation towards the Greek government’, he mentioned in a Press Conference in Athens in July 1955,69 to continue that the Greek state had an obligation to function as a trustee70 of the nation. In this form, which was dictated by the complications created by enosis, Makarios attempted to appropriate, as an ethnarch, political authority over the unredeemed nation – of Cyprus – and to grant to the Greek state the role of executor of the decisions of the Ethnarchy. Despite Makarios’ efforts, enosis did not correspond to anti-colonialism, as this was perceived mainly by the representatives of the former colonised countries of the UN, for whom it disrupted the unity of the ‘Cypriot people, 69 70

Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, I, 307. Makarios speech in Athens (11 July 1955), ibid., 302.

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that is of Greek- and Turkish-Cypriots’.71 Moreover, enosis facilitated the position of Britain, which sought to define the Cyprus question as a ‘NATO problem’72 between the British, the Turks and the Greeks.73 The Tripartite Conference of Britain, Greece and Turkey convened by the British in London (29 August -5 September 1955), as well as the rejection of the claim of Greece to include the problem in the agenda of the UN General Assembly (21 September 1955) showed that Britain managed to turn Cyprus into a military link of the Atlantic Alliance,74 and the Cyprus question into a question of conflict between two countries of NATO – Greece and Turkey. In this framework, enosis offered itself for the reproduction, at a local level (Greece – Turkey, Greek-Cypriots – Turkish-Cypriots), of all the stereotypes of the Greco-Turkish War of 1919-1922. The Cyprus problem was taking the dimensions of the age-old Greco-Turkish conflict,75 while a powerful Turkish ‘public opinion’ was formed against enosis and Makarios. Formulations like ‘the Greeks will have to deal with us, like in Sakarya 33 years ago’ or ‘the Ethnarch of Cyprus is thirsty for blood. He has awoken, with his improper conduct, the age-old antagonism between the Muslim and the gavur’, did not augur well,76 as was proven by the furious attacks of a Turkish mob against the Greeks of Istanbul in September 1955. 71 See the speech of the Indian representative, Krishna Menon, in the 10th Synod of the General Assembly of the UN (September 1955), ibid., 240. Also France, despite the fact that it considered that ‘although the right of the Cypriots to autonomy and self-government is not challenged, this is completely different from enosis’. See AMAE, Europe/Grèce, vol. 125, Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques’, 9 September 1955. 72 For an excellent analysis on the change of NATO’s policy in the Middle East, see ‘Guerre Froide en Proche-Orient’, Le Monde, 30 November 1955; also, ‘Bilan occidental’, Le Monde, 18, 19 December 1955. 73 After pressure from the USA, Turkey and Great Britain, the UN General Assembly (15 December 1954), with 49 votes for and 11 abstentions, approved the resolution, according to which: ‘the General Assembly…decides not to examine further the matter: Application under the aegis of the United Nations of the principle of equal rights and self-determination in the case of Cyprus’. See Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 72. The resolution of the UN General Assembly on 23 September 1955 was the same. 74 ‘L’engrenage de Chypre’, Le Monde, 9 September 1955. 75 The Turkish press accused Greece of inertia on enosis. Newspapers like Cumhuriyet accused it as an enemy of the West and that it approached the Soviet Union and the Arab World, while others (Vatan), on the other extreme, thought that it was used by Great Britain against Greek-Turkish friendship. See AMAE, Europe/Grèce, vol. 140, Ambassade de France en Turquie, Ankara, le 22 January 1954. 76 See the articles in Tercüman or Yeni Sabah, in AMAE, Europe/Grèce, vol. 140. Ambassade de France en Turquie, Istanbul, 10 September 1955.

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The problem with Makarios was aggravated when the British replaced Sir Robert Armitage with a military man, Sir John Harding, in order to reinforce the military character77 of the administration of Cyprus, in order to terminate the activity of EOKA, and to contain the political potency of the Ethnarchy through administrative reforms of controlled democratisation. In this complex political-military framework, in which enosis, instead of consolidating, undermined ethnarchism, Makarios reinforced the ethnarchic role possessed from its historical descent, and political and ideological flexibility. Ethnarchism, the product of an age when the ethnarch exercised kat’oikonomian politics with a political centre (the Ottoman Sultan), was endangered in an era of fragmentation of political centres. Makarios, then, developed the understanding of a multi-centre kat’oikonomian exercise of ethnarchic policy. Thus, since enosis, as was claimed by EOKA and the Greek government, threatened his authority,78 he tried to exercise kat’oikonomian politics with the British (in agreement with Greece). From the end of September 1955 and after the arrival of Harding in Cyprus, Makarios ‘abandoned for the first time the slogan ‘enosis and only enosis’ and accepted to co-operate with the British administration in a transitory constitution of self-government’,79 which he would formulate in co-operation with the British. Inaugurating his negotiations with Harding, Makarios inaugurated at the same time the political and ideological shift of ethnarchism. The abandonment of the ‘enosis and only enosis’ claim, as well as the gradual adoption of ‘self-government’ and ‘self-determination’, meant neither the abandonment of enosis nor the solution of the enosis question on these bases in co-operation with the British. It rather signified the beginning of the redefinition of ethnarchism in relation to enosis. Ethnarchism was gradually becoming autonomous from enosis. The latter existed eternally in the ethnarchic role, but the ethnarch had as his primary obligation the survival of his people.80 Therefore, the Greekness of Cyprus was not defined by enosis, but by the existence of the ethnarch, therefore ‘Hellenism exists as a national imperative, it exists as a moral imperative in the bowels of the inhabitants of this island and it is bequeathed from generation to generation… as a sacred legacy and as a valuable national capital’.81 The ethnarch had the final responsibility for 77 See ‘En confiant Chypre au field-marshal Harding Londres a choisit la fermeté’, Le Monde, 27 September 1955. 78 AMAE, Europe-Grèce, vol. 125, Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques’, 9 September 1955. 79 Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 115. 80 See his speech in the III Pancyprian National Assembly (26 August 1955). Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, I, 312. 81 Ibid., 314.

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claiming enosis: ‘there may be various conceptions about the details. However, it is I who am bearing the responsibility for this question’, stated Makarios.82 Makarios’ attempt to consolidate a centralist political field with the ethnarch at its centre also conceals his tendency of severing the bonds of the ethnarchic role from the ethnarchic Church, members of which had started to oppose Makarios,83 in the name of the abandonment of ‘enosis and only enosis’. Yet this effort remained incomplete, because the close collaboration of Grivas with the Bishop of Kyrenia and the prestige acquired by the latter in society, led Makarios to reject Harding’s proposals,84 and to further radicalise the EOKA campaign. The hard-line, military policy pursued by the British in outlawing AKEL (13 December 1955), circulating the ‘White Paper’ (5 March 1956), the exile of Makarios, together with Kyprianos, Bishop of Kyrenia, Papastavros Papagathangelou and Polycarpos Ioannides (9 March 1956), the execution of Michael Karaolis and Andreas Demetriou (10 May 1956), all showed the limits of a waning colonial power, for which the problem of colonisation was above all a problem of strategic and military balances. Greece, for its part, under new leader Constantine Karamanlis, was wavering between the realistic policy, which was dictated by its NATO alliances, and the national policy, which contained the nationalist dogma of the ‘national centre’. All of these, and especially the reinforcement of the military and political influence of Grivas85 because of Makarios’ exile, threatened ways the ethnarchic role in multiple. First, the absolute expression of the ‘national will’ by the ethnarch was challenged, and second, the ethnarchic unity of the community was threatened because of the atrocities of EOKA against communists and pacifists. Finally, through the radical opposition of the two communities,86 the unity of the Cypriot people, which the ethnarch claimed in the name of the Ibid., 338. The Bishop of Kyrenia and the secretary of the same bishopric, Polycarpos Ioannides, were among his most ardent opponents. See AMAE, Europe-Grece, vol. 125, Présidence du Conseil, ‘Bulletin de Renseignements Politiques’, 9 September 1955; Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, I, 332; Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 115. 84 For the reactions of Grivas and the Bishop of Kyrenia, and Makarios’ rejection of the Harding proposals, see Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 130-6 and 148-175. 85 Grivas’ founding of PEKA (Political Committee of Cypriot Struggle) in late 1956 shows his plan for political control. 86 The founding of VOLKAN in 1957, later renamed TMT (Türk Mukavemet TeûkilatÖ – Turkish Defence Force), started to promote partition as a counter to enosis. It dramatically reinforced the breach between the two communities, a breach which was leading to a Cypriot civil war. See Rauf Denktaû, ‘TMT (Türk Mukavemet Teskilati)’, in Dervis Manizade (ed.), KÖbrÖs. Dün, Bugün, YarÖn, Istanbul, 1975, 160-3; and Arif Hasan Tahsin, ƈ ƜƭƯƤƯƲ ƴƯƵ ƎƴƥƭƪƴƜƲ ƳƴƧƭ ƪƯƱƵƶƞ, Nicosia, 2001, 56. 82 83

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majority, was undermined. Under British pressure, the Cyprus question was in danger of developing into a problem of double self-determination.87 The ending of Makarios’ exile (28 March 1957) hastened the process that he had started. With his arrival in Athens (17 April 1957) and with the aura of a hero acquired by exile, Makarios readapted his policies, according to the demands of another centre: the UN. His political claims were democratised88 according to the decisions of the Political Committee of the UN General Assembly (22 February 1957).89 Proving the adaptability and flexibility of the ethnarchism of an Orthodox leader,90 Makarios was internationalising his ethnarchic role, as an agent of the will, not of unredeemed Hellenism, but of the people of Cyprus. Makarios noted in a letter he sent to the British Prime Minister on 28 May 1957: It is my wish to do the best that I can so that the aforementioned resolution of the United Nations may be implemented. I wish, therefore, to declare that…I am willing and ready to take part, in the name of the people of Cyprus, in bilateral negotiations on the basis of the implementation of the principle of self-determination…I remain…Makarios, Archbishop and Ethnarch of Cyprus.91

On the other hand, with his speech at Columbia University in New York (12 September 1957),92 he recreated the historicity of the ethnarch and reinvented the democratic tradition of the Cypriot Orthodox Church, according to which it always strived (against the Ottomans and against Communism) for the inherent Christian values of democracy and freedom. Thus, the concept of ethnarchic democracy was constructed in the framework of which any force of opposition was inherently anti-national and anti-democratic. The ethnarchic democracy of Makarios was strongly anti-Turkish, since the Turkish Cypriots were excluded, as a demographic minority, from it.93 For double self-determination see, Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 237-1. Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, I, 476-7. 89 Ibid., 480-1. 90 For the adaptability of the ethnarchism of the Orthodox religious leadership, see Anagnostopoulou, ‘1919-1922’, 373-420. 91 See letter in Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 272-3. 92 For text of Makarios’ speech, see Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, I, 501-6. 93 In the secret meeting of Makarios with the new governor, Sir Hugh Foot (20 February 1958), he proposed ‘that the Turks of Cyprus, who have become most audacious, should be discouraged’, while he did not hesitate to propose to Grivas to take care of them, if necessary. According to Makarios, the Turkish Cypriots were an irresolute minority and the instruments of Turkey and Britain. Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, I, 508-11. 87 88

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The incorporation of Cyprus into the Cold War94 and the partitionist policy of Turkey, which was used by Britain as they were pivotal members of the Baghdad Pact,95 rendered enosis a dangerous claim, both for the Greek Cypriots and for Greece.96 EOKA’s enosis, opposed to TMT’s partition, was forming the conditions of an intra-communal and inter-communal civil war in Cyprus97 as well as of a conflict between Greece and Turkey. Enosis delegitimised the right to self-determination and incriminated Greece as a permanent trouble-maker in the area.98 In this framework, the Greek government began direct negotiations with Turkey for a solution. It was at this moment that Makarios made his first great break with the past, by redefining once more his role, in complete identification with the line of the ‘national centre’, but also surpassing it. With his famous declaration to the Labour MP, Barbara Castle, on 16 September 1958, for an independent Cyprus, with enosis and partition banned, Makarios was accepting, in principle, the abolition of ethnarchism: political independence from the ‘national centre’ and the ideological renunciation of enosis. Independence presupposed the reestablishment of the political field of Cyprus in a way that both the colonial and communal fragmentation and the rupture brought about by the activity of EOKA and TMT would be neutralized. The Turkish Cypriots were defined as equal to their Greek Cypriot co-inhabitants of Cyprus: ‘The only way to come out of the present impasse is the granting of independence to the island, so that Cypriots, Greeks and Turks, would be able to decide about

At the sidelines of the 12th UN General Assembly, the American delegation insisted on the solution of the Cyprus problem, not in the framework of the UN, but of NATO, while the British reiterated the position of double self-determination. See Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 300-2. 95 Andrekos Varnava, ‘Reinterpreting Macmillan’s Cyprus Policy, 1957-1960’, The Cyprus Review, XXII, 1, 79-106. 96 Grivas was by now creating problems for the Greek government, according to the Greek Foreign Minister, who was annoyed that Grivas kept sending letters of advice, where in one he was told ‘not to accept slaps from unwarlike Turkey…It is preferable to fall fighting bravely, rather than to live…with the tolerance of others. That’s what we will do here in Cyprus, not accept any compromises’, Evangelos Averof-Tositsas, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƗơƬƝƭƹƭ ƆƵƪơƩƱƩƾƭ (ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼ 1950-1963) (History of Lost Opportunities), Estia, Athens, 1982, II, 77. 97For the conflict between EOKA and AKEL and the execution of leftists with the ac cusation of treason, as well as for the conflict between Greek-Cypriots and TurkishCypriots, see ibid., 60-3. 98 See the speech of Selim Sarper, chief of the Turkish delegation in the UN (1957), in ibid., 289. 94

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their future’,99 declared Makarios in November 1958 to journalists in New York. Also, the marginalised AKEL100 were now accepted as Cypriot. However, Makarios’ ‘shift’ towards independence did not signify a deep political break with the past, but ethnarchism’s adaptation to the needs of the present. It was a tactical move,101 in which ethnarchism was covered by independence. While, then, the ‘shift’ was inspired by the spirit of the UN, as was expressed by personalities like Krishna Menon102 vis-à-vis the NATO policy of partnership,103 in essence it was ethnarchic. To the NATO partnership of the two communities, Makarios opposed the full appropriation of the Cypriot people as an indivisible, Greek entity – historically, socially and politically: The eventual insistence of the British Government to impose…its…plan of a “partnership” will be met with the steady opposition of the Greek Cypriot people. Cyprus belongs to its inhabitants and its ‘inhabitants’ do not want ‘partners’ in the administration of their island. We will avert any attempt for the partition of the island. Through the centuries, Cyprus constitutes a unified whole. Historically, politically and socially, it is one indivisible unit.104

Finally, in 1959, Makarios, through the shift towards independence, hegemonically redefined his position in the national triangle of authority: Greek State – Makarios – Grivas,105 and his role in Cyprus, to Greek- and Turkish-Cypriots. I expressed my satisfaction to Prime-Minister Mr. Karamanlis and I congratulated him for the results of the Greco-Turkish negotiations in 99 Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ Ƅ, (Collected Works of Archbishop Makarios III), Nicosia 1993, III, Archibishop Makarios Foundation, Nicosia 1993, 443. 100 AKEL, in a declaration, published on 26 September 1958, declared: ‘Even though the Cypriot Left supports the new proposal…it will not stop the struggle for selfdetermination.’ Avgi, 27 September 1958. 101 Makarios to Grivas, Pavlides, I, 519. 102 For Memon’s view on independence, see Averof-Tositsas, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ, I, 282-3. 103 For the Macmillan Plan and Spaak’s intervention, see: Averof-Tositsas, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ, II, 46-59 and 70-4. 104 Extract from Makarios’ declaration to Swiss radio and television, on 31 January 1959, in Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ, III, 473. 105 Various sources confirm that Makarios was informed about the negotiations of the Greek government. For example, in Greek Parliament, on 27 February 1959, Karamanlis replied to the opposition’s accusations that he had signed in absentia of the Cypriot people, that Makarios knew everything, since he was constantly updated. See Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, I, 528-9. The same is claimed by Grivas in his memoirs, as well as Nicos Kranidiotis. See Kranidiotis, ƅƽƳƪƯƫơ ƷƱƼƭƩơ, 360-7.

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Zurich. The rapprochement of the opinions of the Governments of Greece and Turkey on the Cyprus Question, in a spirit of good will and understanding, will open a new period of freedom and prosperity in Cyprus for both the Greeks and the Turks of the island.106

On 1 March 1959, and after three years of absence from Cyprus, Makarios returned triumphantly, declaring before an ecstatic crowed, ‘We have won’, invoking the myth that Pheidippides said these words in bring to Athens the news of the Greek victory against the Persians in the Battle of Marathon.

Ethnarchism in the Framework of the President of the Republic of Cyprus The independence of Cyprus, which was signed in London on 19 February 1959, inaugurated a new era for ethnarchism. Firstly, Makarios, for the first time, was imposed as a leader above parties and ideologies, in whose person both the Greek Government and Grivas,107 as well as those who opposed the Zurich-London Agreements, such as AKEL108 and the opposition in Greece,109 each for different reasons, recognised Makarios as the ethnarch, whom they recognised as being above politics. So what would be the political Extract from Makarios’ declaration after signing the London Agreements (12 February 1959), Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥ ưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ Ƅ’, III, 478. 107 The content of Grivas’ ‘order’ in March 1959 to the EOKA fighters for the termination of the struggle is revealing: ‘Nobody should worry concerning the position of the fighters in the new state, which will be the one they really deserve…It is your obligation to aid the ethnarch in his efforts to materialize it, and then you will have possibilities to make more gains than those given to you by the agreement, and let no one promote the discord of the people, because this, I warn you, will be TOTAL disaster…All of you, rally, united around the Ethnarch, who is the symbol of unity and power…’. See Spyros Papageorgiou, Ɣơ ƋƱƟƳƩƬơ ƎƴƯƪƯƵƬƝƭƴơ ƴƯƵ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƯƽ (1959-1967) (The Critical Documents of the Cypriot Problem), 3 volumes, Epifaniou, Nicosia 2000, I, 157-66. In the same style was Grivas’ farewell declaration, on 15 March 1959. «Ƃƶƞƭƹ ƣƥƩơ Ƴ ƼƫƯƵƲ» (I leave health), Eleutheria, 15 March 1959. 108 AKEL, despite reservations, accepted the Zurich-London Accords because, as the General Secretary of PEO, Andreas Ziartides, told Makarios in February 1959 in London: ‘we have given you our advice, but if you finally sign, if Cyprus becomes independent and you come as the head of the state, I am certain that AKEL will support you’. See Panicos Paionidis, ƂƭƤƱƝơƲ ƇƩơƱƴƟƤƧƲ, ƷƹƱƟƲ ƶƼƢƯ ƪơƩ ưƜƨƯƲ (Andreas Ziartidis, without fear and passion), Nicosia, 1995, 94. AKEL’s official position on 1 March 1959 confirmed this, see ‘ƂƲ ƆƴƯƩƬơƳƨƯƽƬƥ’ (Let’s get ready), Haravgi, 1 March 1959. 109 See the discussion in the Greek Parliament on 24 February 1959, Papageorgiou, Ɣơ ƪƱƟƳƩƬơ ƭƴƯƪƯƵƬƝƭƴơ, I, 113-34. 106

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and ideological references of an ethnarchic role in an independent state with democratic procedures, such as electing a president? The alliance of the ethnarch with Grivas, in return, on the one hand, for EOKA’s full support to Makarios in the presidential elections and, on the other hand, for the manning of the state almost exclusively by EOKA fighters,110 indicated that the presidential role that he claimed, made the ethnarchic role ‘partisan’. In fact, in the first free elections in post-colonial Cyprus (13 December 1959), in which Makarios claimed the presidency of the Republic with the support of the EDMA (United Democratic Front of Recreation) party,111 in which were incorporated, after an agreement between Makarios and Grivas,112 the former EOKA fighters, he appeared as a party leader against another candidate, who was supported by Makarios’ political opponents.113 The vote of 66.82% that Makarios received, as opposed to 31.88% to his opponent John Clerides, made evident the mutual undermining of the roles: of president and of ethnarch. The critical question, then, which was posed for Makarios, regarded the process of identification of the two roles in the framework of a modern state. The co-existence of the ethnarch with the president depended on the delimiting of the mission of the state. In fact, Makarios, already in his proclamations addressed to the Greek Cypriots on 27 November 1959, gave the essence of the mission of the state, which he would serve as president: ‘The soul itself of Cyprus has been the force, which transformed our island to the cradle of national magnificence and made…once more the virtues of the Nation shine…The contract, which I have signed with the Cypriot people during the struggle…has not expired…’.114 The content of the mission was condensed in the term ‘nation’ (‘genos’), as well as in the phrase ‘the contract … has not expired’. According to the expression above, the mission of the state was open: to survive, but also to realize at some point the will of the nation, enosis. The president, then, who guaranteed the independence of the state, was at the Almost all of the ministers in Makarios’ cabinet were former EOKA fighters and Makarios sent the list of candidates to Grivas for approval. See, ibid., 178. 111 See the proclamation of the ‘Eniaion Demokratikon Metopon Anademiourgias’, ibid., 175-7. 112 The correspondence between Makarios and Grivas proves this. See, ‘Makarios’ letter (2 April 1959) to Dighenis’ and ‘Dighenis’ letter (12 April 1959) to Makarios’, ibid., 178-179, 181-182. 113 Makarios’ opponent was John Clerides, candidate of the ‘Democratic Union’, who was also supported by AKEL and various extreme nationalists, like the Bishop of Kyrenia. See, ‘ƍơƽƱƯ ƳƴƯƭ ƍơƪƜƱƩƯ’ (Black to Makarios), Haravgi, 13 December 1959. 114 Extracts from Makarios’ proclamation, 27 November 1959, Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ Ƅ’, IV, 111-2. 110

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same time an ethnarch, who safeguarded with his presence a continuous struggle that was by its very aims contrary to the independent state. Thus, in the first period of the history of the Republic of Cyprus the ideological essence of the state, as well as the ideological content of its mission, was determined by the former EOKA fighters, in communication with Grivas, now in Athens, so the identification of the presidential with the ethnarchic role was made with the mediation of enosis. While independence was therefore defined incidentally and statically, the mission of the state was defined dynamically and was the basis for the continuation of the enosis struggle, a fact which formed the terms of the development of a binary conscience: state conscience, on the one hand, Greek, unionist conscience, on the other. And while, as it appears from the laws voted by the Cypriot Parliament of the first period (until the end of 1963), the Cypriot members, Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, exercised a common, Cypriot, agricultural, industrial, labour policy,115 at the same time, the ethnarch expressed the ethnarchic conscience, Greek with enosis on the horizon. The president-archbishop-ethnarch was expected to express the state conscience and to homogenize it ethnarchically. This understanding of the ethnarchic mission of the state clashed with its bi-communal character, which was based on the consociational constitution, that is, with the other community, the Turkish Cypriots, who were, on the one hand, necessary for the international recognition of the Cypriot state, but were, on the other, an obstacle to its ethnarchisation. Thus, the political rights of the Turkish Cypriots, recognised by the constitution and the treaties, were defined ethnarchically, as privileges that the ethnarch had granted out of generosity to the minority: ‘On the form of the polity, the Archbishop… underlined…that the beginnings of free political life in Cyprus would have enormous importance, especially as long as the Greek position would be dominant, and this was certain, regardless of whether privileges were granted to the Turks, privileges without which it would not have been possible to realize the beginning of free political life in Cyprus’.116 This understanding of the political rights of a community as privileges referred directly to authoritarian modernism, according to the examples of the Ottoman 19th century. According to the ethnarchic understanding, the Turkish Cypriot See the declaration of Turkish Cypriot Deputy Halit Ali Riza at the voting of the ‘Law on Customs Dues 1963’: ‘Even in the countries, in which there is racial and religious homogeneity and which do not have a separate communal regime…the Parliament…votes unanimously such a nomoschedion’, Minutes of the House of Representatives, 1 January 1963-15 August 1963, 57. 116 Minute, Greek Foreign Ministry (29 January 1959), for information and approval by Makarios on the Greek-Turkish negotiations concerning the Cyprus problem. See, Papageorgiou, Ɣơ ƪƱƟƳƩƬơ ƭƴƯƪƯƵƬƝƭƴơ, I, 45-50, 48. 115

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community was defined in the Cypriot state as a millet, the rights of which were a product of the generosity of the leader and recognised by international treaties. In fact, the Cypriot people, according to Makarios, were Greek, since the Greek Cypriots constituted its majority. The delimitation of the Cypriot people on an individual basis, in the name of the majority, referred to a republican, liberal regime. However, the majority was not defined on an individual, but on an ethno-religious, communal basis, in the name of the dominant, ethnarchic community, from which the ethnarch-presidentarchbishop drew legitimisation: ‘in Cyprus the Archbishop is not appointed…but he is elected by a universal vote by all the Greek population as the spiritual and national leader…When Cyprus became independent, the people asked for my services as President of the Republic in the first steps of its new life’,117 and in this way Makarios defined the ethnarchic basis of the legitimisation of his role. The Cypriot people, then, were defined as one community, the Turkish Cypriots were defined as a minority, as an ethnarchic community, and enosis (or even independence) constituted one of the state’s missions, if this was regarded as legitimate by the ethnarch-presidentarchbishop: …The armed struggle has ended, in order to be continued in another form…But what is the present and what is the form of the future? The present is the Cypriot Polity, formed by the Agreements of Zurich and London. But was the aim and the goal of the struggle the creation of a Cypriot polity in any form or shape? ‘No’, we reply unhesitatingly…I sincerely believe, and with me the great majority of the Greek Cypriot people believes, that the agreements are not a defeat, but a victory, even if it is incomplete. They are a battlement for the conquest of the future.118

As the above quotation shows, the identification of the president with the ethnarch was legitimised in the name of the demographic majority. Makarios’ opponents were not his political opponents, but his ethnarchic opponents: ‘True to the spirit of my ethnarchic mission, I never identified or will identify with a particular party, but with the entire Cypriot people…’, declared Makarios during his inauguration ceremony as president,119 and this was regardless of whether he had chosen the camp of a particular ideology in order to be elected. Makarios interview with Mr. Engel, Canada Broadcasting Corporation, 8 October 1963, Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ Ƅŷ, VI, 267. 118 Extracts from Makarios’ speech during the celebrations for the 8th anniversary of 1 April 1955, ibid., 56-7. 119 Ibid., 137. 117

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The Turkish Cypriot community inherently undermined the expression of the will of the ethnarchic community, a fact which transformed it from a partner in the state to an enemy of the state. In this sense, the Cypriot state functioned as an agent of an ethnarchic right, the defence of which was undertaken by non-institutional, ‘national forces’: an armed parastate, with Makarios’ consent, groups or paramilitary networks between Cyprus and Greece, like the secret ‘Akritas Organisation’ with Polycarpos Yorkadjis (Minister of the Interior, former EOKA fighter) as leader, which was formed in collaboration with the Greek paramilitary organisation IDEA, with the goal of ‘protecting the Hellenism of Cyprus and the promotion of national rights’.120 With the support of the Akritas Organisation, Makarios decided to propose 13 amendments to the constitution (announced on 30 November 1963), in the name of the better functioning of the state, and in the absence of the other community, which, according to the constitution, formed the state, and in the absence also of Greece and Turkey, who guaranteed the state and its constitution. The conflict of the two communities for the amendment, expressed, in the best possible way, the mutual undermining of democracy in the name of the constitution. According to the Greek Cypriots, the amendment was legitimate, since ‘the Constitution comes from the people in order to serve the people…’.121 According to the Turkish Cypriots, the amendment undermined the existence of the state, since ‘the Constitution expresses the form of the state’.122 In the Greek Cypriot understanding, the will, not of the bi-communally recognised, but of the ethnarchically imposed people, constituted the source of legitimation of the changes in the polity of the state. In the Turkish Cypriot understanding, the constitution was the immovable canon of the ‘partnership of two different peoples’, because of which the state existed. In both cases the lack of democracy and the hegemony of extremist nationalist ideologies, was evident. In fact, this culminated in a civil war from 21 December 1963 to August 1964.123 The Papageorgiou, Ɣơ ƪƱƟƳƩƬơ ƭƴƯƪƯƵƬƝƭƴơ, I, 217-8. Minutes of the House of Representatives, III, 16 August 1962-31 December 1962, Nicosia, 182. 122 Ibid., 176. 123 For a chronicle of the crisis, see: NARA [National Archives of Research Administration], RG [Record Group] 59, CFPF (Central Foreign Policy Files), 1963, POL 25 Cyprus, telegram 382, Wilkins to Department of State, Cyprus Situation Report DEC 26, 0200 to 1500, Nicosia 26 December 1963; NA (National Archives, UK), FO 371/168985, telegram 2350, New York to Foreign Office, 28 December 1963; FO 371/168985, telegram 2350, Ankara to Foreign Office, 28 December 1963; Richard Patrick, Political Geography and the Cyprus Conflict, 1963-1971, University of Waterloo, 1976, 46; Makarios Drousiotis, ƅƽƯ ơưƼưƥƩƱƥƲ ƪơƩ ƬƩơ ƤƯƫƯƶƯƭƟơ. ƈ ƗƯƽƭƴơ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƋƽưƱƯƲ 1967-1970 (Two Attempts and One Assassination. The Junta and Cyprus 1967-1970), Alfadi, Nicosia 2009, 29-114; Makarios Drousiotis, ƈ ưƱƾƴƧ ƤƩƷƯƴƼƬƧƳƧ. 120 121

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withdrawal of the Turkish Cypriots from the state, their confinement into enclaves, as well as the formation of the Green Line in Nicosia destabilised the already weak foundations of the Cypriot state, while they reinforced Makarios’ belief that the appropriation of the state by the ethnarchic community was now possible internationally. From the end of 1963 onwards, Makarios’ policy appears to be contradictory and risky, and this was because of the difficulties emerging from the co-existence of the two roles, those of president and ethnarch, with a constant tendency of submission of the former to the latter. Both foreign and internal policies, as well as relations with Greece, were developing in relation to the co-existence of his roles. Already since 1962, Makarios, with the Cypriot state as his springboard and as leader of a people which believed they were deprived, because of the Zurich-London Agreements, of their right to self-determination, intensified his international contacts, visiting the US to meet John F. Kennedy, West Germany, and other countries. The close contacts he developed with the Non-Aligned countries, as well as his opening to the Eastern Bloc, were aimed at finding allies in the UN for the revision of the Treaties, and trying to sell the myth of a Turkish Cypriot ‘mutiny’ (as was named the Turkish Cypriot withdrawal from the state) which he denounced in 1964. The separatist policy of the Turkish Cypriot leadership, which the UN mediator in Cyprus, Galo Plaza, called ‘constitutional paradox’,124 facilitated the denunciation of the Zurich-London Agreements and the international claim for the right of self-determination of the Cypriot people. However, the content of the term self-determination was defined in a confused way politically and ideologically. In the framework of the interdependence of his role, where the ethnarchic role was reinforced by the presidential one, Makarios pursued the ethnarchification of the state, not its abolition or enosis.125 In fact, the laws for financial, fiscal and institutional matters,126 which were voted by the Cypriot ƋƽưƱƯƲ 1963-1974 (The First Partition. Cyprus 1963-1974), Alfadi, Nicosia, 2005, 289320, and Spyros Papageorgiou, ƆưƩƷƥƟƱƧƳƧ ƋƯƶƟƭƯƵ (Operation Kofinou), Epifaniou, Nicosia, 1987. 124 ARMS (UN Archives and Records Management Sector) S/6253, Report of the United Nations Mediator on Cyprus on the Secretary-General, Note by the Secretary General, 6 March 1965. 125 See the rationale for the rejection of the Acheson plan in Drousiotis, ƈ ưƱƾƴƧ ƤƩƷƯƴƼƬƧƳƧ, 259-86. 126 For the reinforcement of the economy and the formulation of a productive fiscal policy, see the 1965 budget debate, in Minutes of the House of Representatives, 1 January 1964-31 December 1964, 317-22 and 339. Regarding the institutional level, the bill of

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Parliament immediately after the withdrawal of the Turkish Cypriots, indicated two things: first, the tendency of reinforcing the state, now as a state of exception,127 therefore, also the political and ideological investment that Makarios had made in it. Second, that a powerful group had formed (including AKEL128), of which the political and/or economic interests were identified with the existence of the ethnarchic state,129 and with which Makarios had allied himself. However, the right to self-determination contained enosis as possible and desirable, from which Makarios’ ethnarchism had its historical origins. Enosis constituted, at that time, the unique content of self-determination,130 because only in its name both the marginalisation (up to extermination) of the Turkish Cypriots, other enemies of the state,131 and the ethnarchism of the state, which was shared also by AKEL,132 were legitimised. In this sense, enosis did not constitute the objective goal of the state, but the ideological basis of the state’s ethnarchism. However, it was becoming the objective goal, since it allowed the reinforcement by the state of the extremist enosis elements, on which Makarios had been based for his election and which continued to support his ethnarchic role. Moreover, enosis, as a claim in the name of the right of the majority for self-determination, neutralised the bi-communal, Cypriot character of the state and gave once more a leading role to the two ‘national centres’, Greece and Turkey. Added to this was the Cold War environment. The ethnarchisation of the state with enosis as its ideological mantle, transformed it into an ‘open city’, an ‘open’, contested space between the Western and the Eastern blocs.133

the ‘Law on Municipalities of 1964’ was voted, which benefited the state’s Hellenisation project. The same happened with the army. Immediately after the withdrawal of the Turkish Cypriots, was voted the ‘Law on the National Guard of 1964’, with which the National Guard was founded, ibid., 207. 127 See Costas Constantinou, ‘On the Cypriot States of Exception’, International Political Sociology, II, 2, 2008, 145-164. 128 AKEL was increasingly supporting independence and Makarios, see ibid., 265-76. 129 Ibid., 338. 130 See Foreign Minister Spyros Kyprianou’s argument in the Cypriot House of Representatives against the Acheson Plan, 31 October 1964, ibid., 260-2. 131 See the speech of Vassos Lyssarides in the parliament, on the need to form the National Guard, ibid., 207. 132 AKEL, although the only political party advocating the reincorporation of the Turkish Cypriots into the social fabric (though not into the political one, since AKEL too regarded them as a minority), considered that the Turkish Cypriots, because of TMT and the ‘latter-day Sultans of Ankara’, were connected to NATO and imperialism. See ibid., 265-76. 133 From discussions in the House of Representatives, it appears that a great number of agents were active in Cyprus, especially from late 1963. See ibid., 96-202 and 262.

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The non-aligned independence, proclaimed internationally by Makarios, in which the Greekness of the state was combined with the prospect of enosis, placed the state in danger: the clashes with the Turkish Cypriots and the threat of a Turkish invasion were very real. This danger, which was interpreted according to the pattern of the eternal national threat from the Turks, was leading to the militarisation of the island and Makarios’ dependence on the ‘national centre’, on those enosist forces, found a role in Cyprus once more. Thus, the founding of the National Guard of Cyprus was first designed in Athens by Makarios, Yorgadjis and Spiros Kyprianou, the Foreign Minister, and Kostopoulos, Garoufalias and Grivas, and it was then voted in the Cypriot Parliament (December 1963). The organisation of the army was assigned to Grivas, who returned to Cyprus on 19 June 1964 and, as the hero he was in the collective conscience and now with the role of the defender of Cyprus, given to him by Makarios, he immediately claimed the role of the agent of the mission of the state: ‘…the aim of all must tend…towards claiming the union of Cyprus with Mother Greece…we want enosis as a national legacy, we want enosis because we are Greeks in conscience and descent…’,134 he stressed to the Cypriot Parliament on 6 July 1964. In the internal organisation of the Cypriot army, the Cypriot state did not have any involvement. The defence of Cyprus was assigned completely to Grivas, who undertook, on 3 July 1964, the leadership of the Greek forces in Cyprus and of the National Guard. The founding of the High Military Command of the Defence of Cyprus (ASDAK) by the General Command of Greece, with Grivas as leader,135 and the staffing of the National Guard by Greek officers, testify to the degree of autonomy from the state of one of its most important institutions. Grivas and the Greek officers started to act as a ‘state within a state’, as the true interpreters in Cyprus of an ideal Greece, as it fitted their ideology and interests. From the middle of 1965 onwards,136 the efforts of the Cypriot Parliament to control this paradoxical ‘state within a state’ that was forming, were unsuccessful. In a parallel way, the Turkification of the institutions of the Turkish Cypriot community rendered Cyprus a space of fierce antagonism between the two ‘national centres’, as well as of an international armaments antagonism between the two camps. The ethnarchic state built by Makarios was functioning inherently antidemocratically and conspiratorially. Enosis, as one of the banners of the state, favoured the formation of parallel fields of the exercise of ‘national’ politics, Ibid., 129-30. For the founding of the National Guard, see Papageorgiou, Ɣơ ƪƱƟƳƩƬơ ƭƴƯƪƯƵƬƝƭƴơ, III, 226-33. 136 In August 1965, the Chairman of the Cypriot House of Representatives raised the issue of the illegality of Greek officers serving in the National Guard. See ibid., 230-3. 134 135

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either between the ‘national centre’ and the ethnarch, or only by the ethnarch in collaboration with Grivas and in the absence of the ‘national centre’. The limits of the political responsibility of each one inevitably led the ‘national centre’ and the ethnarch into conflict, which gave Grivas the opportunity to reinforce his authority. The Mansoura incidents, which took place with the responsibility of Makarios and Grivas, without informing Athens, and which provoked Turkish air-strikes in Cyprus, highlighted the problem. In the furious reaction, in August 1964, of Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou and in his demand that ‘the opinion of Athens must be accepted, because it is the agent of the responsibility of the whole of Hellenism’, Makarios found the opportunity to delimit the meaning of enosis, as well as of independence: I fully agree that in case of an unprovoked Turkish attack on Cyprus, when Greece will support Cyprus with all its strength, the struggle will be in the name of Enosis, which will be immediately declared by the two Parliaments, the Greek and the Cypriot one. Because, [...], the Greek Army cannot fight with under the banner of ‘non-aligned independence’, which may be a claim before the United Nations, but it is completely unsuitable as the Nation’s war banner.137

According to Makarios, then, the aim of the nation was enosis, but the aim of the state, was non-aligned independence. Under the light of this contradictory pattern, which constitutes the essence of new ethnarchism in post-colonial Cyprus, Makarios reinvented the history of the founding of the Cypriot state: ‘In all our struggles we have enosis as our only slogan. We had enosis as our goal when, under the pressure of circumstances, and in order not to lead the Motherland into trouble, we were forced to accept, with the insistent advice of the Greek government, temporary solutions’. Accordingly, independence constituted a temporary solution, with which ‘Cypriot Hellenism’ was forced to accept from the ‘national centre’. In this sense, however, independence, even though forced and temporary, constituted a ‘national solution’ since it was decided by the ‘national centre’, yet was a solution in the service of enosis. A second reading of Makarios’ formulation, however, reveals also the opposite: enosis was inherent in independence, therefore the preservation of the latter guarantees the safeguarding of enosis as a national claim. This double reading was legitimised by the way in which Makarios, in the same letter again, was clarifying the matter of political responsibility concerning Cyprus. Makarios, then, admitted that, for Cyprus, as a part of Hellenism, the initiative and the final responsibility rested with the ‘national centre’, as responsible vis-a-vis the nation. However, he gave a 137

Makarios to Papandreou, in Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, II, 658-62.

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double content to the notion ‘political responsibility’: political-military and political. As regards military matters, Athens had the political responsibility, but as regards the political ones, Nicosia had it. This distinction of responsibilities had, of course, constitutional basis, since the Treaty of Guarantee recognised the right of intervention of the ‘national centres’, Greece and Turkey, and the former colonial power, Britain, in case of threat against the state. However, the framework of interpretation of this distinction was dictated by Makarios’ ethnarchism, in conflict with the notion of the ‘national centre’ of Greece. The level on which the Papandreou-Makarios conflict was expressed highlighted a major problem: to what extent could an ethnarch, who recognised the ‘national centre’ as the will of the nation, acquire independent authority from the ‘national centre’, as president of a state, whose people were defined in the framework of the nation. The clash between the Greek state and Makarios would take place on this level. In the ethnarchic notion of the state, which was formed by Makarios, the archbishop-ethnarch-president decided for Cyprus and the ‘national centre’ was executing. This pattern, however, created enormous complications in an international environment divided into two camps, the Eastern and Western blocs. His notion of international relations, both with the Soviet Union and the Non-Aligned, as well as with the US, exposed the Greek state, which was dependent upon NATO.138 Makarios developed an ecumenical notion of foreign policy, in the framework of which the UN was the highest political authority, before which he was negotiating the position of the Cypriot state, just like his ancestors negotiated the position of the church with the Ottoman sultan. While he was declaring his devotion to the UN, and adopting its resolution concerning the preclusion of enosis as a solution to the Cyprus problem,139 as this was codified in the analytical memorandum of the UN mediator, Galo Plaza (26 March 1965),140 on the other hand he was forming alliances in such a way as to be able to promote in the UN the right to self-determination, which was a euphemism for enosis. In this ecclesiastical understanding of politics, which was part of the Ottoman tradition, in which all the archbishop’s political alliances were legitimate as long as they served the sacred goal, that is, the political authority of the religious leader, enosis was a powerful negotiating card for Makarios: on the one hand, under the threat of enosis and in the name of self-determination, he reinforced the international position of an For an analytical presentation on the Greek position on enosis, see the resolutions of the Greek governments of 1965-1966, in Glafkos Clerides, ƈ ƋơƴƜƨƥƳƞ ƬƯƵ (My Deposition), Alithia, Nikosia 1989, II, 194-200. 139 Makarios to UN General Secretary, ibid., 181-3. 140 Ibid., 159-71. 138

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ethnarchic, Cypriot state, from which the Turkish Cypriots were excluded by right as a demographic minority, while on the other hand, in the name of enosis and under the threat of the internationally recognised state, he pursued Greece’s compliance to the ethnarch’s decisions. According to Makarios’ political understanding, there was an ‘ethnarchic enosis’, which had to be preserved, without allowances and discounts, while in the opposing understanding, represented by the Greek state, there was the ‘national enosis’, as a matter of Greek politics depending on the nation’s interests.141 In both notions, however, the lurking problem was that of the imposition of one over the other. In mirror image to the two ‘national fronts’, two fronts were gradually forming in Cyprus from 1966 onwards: the ‘political’ and the ‘military’, which clashed under the banner of one or the other notion of enosis, for control of political and military authority. These fronts were not cohesive in their interior, nor did they have a clear line of ideological confrontation. In the beginning it was more of a rallying of armed or unarmed groups sometimes with underground alliances and partnerships, sometimes with a fierce antagonism between them. The major problem, which Makarios was finally called upon to confront, was not a problem of ideological principles or enosis,142 but the problem of the consolidation of the president-ethnarch-archbishop as the only political agent,143 from whom the army would be dependent,144 while it was reinforcing its autonomy from the state in a way threatening to Makarios. For that reason, any alliance (or even conflict) with any ‘centre’ (Athens or even Moscow) was legitimate. In this framework, Makarios’ ethnarchic state was a de-ideologised state, which took the ideology given to it by the ethnarch according to the alliances he made each time: thus the state was democratic and anti-democratic at the same time,

Makarios’ rejection of the Acheson plan reflected his different view on enosis with Athens. Ibid., 124-58. 142 In his public speeches, Makarios underlined that enosis was the ultimate aim of the Cypriot state. See Makarios speech during mass in the holy church of St. Nicholas in Montevideo, 23 October 1966, Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ Ƅ’, IX, 195-7; and his speech in the Holy Monastery of Arkadi, during the celebrations of one hundred years from the holocaust of Arkadi, 8/11/1966, ibid., 232-5. 143 Makarios corresponded with Greek Prime Minister, Stephanos Stephanopoulos, on Grivas and the army. See Makarios message to the Greek government on the issue of the Cyprus National Guard, 18 April 1966, ibid., 104-7; and Makarios letters to Greek PM Stephanopoulos, 16 March 1966 and 19 March 1966, ibid., 319-24 and 332-40. For an analysis, see Papageorgiou, Ɣơ ƪƱƟƳƩƬơ ƭƴƯƪƯƵƬƝƭƴơ, III, 209-25 and 23441. 144 On Makarios’ first attempt to reinforce militarily the Cypriot Police and for the secret importation of weapons from Czechoslovakia, see Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, II, 703. 141

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extremely nationalist and moderate, from pro-western up to pro-communist, but always anti-Turkish. The events of Kofinou (13-4 November 1967)145 indicated the limits of the ethnarchic state, which, in its painstaking effort to dominate the place and the people, legitimised practices, which placed it in immediate danger. The ‘national reckoning’ with the Turkish Cypriots, to which Grivas proceeded, with the consent of Makarios, revealed the underestimated dimensions of reality. The existence of a Cypriot state was not an intra-Greek affair, nor a balancing act between enosis and independence, in the absence of the resolutions of the UN. The consequences of the events of Kofinou, which were ‘legitimising’ the immediate involvement of Turkey in Cyprus and led to the declaration by the Turkish Cypriot leadership of the ‘Provisional Turkish Administration of Cyprus’ on 28 December 1967,146 forcing Makarios to revise the ideological content of ethnarchism, as well as his alliances. The prospect of a political and geographical separation of the two communities of Cyprus made Makarios’ ethnarchic state vulnerable, without the prospect of the reincorporation of the Turkish Cypriots in it,147 as was expressly foreseen by Resolution 244 (1967) of the UN Security Council. On the other hand, the ‘national centre’ did not leave any margin for initiative. The Greek Junta, which had just taken power on 21 April 1967, indicated, both with the Greco-Turkish meeting in Evros (9-10 September 1967), and with the withdrawal of Grivas and the Greek Brigade from Cyprus, that it had the intention of dynamically taking over the Cyprus question as part of GrecoTurkish relations and within the context of NATO. Under the pressure of events, Makarios made, once more, a ‘shift’, inaugurating a new dogma: that of the ‘feasible’, independence, over the ‘desirable’, enosis. However, this ‘shift’ did not mobilise society democratically. Recourse to the ballots (28 February 1968) was not done with the bi-communal negotiations at its centre148 and the change of the mission of the state, which those required. Makarios was voted, essentially without a rival,149 with almost absolute See Drousiotis, ƅƵƯ ơưƼưƥƩƱƥƲ, 29-114; also, Papageorgiou, ƆưƩƷƥƟƱƧƳƧ ƋƯƶƟƭƯƵ. Also, Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ Ƅ’, X, 227-36 and Ǝikos Kranidiotis, ƂƭƯƷƽƱƹƴƧ ƑƯƫƩƴƥƟơ (Open City), I, 454-7. 146 For the ‘Provisional Turkish Administration of Cyprus’ and the ‘Basic Law’ of Administration, see Halil Ibrahim Salih, Cyprus: The Impact of Diverse Nationalism on a State, University of Alabama Press, 1978, 75-9. The ‘Basic Law’ was published in Halkin Sesi, 29 December 1967, and in English by Salih, Cyprus, 153-4. 147 See Makarios decdlaration after announcement of the formation of Turkish Cypriot ‘Provisional Administration’, Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ Ƅ’, X, 442-5. 148 Cleridis, ƈ ƪơƴƜƨƥƳƞ ƬƯƵ, II, 224-5. 149 Makarios’ opponent was psychiatrist Takis Evdokas, only received 3.71%. 145

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majority, as archbishop-ethnarch-president, to whom the people entrusted once again their survival – the ‘feasible’, as well as its destiny, the ‘desirable’.

The Ethnarch’s Painful ‘Shift’ to the Possible The separation of the ethnarchic role from enosis and its dependence on the presidential role signified the historical change of the role of the ethnarch. The ethnarchic role was being transformed into a politically visible, negotiable and dubious role. On the one hand, the presidential role reinforced the ethnarchic one, but as a democratic institution, it also dictated the democratisation of ethnarchism. The first powerful move of challenging Makarios appeared within the church itself, from Gennadios, Bishop of Paphos, Anthimos of Kitium and Kyprianos of Kyrenia. In the Holy Synod, which was convened in the Archbishopric on 28 January 1968, the issue of protecting the ethnarchic role was raised, which was rooted on the ethnarchic Church, which had to remain independent in order to continue the enosis struggle. Makarios, as ethnarch, ‘ethno-religious’ leader and spokesman of the ‘eternal’ and immovable will of the Greek Orthodox people, had to resign the secular presidential office in order to serve enosis. With his answer to the Synod, ‘if Cyprus would have to abandon the national pursuits of the Cypriot people’, then he would resign the presidency,150 Makarios laid enosis outside of historical time and politicised the ethnarchic role: enosis was inherent in the ethnarchic role as national destiny (the desirable) and existed in eternity as long as there was an ethnarch. The archbishop-ethnarch-president had to administer the political present and future (the feasible), to readapt therefore the content of his mission to political reality. However, while the major issue posed by the period was that of the democratisation of the state, the concentration of political life around institutions and claims with autarchic ideological content – ‘ethnarchic Church’, ‘ethnarch’, enosis – had two important consequences: first, the creation of a powerful enosist opposition, which, under the pretext that enosis was persecuted by the state, desacralised Makarios and sacralised with conspiratorial and ‘junta-like’ methods every movement against the president and the state. On the other hand, Makarios, increasingly conditioning the ethnarchic on the presidential role, sacralised the latter, but also secularised the former. In this framework, the political life of Cyprus started to present two simultaneous movements, towards ‘juntification’ and towards pseudodemocratisation.

See Makarios reply to journalists, after a 7-hour long Meeting of the Holy Synod, 25 January 1968’, Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ Ƅ’, X, 459-62.

150

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The uncontrolled formation of institutions, like the National Guard, had contributed to the formation of a military dictatorship in Cyprus long before the coup in Greece.151 The 1967 coup hastened this process in Cyprus. The conflicting Greek ‘junta branches’ were continuously spreading in the National Guard and in the police, and from there they spread to various groups, which, according to their interests, also formed their alliances with members of the Greek junta. Makarios himself, allying himself with various groups or persons each time, either in order to reinforce his authority or in order to control their activity, was ensnaring himself to such an extent that even his personal bodyguard was infiltrated by Greek junta elements, which finally turned against him.152 The ‘juntification’ of Cyprus emerged through a complex process, of which characteristic examples were Polycarpos Yorkadjis (Minister of the Interior and since 1964 of Defence too) and Grivas. Despite the fact that they both clashed with the formal junta,153 they exploited its internal contradictions and created the receptacles for the eroding of the institutions in Cyprus, the former in Cyprus and the latter in Athens. Yorkadjis, the all-powerful Interior Minister and trusted man of Makarios, who controlled the Cypriot Secret Services, the Police and the para-state, the man with close relations with the CIA, as well as with extremist elements of the Greek junta, the man with the powerful presence in the Cypriot countryside and the nationalist organisations and clubs, condensed in his person the underground and dark trajectories of Cypriot political life. His forcible expulsion from the government (25 October 1968) and the ‘war’ with Makarios rendered the conspiratorial and anti-democratic methods the canon of the conduct of politics. The assassination attempt against Makarios on 8 March 1970, and the assassination of Yorkadjis himself a week later154 testify to this.

Makarios Drousiotis, ƆƐƋƂ ƃ ƪơƩ CIA. ƔƯ ƥƫƫƧƭƯƴƯƵƱƪƩƪƼ ươƱơƪƱƜƴƯƲ ƳƴƧƭ ƋƽưƱƯ (EOKA B and CIA. The Greek and Turkish Parastate in Cyprus), Alfadi, Athens 2002, 73. 152 Makarios Drousiotis, ƈ ‘ƥƩƳƢƯƫƞ’ ƴƧƲ ƗƯƽƭƴơƲ ƳƴƧƭ ƋƽưƱƯ (The Junta’s ‘Invasion’ in Cyprus), Athens, 2000, 89-94. 153 Polykarpos Yorkadjis, an EOKA fighter, Minister of the Interior, and head of the Akritas Organisation, was forced, on 25 October 1968, to resign by the Greek Junta. Yorkadjis had helped Alexandros Panagoulis to prepare the assassination attempt on dictator George Papadopoulos. See Drousiotis, ƅƽƯ ơưƼưƥƩƱƥƲ. Concerning Grivas, he was placed in home detention in Athens by the Junta, after his recall from Cyprus at the end of 1967, when he was regarded as responsible for the Kophinou incident. Grivas, a royalist did not enjoy good relations with the Junta. See Drousiotis, ƆƐƋƂ ƃ ƪơƩ CIA, 80-1. 154 Clerides, ƈ ƪơƴƜƨƥƳƞ ƬƯƵ, II, 380-99 and Drousiotis, ƅƽƯ ơưƼưƥƩƱƥƲ ƪơƩ ƬƩơ ƤƯƫƯƶƯƭƟơ. 151

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In this chaos, enosis was delegitimised as the formal policy of the state, but was legitimised as desirable, reinforcing the conspiratorial notion of politics and legitimised the activity of groups, like the ‘National Front’ (1969),155 which Greek junta officers infiltrated. Makarios was trapped between the ‘feasible’ and the ‘desirable’. The founding of such groups was done with his tolerance, to the extent that they were declaring that they were serving the ‘desirable’.156 Their terrorist activities, however, threatened the ‘possible’, and were therefore declared illegal,157 with the consequence that Makarios was denounced by them as a ‘national traitor’, who undermined the ethnarchic mission of the state. Grivas’ founding of the most conspiratorial and terrorist organisation, EOKA B (1971),158 dramatically highlighted the problem. The bi-communal negotiations between the Greek and Turkish Cypriots, which had started in 1969, provided the alibi for Grivas’ re-appearance in the name of the ‘desirable’ (31 August 1971) and the involvement, through EOKA B, of the most extremist junta elements in Cypriot political life.159 Despite his conflict with the official junta, because of the Cyprus problem,160 the ideological similarities between Grivas and the junta were many. They shared, beyond anything else, extreme nationalism, deep anti-communism and hatred for Makarios. In the ideological schematisation of Grivas, ‘enosis and only enosis’ constituted the only healthy national claim. Independence constituted national treason, that is, it was carried out by traitors – the communists. In this sense, Makarios was turning into a national traitor and pro-communist. In such an extreme pattern, Makarios, despite his efforts to come to an understanding with Grivas, was becoming an enemy of the nation, and the Cypriot state a pro-communist bastion, which had to fall. With enosis as its 155 For the founding and the activity of the organisation, see Clerides, ƈ ƪơƴƜƨƥƳƞ ƬƯƵ, II, 337-9. 156 For the position of Makarios vis-a-vis the ‘National Front’, see his interview to A. Kalamaras, correspondent of the Athenian Simerina, 29/5/197’, Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ Ƅ’, XII, 423-4. 157 In Autumn 1969, Makarios denounced as ‘anti-national’ the activities of such organisations. In 1970, however, he publicly denounced the organisation, emphasising that it was threatening his life and Cyprus. See Makarios proclamation during a press conference at the Presidential Palace, 1 September 1969, Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ Ƅ’, XI, 221-6 and his speech at the unveiling of the busts Michael Koutsoftas and Andreas Panaghides in Paliometochon, 7 June 1970, ibid., XII, 105-8. 158 For the founding of EOKA B and its activities, see Drousiotis, EOKA B ƪơƩ CIA. 159 For the close relations between Grivas and Ioannides (a hardline officer of the Junta, who overthrew Papadopoulos on 25 November 1973) see Drousiotis, EOKA B and CIA; Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, II. 160 See the articles of prominent EOKA B members published in Patris in 1971, in Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ. ƑƯƱƥƟơ ƤƩơ ưƵƱƼƲ ƪơƩ ƳƩƤƞƱƯƵ (Makarios. A March through Fire and Iron), Epifaniou, Nicosia 2002, 133-42.

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banner, EOKA B decisively undermined state institutions,161 constituting the most important avenue for the reinforcement of the local junta elements,162 which were consolidating around the ESEA (Committee for the CoOrdination of the Enosist Struggle) – the political branch of EOKA B.163 The exercising of politics with conspiratorial and terrorist methods did not only result in the ‘juntification’, but also in the gradual ‘democratisation’ of political life. Democratisation was inaugurated in two ways: with the founding of political parties and the inauguration of bi-lateral negotiations. Until 1968, there was essentially one ‘front’ consolidated around Makarios, to which there had also entered the only durable and constant political party – AKEL. At the end of the 1960s, members of the economically and politically powerful (because of the state) bourgeoisie proceeded to found the Eniaion Party with ‘centre-right political orientation’, according to the expression of one of its founders, Glafkos Clerides, and with a clearly ‘pro-Western’ and therefore anti-Communist orientation. In the circle of authority of Makarios and in the heart of the state, Glafkos Clerides, Polycarpos Yorkadjis and Tassos Papadopoulos pursued, through this ‘modernising’ party, the marginalisation of the left, which was reinforced by its alliance with Makarios. Despite the fact that this party was founded with the connivance and indirect support of Makarios,164 it indicates the need of the autonomisation of the bourgeois right from Makarios. At the same time, other parties appeared, which moved either in the socialist nationalist, or conservative space.165 The founding of parties with the support of Makarios166 proved that the ethnarch, as president in the service of the ‘possible’, could not preserve both roles without the obligatory democratisation of his ethnarchism. The bi-communal negotiations between the Greek Cypriots and the Turkish Cypriots must also be seen within this framework of pseudo-

See the threats of EOKA B against judges, teachers and policemen, in Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 150. 162 For the relations between National Guard HQ, controlled by Demetrios Ioannides in Athens, see Drousiotis, EOKA B and CIA, 121-2. 163 Clerides, ƈ ƪơƴƜƨƥƳƞ ƬƯƵ, III, 121-2. 164 For the details of the founding of the Eniaion Party, see Clerides, ƈ ƪơƴƜƨƥƳƞ ƬƯƵ, II, 329-30. 165 The ‘Socialist’ Party (EDEK) was founded by Makarios physician, Dr Vassos Lyssarides, a nationalist and a socialist on the Baathist model. The ‘Progressive’ Party was founded by the EOKA gunman Nikos Sampson. 166 For Makarios’ views see Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ Ƅ’, XI, 480-1. 161

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democratisation. Despite the fact that these were carried out (1968-74)167 under the pressure of Greece and Turkey and parallel with other plans, which the two countries weaved for Cyprus under the umbrella of NATO, the same process obliged Makarios to negotiate with the Turkish Cypriots the content of the notion of Cypriot – state, people, space, problem, etc. However, this process of democratisation of Cyprus remained suspended, trapped in the ethnarchs notion of the state. During the negotiations, where local, individual or collective, interests for the control of authority were interwoven with the planning of Greece and Turkey for the absolute control of the island, Makarios, with the negotiations as his weapon, tried to protect his presidential-ethnarchic role, albeit undermining the negotiations. As is testified by several sources,168 he gave particular emphasis to the executive authority because its form and constitution gave the character of the nationality of the state.169 The negotiations were serving the international presence of the state, contributed to the re-negotiation of Makarios’ intra-communal balances, between the pro-enosists and the pro-independence, as well as to the delimitation of his relations with Greece, but they did not serve his ethnarchism: according to him the constitution of 1960 had been wrong to designate the Turkish Cypriots a community; they were a minority.170 Makarios’ ethnarchism, attempted to democratise intercommunally, but that was not enough for the bi-communal democratisation of the state. The critical level, on which both the juntification and the democratisation of Cyprus was played out, was that of Makarios’ relations with the Greek junta. Faithful to the dogma of ‘national centre’, Makarios, in the beginning, developed particularly good relations with the Greek junta. However, in the junta’s understanding, the relations between the ethnarch and the ‘national centre’ were not an object of negotiation or of conflict. ‘National matters’ were defined and decided only by it, and its decision had the prestige of a 167 For a detailed analysis of all the phases of the negotiations, see Clerides, ƈ ƪơƴƜƨƥƳƞ ƬƯƵ, II, 226-59, 275-322, 326-8, 331-6, 347-59 and 365-79, and III, 193-206, 212-3 and 310-317. 168 Besides the testimony of Glafkos Clerides, see Kranidiotis, ƂƭƯƷƽƱƹƴƧ ƑƯƫƩƴƥƟơ, I, 520-1, 589 and elsewhere; Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, II, 791 and elsewhere. See also Makarios’ speeches and memoranda to the Greek Junta, 17 January 1970, Źươƭƴơ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƼưƯƵ ƍơƪơƱƟƯƵ Ƅ’, XI, 313-5; and his letter to Greek PM George Papadopoulos, 24 June 1971, ibid., XII, 699-706; and his speech at a meeting in the Presidential Palace on the Cyprus question, 27 January 1971, ibid., XII, 253-9, and others. 169 Makarios memorandum to the Greek government, 21 August 1970, ibid., XVII, 152-4. 170 ‘Makarios…did not intend to abandon his aim for confining the Turkish community to the status of a minority’, Clerides, ƈ ƪơƴƜƨƥƳƞ ƬƯƵ, II, 378.

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national imperative for everyone, including the ethnarch. As witnessed by the memorandum handed by George Papadopoulos’ government, through the Foreign Ministry, to Makarios in 1971,171 in the junta’s conception of the ‘national centre’: a) Cyprus, even though internationally independent, was not independent vis-a-vis the Greek State, since it formed part of the national body, and b) Makarios was elected by the Cypriot people with the mandate to co-operate harmoniously with the national centre. With the first point, the Greek government made clear that its interventions in Cyprus were legitimate, since the island was national ground, and with the second, that Makarios’ disobedience vis-a-vis the national centre constituted high treason vis-a-vis the ‘Hellenism’ of Cyprus, which elected him with the mandate of obedience to the ‘national centre’. Makarios, as archbishop-ethnarch-president, was trying to co-operate, in the name of national duty, with the junta, but also, at the same time, opposing it, in the name of his interpretation of this duty. Thus, on the one hand, he accepted the negotiations as an order imposed by the ‘national centre’, as a national duty, while he was undermining them, based on the question of who interprets national duty more correctly. Makarios, in his attempt to impose himself on the junta, projecting his double role, left the state in a deadly peril. In the junta’s conception, national duty was defined and interpreted only by the ‘national centre’. The breach of duty would bring punishment, as Papadopoulos made clear with a letter (18 June 1971) to Makarios: The good judgement, which characterises You, gives me the hope that, even in the last moment, You would want to revise Your decisions. If the opposite happens, if You insist in rupturing our common front, I am obliged to tell You that You are undertaking a grave responsibility vis-a-vis Cypriot Hellenism, vis-a-vis the Nation in general, and vis-a-vis History. In such a case, the Greek Government will find itself in the hard necessity to take the measures commanded by national interest, and the interest of the Cypriot Hellenism, no matter how bitter they would be.172

The visible breaches between the ethnarch and ‘national centre’ were constantly deepening. The transfer of Czechoslovak weapons to Cyprus, after Makarios’ deal with Moscow, in order to equip the ‘Reserve Body of the Police’, Makarios’ personal police guard, against the anti-Makarios National Guard, which had been eroded by the junta,173 meant that Makarios had gone too far for the junta. According to the ultimatum of 10 February 1972,174 Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 84-5. Ibid., 81-3. 173 According to the report of the American Ambassador in Nicosia, the National Guard was responsible for anti-Makarios propaganda. See NARA (National Archives 171 172

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Cypriot Hellenism is part of the Nation. This must not be forgotten. Just as we must not forget that Athens is and remains the national centre. Nevertheless, the Greek Government does not have at this moment, the intention of intervening in the internal affairs of Cypriot Hellenism…The Greek Government believes that the time has come for the formation of a Government of National Unity by all groups of nationalist Cypriot Hellenism. Of a Government which will come from the free initiative of the political and ecclesiastical leadership. In this will participate persons…who are able to work for the restoration of the disrupted national unity.

Athens thus gave the command for the formation of a national government, according to its own example, in Cyprus, while Makarios’ resignation from authority, even with the use of violence,175 constituted a patriotic duty. The materialisation of the command of Athens was undertaken by the three antiMakarios, pro-junta bishops. Makarios’ ethnarchism, his once powerful weapon for his imposition as an undisputable president, was by now the Achilles’ heel of the presidential role. In fact, the three bishops of the Church of Cyprus, in a Holy Synod they convoked on 2 March 1972, asked, invoking canon law, for Makarios’ resignation from the presidency of the Republic. This other patriotic front, with the collaboration of the entire ecclesiastical, paraecclesiastical and juntic world of Greece under the leadership of Ieronymos, Archbishop of Athens,176 was following the desire of the ‘national centre’. The anti-Makarios ‘ecclesiastical front’, whose mastermind was Anthimos, Bishop of Kitium, and which was in constant communication with the Greek junta’s Ambassador in Nicosia, consolidated the enosist-proGrivas and nationalist-anti-communist forces in Cyprus. The bishops shared the Junta’s political concerns: Makarios, as archbishop-ethnarch-president of an independent state, was undermining their own authority in Cyprus. The identification of the ethnarchic with the presidential role, without the mediation of enosis, marginalised the political activity of the Church as ethnarchic – a spiritual expression of Hellenism – and of Greece as a ‘national centre’ – a political expression of Hellenism. The common enemy of their of Research Administration), RG 59, CFPF, 1970-1973, Cyprus, letter from Crawford to Boyatt, 19 November 1971; Also Drousiotis, EOKA B and CIA, 135-6. 174 Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 75-6; Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, II, 802-3; Clerides, ƈ ƪơƴƜƨƥƳƞ ƬƯƵ, III, 124-8. 175 The Junta was preparing to overthrow Makarios, in collaboration with Turkey, but the US frustrated this plan because it feared a possible Soviet intervention in Cyprus. See NARA, NPMS, NSC, Cyprus/Greece, 10 February 1972, Harold Saunders and Rosemary Neaher to Kissinger, ‘The Cyprus situation’. 176 See the letter of Archbishop of Athens Ieronymos to Makarios, which asks for his resignation from the office of president, in Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 106-7.

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authority was Makarios. In this period of great crisis, when the Greek junta was pressuring, on the one hand for intercommunal negotiations, while at the same time reinforcing the most enosist, nationalist and anti-Communist elements, Makarios made the Cypriot state his greatest shield of protection, giving it the mission of the guardian of the Greek and Orthodox values in Cyprus, which the Greek state was forfeiting with its insistence on intercommunal negotiations: ‘Secular is called the secular office. It would have been secular…if it had not been closely connected with the struggle of the Cypriot Hellenism for its national survival and future. And the struggle of the Greek Cypriots is not only for the motherland, but also for the faith’,177 he replied to the argument of the bishops about the conflict of roles. According to the quotation above, the ethnarch’s role was based on Cypriot Hellenism, not Hellenism, and therefore its source was the Cypriot, ethnarchic state and not the ‘national centre’. According to the extremist anti-communist, nationalist, enosist front, in the framework of which the three bishops were, since 1972, in open collaboration with Grivas and EOKA B, Makarios was a national traitor and pro-communist, and together with him also the state. They told Makarios on 23 March 1972 that Cyprus, eternally struggling for enosis with Mother Greece, under the leadership of the current Primate of the Church, is turning towards alternatives and solutions which are hardly national. The “feasible”, of which, unfortunately, Your Beatitude has the fathership, is not a synonym with the ideal of ENOSIS. This novelty for our National History – the possible, constitutes a blatant rejection of Enosis, and if materialized, it would cut off Cyprus definitively from the National Body…During the Presidency of Your Beatitude, the atheistic and anti-Christian Communism has been established and spread its tentacles, both in the state mechanism and in any expression of public life of the country…And how can we neglect to say with sorrow that the communist mass, which has grown with Your tolerance, has become the support par excellence of the Primate of the Church.178

At the same time, another rightist front, not openly anti-Makarios, was forming, in which pro-independence parties (Eniaion Party of Clerides) met with extremist nationalist ones (Progressive Party of Nikos Sampson) and with nationalist trade unions and organisations. Their point of contact was their devotion, for various reasons, to the ‘national centre’ and their antiMakarios’ reply to the three Bishops, on 19 March 1972, in Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, II, 813-4; Makarios Drousiotis, ƂưƼ ƴƯ ƆƨƭƩƪƼ ƍƝƴƹưƯ ƳƴƧƭ ƆƐƋƂ ƃŷ (From the National Front to EOKA B), Nicosia 1994, 379-92; Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 109-10, etc. 178 Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 114. 177

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communism of nationalist references. This front pressured Makarios for the normalisation of his relations with Greece.179 The bourgeois class of Cyprus, in order to maintain its dominance of the state, which was endangered by Makarios’ policies, developed an opportunistic ideological behaviour: anti-ethnarchic and secular, but not democratic, which legitimised the most extremist nationalism of Cyprus, as well as of the Greek junta. At the other end, a part of the ‘pro-Makarios front’, EDEK and AKEL, were ideologically and politically opposed to the Junta. This ‘pro-Makarios front’, ethnarchic in its devotion to Makarios, was forming, however, a potentially new public space, in the streets, with demonstrations, outside of the ethnarchic mechanisms, and against the Church. The failure to reconstitute the unity of the ethnarchic space through an agreement with Grivas (26 March 1972), and the futility of his declared loyalty to the ‘national centre’, pushed Makarios to increasingly cling to the presidential office, from which by now his ethnarchism depended. There was no attempt to create conditions of democratisation. It was forming, however, a new conscience: Makarios’ defence was identified with the defence of democracy and the state. Grivas’ plans for a coup, with EOKA B as its executor,180 and with ecclesiastical funding,181 were reinforcing the selfcontradictory process of democratisation through the ethnarch. Makarios’ deposition from the Archiepiscopal Throne, which was decided by the Holy Synod on 7 March 1973, neutralised the ethnarchic role, giving the ‘sacred’ cue for the extermination of the president. A great political battle was transferred once again (as in 1900-9) to the ecclesiastical level. Confronting the three bishops, Makarios responded with an ‘ecumenical front’, with the convocation of a Meizon and Hypertelis Synod, under the presidency of the Patriarch of Alexandria,182 which deposed the bishops.183 In this ecclesiastical Clerides, ƈ ƪơƴƜƨƥƳƞ ƬƯƵ, III, 178-81 and Appendix 4, 414-6. The first plan for a coup, which EOKA B prepared, was operation ‘Arachni’ (Spider), in February 1972. In 1973, these plans became more frequent. With Grivas’ plan ‘Vronti’ (Thunder), EOKA B started the bloody attacks on police stations. Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 150-1. For the coup plan named ‘Apollon’ and for the assassination plans against Makarios, see ibid., 151-3 and 157-81. 181 Bishop of Kitium, Anthimos, gave Grivas 10,000 pounds for weapons. Besides this, the Bishop’s Palace in Limassol had been transformed into an anti-Makarios headquarters, with armed men of EOKA B. For EOKA B’s weapons in Limassol, see Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, II, 851. 182 The Meizon and Hypertelis Synod, which convened on 12 July 1973, consisted of 16 prelates (a Synod is Meizon with 12 prelates). In this Synod the Patriarchate of Constantinople and the Church of Greece did not participate. 179 180

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civil war, one can trace the Cypriot political particularities: both democratisation and juntification of political life constituted, in the end, a sacred, ethnarchic claim. The ‘holy war’ weakened the state. In the meantime, the junta’s stranglehold on Makarios, and consequently around the Cypriot state, was suffocating, especially when the head of the Greek Military Police, Demetrios Ioannides, a friend of Grivas’, as well as of Sampson, overthrew Papadopoulos on 25 November 1973. The political, as well as physical survival of Makarios was now dependent on the survival of the state, and vice versa. The survival of the two had as a precondition the denunciation of the Greek junta and of its blatant interventions in Cyprus. Grivas’ death on 27 January 1974, which deprived EOKA B of its great national capital, paved the way for the disengagement from the ‘national centre’, in the name of democracy. Makarios’ letter of 2 July 1974 to the President of the Junta government, Phaidon Gizikis,184 as well as his press conference on 5 July 1974,185 constituted the most important steps for the democratisation of the ethnarchic state. Makarios denounced for the first time, explicitly and categorically, the junta for the situation in Cyprus, while he essentially denounced Nicosia’s relationship of dependence from the ‘national centre’. For the first time, then, Makarios was using the language of the president of an independent state vis-a-vis a foreign state. However, with this denunciation, he was terminating, at the same time, the intercommunal negotiations. Instead of placing them under the exclusive aegis of the state as a Cypriot issue, he implicitly excluded, together with the junta, the Turkish Cypriots from the state. Makarios, with his denunciation of the junta, claimed the ‘democracy’ of the ethnarchic, but not of the Cypriot state.

Conclusion: Makarios’ New Mission The Greek junta’s response to Makarios’ letter came a few days later, on 15 July 1974, with the military coup and his overthrowing.186 Makarios’ salvation and flight from the presidential palace towards Troodos, and from there to 183 On the occasion of the election of new bishops to the three bishoprics, Makarios proceeded to the formation of two new bishoprics, those of Limassol and Morphou, thus splitting the power of the three bishops that had hitherto existed. The full text of the resolution of the Meizon and Hypertelis Synod is given in Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, II, 876-80. 184 Makarios’ letter to Phaedon Gizikis in Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 257-61. 185 See Makarios’ press conference in ibid, 264-73. 186 For an analytical presentation of the coup, see Drousiotis, EOKA B’ and CIA, 361413.

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London, opened a new page in the history of Cyprus. In fact, already from the first evening of the coup, in his dramatic proclamation, with which he announced that he was alive, Makarios undertook the role of the defender of the democracy and independence of Cyprus. In his speech before the UN Security Council on 19 July 1974,187 he denounced the coup as a foreign invasion against the independence of Cyprus. The coup was not a Cypriot ‘revolution’,188 as the rebels, through Nikos Sampson as the ‘president’ of the coup, claimed. He also ‘decyprified’ the coup, by giving ‘absolution’ to the Cypriots, who co-operated with the Greek junta and ‘endowed’ the Greek Cypriots with a constant stance of resistance and democracy, rendering the Cypriot state under his leadership a symbol of democracy. Then he redefined the Cypriot people, into which he reincorporated the Turkish Cypriots: the failure and termination of the negotiations was due to the Greek junta and its coup against him, because of which the entire Cypriot people, Greek and Turkish Cypriots, now suffered. The coup did not take place under such circumstances, as it may be considered an internal problem of the Greek Cypriots. It clearly constituted an invasion from outside, in blatant contravention of the independence and sovereignty of the Republic of Cyprus…It was confronted with the decisive resistance of the legitimate security forces and of the Greek people of Cyprus. I cannot tell with certainty that the resistance…of the Greek population of Cyprus against the conspirators will be terminated until the restoration of its freedom and democratic rights. The Cypriot people will never succumb to dictatorship…But, how could there be progress in the negotiations, when the policy of the regime of Athens concerning Cyprus was double-faced…[while the coup] constituted a containment of the progress of the negotiations towards a solution…As I have already declared, the events of Cyprus do not constitute an internal affair of the Greeks of Cyprus. The Turks of Cyprus are also affected. The Greek Junta’s coup is an invasion and from its consequences the entire people of Cyprus will suffer. Both Greeks and Turks.189

Makarios’ forceful denunciation of the Greek coup and the Turkish invasion five days later, rendered Makarios the greatest moral and political capital for peace and democracy in Cyprus and at all levels. The enthusiastic reception reserved for him by both the Greeks in Greece (30 November 1974) and the Greek Cypriots in Cyprus, at the time of his return to the island (7 December 1974), after a five-month absence and after the Turkish See speech in Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 284-290; Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, II, 965-8. See Sampson’s proclamation (15 July 1974), proclamation of the Armed forces (15 July 74) and Sampson’s statements at a press conference (18 July 74), in Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 275-6, 274-284. 189 See speech in Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 284-290; Pavlides, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, II, 965-8. 187 188

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army had occupied 37% of the island, proved this. Democracy in Cyprus, as well as the unity of the community, could only be guaranteed by Makarios: both the bourgeois class (Eniaion Party) of Cyprus and its Church, delegitimised because of their open or indirect covering of the coup, could only ‘hide’ behind Makarios, in order to again earn a place in political life. I am granting to all absolution and amnesty in the hope that the desired concord and unity of our people will return. Before the sacrificial altar of Cyprus, passions and discord have no place. The spiritual unity of Cypriot Hellenism constituted a National Imperative. And towards this direction we all have a duty to contribute, Church, State, parties, organisations, press, persons…The concord, unanimity and unity of our people will be for me a constant effort.190

With this absolution, ethnarchism, with Makarios as the president of the state as its agent, constituted the canon of democracy. However, under Makarios’ ethnarchism, Athens, guilty vis-a-vis the nation for the national tragedy, also found the opportunity to be purified as a ‘national centre’. In the future, it had to stand by what Nicosia decided. The price for the fall of the Junta and the restoration of democracy was very heavy, and ‘Cyprus paid it. Through the Cypriot sacrifice, the tree of freedom and democracy, which was uprooted by the Junta, was restored in Greece’,191 declared Makarios, thus underlining the importance of a historical problem. The nationalism that had dominated Greece from the Civil War onwards, was legitimised because of Cyprus and the irredentist pattern of the ‘national centre’: this ideology, which devoured the entrails of democracy and led to the Greek Junta, had met disaster in Cyprus, with the Turkish invasion. The independence of Cypriot ethnarchism from the Greek state gave the death blow to Greek nationalism and paved the way to democracy. On the other hand, the forceful denunciation of the Greek coup by Makarios delegitimised Turkey internationally as ‘an agent of peace and constitutional order’ in Cyprus. Makarios, as President of the Republic of Cyprus, was the only one who could guarantee the constitutional order and the independence of Cyprus, as well as peace between the two communities: ‘The fall of the Junta facilitated also my return to Cyprus. And my return means the restoration of constitutional order, which was overthrown by the Junta and was exploited by Turkey’.192 In the light of 15 July 1974, the date of Makarios speech at the time of his reception in Cyprus, 7 December 1974, Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 305. 191 Ibid., 304. 192 Ibid. 190

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the coup, Makarios was rereading the contemporary history of Cyprus as a result of a great national treason: Some claimed that the Turkish invasion was predetermined and it would have materialised under any circumstances. I do not share this claim. The coup of the 15th of July created the favourable conditions for the invasion.193

Turkey, in any case the national enemy who always threatened Hellenism, would never achieve anything without treason: ‘the fall came from inside. The rebels demolished the walls, they opened the gates for Turkey, which was lurking for a long time, to enter Cyprus. And the hordes of the Turkish Attila conquered and occupy today a great part of our ancestral land’.194 With the tragedy of 1974, ethnarchism was definitively identified with Makarios’ person and, independent of the Church or the ‘national centre’, lost its autonomous function. It was subterraneously incorporated into the presidential role, in order to signify a new desirable and feasible. The feasible was the preservation of the non-aligned, independent Republic of Cyprus, an agent of the island’s Greekness and unity. The desirable was the reunification of Cyprus. In this sense, the Turkish Cypriots belonged, unquestionably now, to the Cypriot state. Already in his speech before the UN Security Council on 19 July 1974 and at the time of his return to Cyprus, Makarios spoke as the President of the Cypriots, both Greek and Turkish Cypriots, and set as a precondition for the survival of the state the participation of the Turkish Cypriots on an equal footing. The Cypriot state, then, was undertaking the mission to seek a solution to the Cypriot problem under the aegis of the UN. We desire negotiations with our Turkish neighbours for the bridging of our differences, for finding a solution to the Cyprus problem…It is possible to find a way of self-government for the two neighbouring elements. And it is possible to find a way of safeguarding the rights of the Greeks and the Turks of Cyprus and of their peaceful coexistence towards their mutual benefit and common prosperity.195

The survival of the Cypriot state depended on his ability to keep the prospect of the negotiations for finding a solution to the Cyprus problem constantly alive. Makarios, reincorporating the Turkish Cypriots into the desirable future of Cyprus, was safeguarding the present and the future of a state in which the Makarios speech on the first anniversary of the coup, 15 July 1975, Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 307-8. 194 Ibid., 307. 195 Makarios speech at the time of his reception in Cyprus, 7 December 1974, Papageorgiou, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, 305. 193

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spiritual and political expression of Hellenism were identified for the first time. The ethnarch had, for the first time, obtained independent political authority, having, however, previously recognised that this authority of his was eventually bound to the ‘neighbouring millet’. Makarios died in August 1977.

Figure 17: Portrait of Archbishop Makarios III at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus.

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Figure 18: Vandalised Statue of Makarios III at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2008.

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Figure 19: New Marble Statue of Makarios III at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Andrekos Varnava, 2008.

CHAPTER ELEVEN CHRYSOSTOMOS I, 1977-2006: MAKARIOS III WAS ‘A DIFFICULT ACT TO FOLLOW’ ANDREKOS VARNAVA

The role of the archbishop and ethnarch of Cyprus, as shown in the previous chapters, underwent a number of changes from the late eighteenth century, yet regardless of these changes the archbishop-ethnarch has always sought to have authority over the political, economic, and social direction of the island. This was no different under the leadership of Archbishop Chrysostomos I, except that on the political, and for the most part on the social, level he failed to have the same influence as his predecessors. This chapter focusses on how Chrysostomos I saw his role as the archbishop-ethnarch in the aftermath of the untimely death of Makarios III in 1977 and various problems emanating from the war of 1974, not least the question of reunifying the island. Therefore, this chapter offers an interesting case study on how the archbishop of Cyprus has evolved after the end of the ethnarchic state that Makarios had created. In interpreting Chrysostomos’ approach to being the archbishop-ethnarch, one cannot escape his efforts to follow in his predecessor’s footsteps and his comparative failure to realise this. Evidence that he wanted to take over from where Makarios left off was present in the memoir of Christos Zaharakis, the Ambassador of Greece to the island, who first met Chrysostomos during the summer of 1979 when he arrived to take up his post. Zaharakis claimed that Chrysostomos succeeded Makarios and is trying desperately, but in vain, to be recognized by the public and the status of ethnarch, having lifted the banner of the “fighting line” and mimicking Papaflessas with fiery speeches from the pulpit in which

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Clearly what Zaharakis meant by ethnarch was the nationalist and populist political leadership of the Greek Cypriot community that Makarios had offered. Indeed Makarios’ success in dominating all aspects of Greek Cypriot life, whether supported or not, influenced Chrysostomos to attempt to mimic Makarios rather than to forge his own path. That is why Chrysostomos always referred to Makarios to promote or justify his ideas and policies. For this reason, Chrysostomos invited comparisons with Makarios. As the journalist Felix Corley opined after the death of Chrysostomos in December 2007: ‘Archbishop Makarios, the controversial ethnarch of Cyprus’ Greek Orthodox majority and first president of the Republic of Cyprus, was a difficult act to follow’.2 The other factor that decisively influenced Chrysostomos’ course as archbishop-ethnarch was how he reacted to the war of 1974. In many ways, Chrysostomos’ reactions to the aftermath of the war and the political problem that resulted were based on the ethnarchic state that Makarios had created. Chrysostomos, no less than most people, was a product of his times. The Church of Cyprus played an important role in aiding the internally displaced Greek Cypriots after the 1974 war, especially by offering substantial funds for their needs. Following on from Makarios’ ethnarchic state, Chrysostomos believed that it was his duty to be actively involved in all facets of the Cyprus ‘problem’, and there was still no desire on the part of the church and some political elites to see a division of church and state. As will be shown, Chrysostomos was a consistent commentator on the Cyprus ‘problem’, regularly putting forward his advice (which he often demanded should be followed) on how the Greek Cypriot politicians and the Greek government should prosecute negotiations. Finally, it is important to note, as Paul Tzermias has done, that another important factor in Chrysostomos’ period as archbishop-ethnarch was that, unlike his predecessor, he was not the president of the republic. The decision by Cypriot political elites to have Spyros Kyprianou, the President of the House of Representatives, act as president until February 1978, despite the constitution stipulating that new elections had to be held immediately after the death of the president, meant that the new archbishop would not be president of the republic unless he was a candidate in the February 1978 Christos G. Zacharakis, Top Secret – Special Handling (in Greek), Athens, 2008, 24-5. See ‘Archbishop Chrysostomos I: Leading cleric in Cyprus’, The Independent, London, 5 January 2008. 1 2

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presidential elections. Chrysostomos’ decision not run and his faith in Kyprianou to follow Makarios’ political legacy impeded his desire to have an ethnarchic role.3

Chrysostomos before he became the Archbishop-Ethnarch More than any of the previous archbishop-ethnarchs, Chrysostomos was immensely influenced not only by his predecessor’s legacy and the structures he had created that linked the roles of archbishop, ethnarch and president, but by the political power struggles and nationalism that had dominated politics and political discourse. Chrysostomos was born on 27 September 1927 in a small village, Statos, in the Paphos district. He grew up in a poor religious family, with twelve brothers and sisters. In 1940, at the age of 13, he became, like his predecessor, a monk at the famous Kykkos Monastery. Six years later he began his studies, with the financial assistance of the Monastery, at the Pancyprian Gymnasium in Nicosia, where he graduated in 1950. He subsequently returned to Kykkos Monastery where he became a deacon and he took the name Chrysostomos. In 1952, he went to Greece and studied philosophy and theology at the University of Athens. It must be remembered that Greece had just endured a very violent and bitter civil war, which the right-wing conservative and pro-royalist forces had won with the financial and military aid of the British and US governments. During his studies in Greece, Archbishop Makarios III chose him to lead the very important office of the Ethnarchy in Athens,4 and because of this position, he became known by the Greek political and military elites. In post-colonial Cyprus, Chrysostomos played the role of a loyal follower of Makarios. Chrysostomos returned to Cyprus after the establishment of the republic, in 1961, and in October he became a priest and later an archimandrite, while he also taught theology. In 1966 he went to the UK for further studies and stayed there for two years, returning in March 1968 to take up the post of Metropolitan of Constantia, to which Makarios had appointed him. In 1973, when EOKA B was undermining Makarios and he was facing opposition from within the Cypriot Church, Chrysostomos was his closest ally. As discussed in the previous chapter, the three Metropolitans of Paphos, Kyrenia and Kitium, decided to depose Makarios from his position as president because, according to their logic, he could not be both archbishop and president. Following Makarios’ successful deposing of the Paul Tzermias, A History of the Cyprus Republic, II, Libro, Athens, 1998, 807. See the tribute on Archbishop Chrysostomos I on the web page of the Church of Cyprus, http://www.churchofcyprus.org.cy/article.php?articleID=434

3 4

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three metropolitans (see previous chapter), Chrysostomos became Bishop of Paphos. 5 It was to Paphos that Makarios headed after the coup. Consequently, Chrysostomos’ career closely followed that of Makarios’ and was also propelled by Makarios’ success in becoming the (virtually) undisputed political power in the ethnarchic state he had created. But as much as Chrysostomos was a product of the path that Makarios fashioned for himself as archbishop-ethnarch-president and for the Greek Cypriot people, he was also a product of the church. So whereas as archbishop-ethnarch-president Makarios had to deal with his role as president, from domestic affairs and international relations, Chrysostomos had none of this. Although Chrysostomos would have been involved in discussions with Makarios about the Cyprus ‘problem’, he was neither an advisor nor a close confidant of Makarios, who kept his advisors close and all major decisions reserved for his own exclusive making. Chrysostomos, although a high ranking cleric, had no experience of politics, while being, as with others who supported Makarios, a loyal and uncritical believer in the policies and actions of the archbishop-ethnarch-president.

Chrysostomos as Archbishop-Ethnarch Makarios III died unexpectedly, of a heart attack, on 3 August 1977. At his funeral, held at St. John’s Cathedral in the Archbishopric grounds in Old Nicosia, 182 dignitaries from 52 countries attended, whilst an estimated 250,000 mourners – about half the Greek Cypriot population of the island – filed past the coffin.6 Could a successor live up to this adulation? On the next day, a fascinating obituary, full of insight into the legacy of Makarios, appeared in The Times. The last paragraph was most enlightening: He was, above all, a Greek Cypriot. In this, perhaps, lay his failure to weld Cyprus into a single nation. He was under many pressures from a changeable and volatile people, it is true, yet he missed his opportunities of speaking for all Cypriots, of being a leader of Turkish Cypriots, as well as of Greek.7

The writer had of course hit the nail on the head, namely that Makarios had led only for the Greek Cypriots, and so the challenge would now be whether his successor, either as archbishop or as president, would change their approach, and lead for all Cypriots. On both counts the answer was no.

Stanley Mayes, Makarios: A Biography, Macmillan, London, 227. For Makarios’ death and the funeral, see ibid., 269-71. 7 The Times, 4 August 1977, 14. 5 6

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In any event, on 12 November 1977, Chrysostomos became Archbishop of Cyprus, and his immediate speech established what his mission would be and how he would proceed to succeed in fulfilling it: …the Church of Cyprus will never accept the legalisation of unjust foreign occupation and will not renounce the legitimate rights of the Cypriot people…[and continuing in Makarios’ footsteps the church would] continue its mission through close cooperation with the legal government of Cyprus until the nations’ problem is resolved in a fair and permanent way.8

Clearly, Chrysostomos had no intention of seeing Cyprus and Cypriots as anything other than Greek, and when he spoke about ‘legitimate rights’ and ‘fair’ resolution of the Cyprus ‘problem’, he meant from the point of view of the Greek Cypriots. He was incapable of thinking beyond this because he was a product of the Church under Makarios, and of the ethnarchic state (i.e. Republic of Cyprus) and tradition, as invented and re-invented, respectively, by Makarios. Although it would have been too soon to embark upon a critique of Makarios’ policies, unlike the journalist writing his obituary in The Times, Chrysostomos never made such a critique, but was far more blinkered in his approach to the problems facing Cyprus than Makarios, and lacked Makarios’ tact and ability to change course. Stanley Mayes, a two-time biographer of Makarios, described Chrysostomos as ‘a big bluff man in middle age’, who, although declaring he had no political ambitions, ‘soon made it apparent that, as ethnarch, he was wholly opposed to any compromise with the Turks and Turkish Cypriots and was in favour of a “long struggle”’.9 In fact Chrysostomos attempted to exert influence over the politics of the island by lauding Makarios’ policies and elevating him to hero-worship. He spearheaded the construction of the colossal bronze statue of Makarios outside the Archbishopric and saw to it that Makarios remained a constant presence in all government offices, including schools, with his portrait. On many occasions Chrysostomos waxed-lyrical about Makarios, and on one such occasion he addressed his words to Makarios himself: You are alive and you will always be in our souls, our thoughts, in our memory. You are alive and you will always be in the legends and our histories, in the mountains and valleys of our Island, in Morphou, Kyrenia, on Pentadaktylos, in Karpasia, Famagusta, Paphos, Limassol, Larnaca, in Olympus. In every inch of this land, that you watered with your sweat and sanctified with your blood. You are alive and you will always be, because the

8 9

The Times, 14 November 1977, 5d. Mayes, Makarios, 272.

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This flowery and elevated language endeared Chrysostomos to most of the religious public, and others who agreed with his ultranationalist and chauvinist politics used him when they believed he could be of advantage. But most politicians, who looked to move beyond Makarios, saw Chrysostomos as insignificant in comparison. Yet Chrysostomos persisted and although he had an insignificant political and social role by comparison to Makarios, he did succeed in maintaining the influence of the church over the realm of education and the Cyprus ‘problem’. With respect to education, Chrysostomos played a pivotal role, in conjunction with the politicians, to maintain that Cyprus is Greek and to perpetuate the official policy of ‘I never forget’ and that reunification must be just and viable (for Greek Cypriots of course), rather than geared at moving society towards reconciliation with Turkish Cypriots.11 His position on this was a result of the fact that under the Cyprus Constitution education was the responsibility of the respective Communal Chambers, even though these had ceased to exist after the civil war of 1963-4. In this connection, Chrysostomos’ main priority and preoccupation was to involve himself in various capacities in the debates over the reunification of the island.12 Being a product of the Makarios ethnarchic state, while also lacking Makarios’ experience in having relations with Turkish Cypriots as well as the international community, Chrysostomos remained unable to alter his beliefs that the Cyprus ‘problem’ was an issue of invasion and foreign occupation and it should be approached in this way and not as a bicommunal problem between Greek and Turkish Cypriots, which had started well before 1974.

10 See the speech (in Greek) of Dr. Andreas Fylaktou, Director General of the Archbishop Makarios C’ Institute in the literary memorial of Chrysostomos with the title ‘Chrysostomos: the passionate prelate’, 18 December 2011, http://www.churchofcyprus.org.cy/article.php?articleID=2110. 11 Stavroula Philippou & Andrekos Varnava, ‘Constructions of solution(s) to the Cyprus problem: exploring formal curricula in Greek Cypriot state schools,’ in Reunifying Cyprus: The Annan Plan and Beyond, (eds.) Andrekos Varnava & Hubert Faustmann, I. B. Tauris, London, 2009, 194-212. 12 See ‘Archbishop Chrysostomos I: Leading cleric in Cyprus’, The Independent, 5 January 2008.

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At every opportunity, and there were many since the archbishop almost always spoke after the president during important public events, 13 Chrysostomos used emotional rhetoric to convey his thoughts on how he saw the ‘solution’ to the Cyprus ‘problem’, usually blaming Turkey, the Turkish Cypriot leadership and the international community, and criticising Greek Cypriot and Greek political elites for weakness. In order to promote his ideas regarding the solution to the Cyprus ‘problem’, he also visited many European capital cities, and the US. For example, on a visit to the US in 1979, Chrysostomos declared that a resumption of talks between Kyprianou and Denktash would be ‘untimely’.14 Among Chrysostomos’ main beliefs was that Greece had a special role and responsibility for the reunification of Cyprus. He often referred to the role that Athens should play in the efforts to find a solution to the Cyprus problem and frequently visited Greece to make his ideas known to the Greek politicians and he even publicly criticised Greece when he believed that Athens was not following the ‘proper’ policy on Cyprus. That was the case especially when New Democracy was in power. As Zacharakis claimed, during a Sunday church service in 1980, when George Rallis, the New Democracy leader, was the Prime Minister, Chrysostomos criticized the Greek government because it ‘mocks and deceives the Greeks Cypriots who wonder why Greece denied them and if today’s Greece, with its timidity and passivity, is not the one with which we had nurtured’.15 In another instance during a meeting with the Greek Minister of Foreign Affairs, Constantine Mitsotakis, on 3 August 1981, Chrysostomos asked for Greece to be more actively involved in the Cyprus problem.16 Ten years later, little had changed, when in a meeting with Mitsotakis, now prime minister, Chrysostomos made his serious disagreements with Mitsotakis on the Cyprus ‘problem’ known in no uncertain terms: As Greeks, we are asking for the dynamic presence of the Motherland in our ongoing struggle! And our struggle is not just for Cyprus. It is a struggle for the whole Nation! Because for those who can see and grasp the message of the times, with what is happening today in Cyprus, it is not just the Greek Cypriot people that are in danger. The whole Nation is in danger, both as a Nation and as a value...In Cyprus today, Mr. Prime Minister, a National struggle is taking place. We should not loss this struggle! And we will not loss 13 See the Order of Precedence of the Republic of Cyprus at http://www.mfa.gov.cy/mfa/mfa2006.nsf/protocol02_en/protocol02_en?OpenDoc ument 14 Mayes, Makarios, 285. 15 Zacharakis, Top Secret, 66. 16 Ibid., 110.

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On the other hand, Chrysostomos was a great supporter of Andreas Papandreou’s approach to the Cyprus ‘problem’, indicating that the populist nationalism of Papandreou appealed to Chrysostomos’ confrontational and rhetorical flourishes. After Papandreous’ victory in the Greek elections in October 1981, Chrysostomos made a speech lauding Papandreou: ‘since 18 October new optimism is blowing and new promising horizons were opened, which pulled Greek Cypriots from the abyss of despair and abandonment’.18 In 1982, during Papandreou’s visit to Cyprus (the first by a Greek prime minister), Chrysostomos stated: Your declaration for repositioning the Cyprus problem on the international stage as an issue of foreign invasion and occupation, and not as a matter of inter-communal dispute, demonstrates that you have understand the depth of the misfortune of the evolution of the Cyprus problem. It was natural that your position meets fierce opposition, because it comes to clear up the confusion, deliberately cultivated by the Turks and their allies, and, unfortunately, reinforced the endless and fruitless inter-communal talks.19

During the same speech, in order to show his agreement with the way Papandreou approached the Cyprus ‘problem’, but also his disagreements with those who he believed were following ‘the wrong path’, Chrysostomos claimed that it was during such difficult times that real leaders showed their true colours and their abilities: …a capable leader is not the one who, because of the difficulties, accepts the injustice in the name of realism, but the one who succeeds to change, despite the adverse conditions, the realism to law. After all that what it shows the long history of Hellenism.20

Then, when referring to the prospects of a solution, he claimed that

17 See Fylaktou memorial, 18 December 2011, http://www.churchofcyprus.org.cy/article.php?articleID=2110. 18 Zacharakis, Top Secret, 120. See also the address of Archbishop Chrysostomos during Papandreou visit in the Archdiocese of Cyprus when he officially visited Cyprus in February 1982, Light at the end of the Tunnel, Papandreou in Cyprus (in Greek), Nicosia, 1982, 54-9. 19 See Fylaktou memorial, 18 December 2011, http://www.churchofcyprus.org.cy/article.php?articleID=2110. See also Light at the end of the Tunnel, Papandreou in Cyprus (in Greek), Nicosia, 1982, 57. 20 See Fylaktou memorial, 18 December 2011, http://www.churchofcyprus.org.cy/article.php?articleID=2110.

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…justice is achievable, despite that our enemies are many. It suffices to show perseverance, endurance, perseverance, wisdom, fighting and courage for the assertion of our rights and above all faith, faith that nothing is impossible for the one who wants to struggle. Hellenism should be alive in this land. It is our responsibility, and yours, Mr. Prime Minister. It is responsibility of all Hellenism.21

Quite clearly Chrysostomos was advocating a long-term struggle where compromise was not entertained, and the reunification of Cyprus was a matter for all of Hellenism and one which could only be ‘solved’ in the context of Hellenism; that is, in favour of the Greek Cypriots. He was desirous of emphasising disappointment with the ‘motherland’, who he believed could do more, and the feeling of victimhood and abandonment. We would not want, however, to hide that our weakness on the one hand to expel with our own forces the Turkish invader from our territory, and on the other the bitter feeling of abandonment not only from others, but also from those they should not, undermined the fighting spirit of our people – and they made them receptive to suspect arguments fraught with logical fallacies of so called realism. Because of this, we drifted to the acceptance of the continuation of the process of the intercommunal talks, aiming not to restore the rights of our people with the implementation of the United Nations resolutions, but the compromise with the grabbing and the injustice…Faced with this impasse and watching every day more and more to rise before us the walls of division and enhanced the barbed wire of division and destruction, our people sink into defeatism and pessimism…Our people believed that even Greece, the motherland, faces the issue of the Cyprus Hellenism as a lost cause. It also believed that [the motherland] viewed us not as part of the nation, but as some distant relatives who are suffering, but despite its desire could not help them.22

In addition to trying to use emotional blackmail in his dealings with the Greek government over the reunification of Cyprus, Chrysostomos was active during periods where international initiatives for the solution of the Cyprus problem were afoot. Almost always his interventions did far more harm than good, since his hard-line stance contributed to the maximalist Greek Cypriot positions and the discouragement of compromise. One example was his interventions on the American-British-Canadian Plan (known as the ABC Plan), which the US government led, and had been submitted in November 1978, only a year after Chrysostomos became

21 22

Ibid. See Light at the end of the Tunnel, Papandreou in Cyprus (in Greek), Nicosia, 1982, 55-6.

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archbishop. 23 This was a twelve-point proposal that the UN SecretaryGeneral endorsed when putting it to the two sides, and was in line with the Makarios-Denktash high level agreement of 1977, and therefore the plan envisaged one federal state made up of two regions, one predominantly Greek Cypriot and the other mostly Turkish Cypriot. The central government would deal with foreign affairs, defence, currency and central banking, trade, communications, federal finance, customs, immigration and emigration, and civil aviation. Residual functions would rest with the two regions. There would be a bicameral legislature, with the upper chamber evenly divided between the two communities, and the lower one divided proportionally. The Greek Cypriot president and the Turkish Cypriot vicepresident would select the Council of Ministers. The size of the two regional states would take into account economic viability, security, population distribution, and history, yet Turkish Cypriot concessions were flagged. The plan called for a demilitarized republic and withdrawal of all foreign forces except for an agreed upon contingent. The majority of the Greek Cypriot political elites objected to many of the points of the plan, even though it conformed with the 1977 agreement, because it did not enshrine the three principles of ‘freedom of movement’, ‘freedom of settlement’, and the right to own property anywhere. The only voice of Greek Cypriot support was Glafkos Clerides, who urged acceptance as a basis for talks. The Turkish Cypriot leadership also formally rejected the plan. The role of Chrysostomos was telling, since he supported the government of President Spyros Kyprianou. The British High Commission in Nicosia informed the Foreign Office that Archbishop Chrysostomos, who had hitherto held his fire, came out yesterday (29 November 1978) with a robust attack on the proposals on familiar lines. He said that the prior return of Varosha should be a precondition for negotiations but that under any settlement all displaced must be allowed to return home. He was highly critical of Anglo/American diplomacy from 1974 onwards, which he claimed had served Turkish interests.24

This was an excellent summation of Chrysostomos’ position: Varosha must be returned to Greek Cypriot control before any discussions should be undertaken and all displaced Greek Cypriots should return. These were his

23 For the details of the ABC Plan see Nikos Christodoulides, The Plans for the resolution of the Cyprus problem, 1948-1978 (in Greek), Kastaniotis, Athens, 2009, 200-35. 24 FCO9/2728, no. 288, telegram, J. F. R. Martin, British High Commission, Nicosia, to FO, 30 November 1978.

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red lines.25 Such maximalist and conditional rhetoric helped fuel the cold war between Greek and Turkish Cypriots and to prevent the two sides from compromising. Indeed the British High Commissioner, J. F. R. Martin, went even further by claiming that Chrysostomos was unable and unwilling to change, and his views were influential amongst rural society. …[he] had consistently taken this hawkish line since he was Bishop of Paphos in Makarios’ time. Since succeeding Makarios he seems to have learnt nothing and forgotten nothing. Although not a member of the National Council, he carries a good deal of weight in the villages and President Kyprianou, who consults him on matters of national significance, is bound to take account of his views.26

Martin reported Chrysostomos’ political statements to his superiors because he knew the power of the archbishop-ethnarch, even in the aftermath of Makarios’ death and the subsequent ‘ending’ of the ethnarchic state. In a follow up telegram, Martin referred to Chrysostomos’ speech on the opening of a photo exhibition by the Karpassia Coordinating Committee, which was an organisation representing displaced Greek Cypriots from the Karpass Peninsula, in the Famagusta District. According to Martin, Chrysostomos’ comments regarding the ABC Plan at the event were significant because the President of the Karpassia Coordinating Committee, Nicos Fallas, was also the editor of Ammochostos (Famagusta) newspaper, which generally supported the ABC plan, unlike the Kyrenia and Morphou associations representing their displaced.27 The British were concerned with the negative stance that Chrysostomos’ was taking on the proposed plan because he was trying to mislead the Greek Cypriot community, and especially the displaced, into believing that they could achieve all their hopes and dreams. Martin added that Chrysostomos’ rhetoric hinged on the use of emotional blackmail, such as when he stated that the ‘struggle of the Greek Cypriot people was not being carried out for the sake of a few suburbs of Famagusta. He was confident that the people of Famagusta themselves did not wish to betray their brothers who had also been turned out of their homes by the Turks’.28 Also obvious in Chrysostomos’ approach was the blaming of the international community for not supporting the Greek Cypriot version of the past and its ideal ‘solution’, such as when Chrysostomos claimed that Turkey 25 James Ker-Lindsay, ‘A History of Cyprus Peace Proposals’, Reunifying Cyprus: The Annan Plan and Beyond, (eds.) Andrekos Varnava and Hubert Faustmann, I. B. Taurus, London, 16-7. 26 Ibid. 27 FCO9/2728, 285A, telegram, J. F. R. Martin, British High Commission, Nicosia, to FO, 30 November 1978. 28 Ibid.

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was ignoring the UN resolutions regarding Cyprus and ‘countries which could exercise pressure on Turkey did not support and seek to implement UN resolutions’. 29 Chrysostomos, Martin hastened to add, blamed the Americans and the British for their traditional negative policies and actions in relation to Cyprus, such as when Chrysostomos stated that Anglo-American diplomacy had never been frank and just with the Greek Cypriots. They could have prevented the July 1974 coup if they did not plan it. If they wanted to, they could oblige the invader to withdrew, but they continued to refuse to do this and most of the time at the UN they either abstained or voted against the Cyprus Government. Could one then have confidence in their proposals which had as their object the granting of justice?30

Martin expected such hawkish statements from Chrysostomos and thought they would carry considerable weight in the Synod of Bishops and with the Orthodox clergy whose influence particularly in the villages is probably stronger than that of any of the political parties. They are less likely to influence the political leadership although…Kyprianou is bound to take them into account.31

It is important to note that following the development of the said initiative, the leader of AKEL, Ezekias Papaioannou, who was initially supportive of resuming talks, worried that such rhetoric would prejudice any initiative, and in particularly turn President Kyprianou and the public against any compromise deal. As noted by Miltiades Christodoulou, ‘after returning from New York Papaioannou visited Archbishop Chrysostomos the [same] night…and submitted the request of the party, to avoid any negative public demonstration…because of the seriousness and good content’.32 Another example was three years later, when in November 1981 the UN Secretary General, Kurt Waldheim, pushed for the resumption of talks, which had been halted in 1980. In 1980 Hugo Gobbi had been negotiating with the two leaders on 1) improving relations; 2) returning Greek Cypriots to Varosha; 3) a new constitution; and 4) the territorial boundaries of each Ibid. Ibid. 31 Ibid. 32 Miltiades Christodoulou, ƈ ƑƯƱƥƟơ ƴƹƭ ƆƫƫƧƭƯƴƯƵƱƪƩƪƾƭ ƓƷƝƳƥƹƭ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƋƽưƱƯƲ (Greco-Turkish Relations and Cyprus), II, Nicosia, 1995, 427; Paul M. Digklis, ƑƩƪƱƝƲ ƂƫƞƨƥƩƥƲ, ƋƵưƱƩơƪƼ 1878 – 2004 (Bitter Realities: Cyprus Problem, 1878-2004), Nicosia, 2005, 335-6. 29 30

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regional state. But the talks broke down when the Turkish Cypriot leader, Rauf Denktash, insisted that a ‘bi-zonal’ state was a confederation and not a federation. This, of course, aggravated those who had been against the talks in the first place, and indeed against a federation, and who naturally were sceptical of a resumption in talks. Chrysostomos was such a person. He wrote to Kyprianou and the Greek Prime Minister, Papandreou, expressing his disappointment because they supported a resumption of talks. According to Chrysostomos, the Waldheim was ‘trapping the Cyprus problem in endless and devastating procedures…and it is in extreme contrast to the [Greek] prime minister's statement for reposition of the [Cyprus] problem, which they had been received with excitement from the Greek Cypriots who risked being disappointed again’.33 Chrysostomos did not believe in discussions with Turkish Cypriots, but merely for the international community to dictate his desired solution to the Turkish side. This was even more evident in a speech in 1982 after a Sunday liturgy, which was, as all his church speeches, sent to all the churches on the island for the priests to read out after the liturgy, as another push was made to restart talks: …[the] objectives of our struggle is – and always should be – the liberation of every corner of our occupied country, the recovery of our ancestral homes and the restoration of freedom and justice throughout Cyprus and for all its inhabitants. We do not forget…Neither Famagusta, nor Morphou nor Karpasia, but neither Kyrenia. And this should, with our fighting position on the issue, make it clear towards every direction. Because if we accept the separation of our country in north and south, the northern part, sooner or later, will turn as a bridgehead for Turkey and then nothing, from what we are doing today, we will be sure that we will have them tomorrow….34

Chrysostomos obtained the role and authority he was craving on the Cyprus ‘problem’ only when he had a receptive audience, such as with the organisations set-up by displaced Greek Cypriots, as seen above during the ABC Plan, but increasingly during the presidency of George Vasiliou, with whom he had strong disagreements on Vasiliou’s reconciliation and reunification initiatives. During the first months of Vasiliou’s presidency, Chrysostomos came out strongly against Vasiliou’s approach to reunifying the island after his positive reply to the UN Secretary General’s initiative, such as at Makarios’ memorial service on 3 August 1988. When the dialogue is not really a dialogue, or when you have the objective of step-by-step consolidation of possession intending to establish direct or Zacharakis, Top Secret, 100. See Fylaktou memorial, 18 December 2011, http://www.churchofcyprus.org.cy/article.php?articleID=2110. 33 34

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Chapter Eleven indirect legalisation of partition and the presence of Turkey in Cyprus, then there is no real dialogue, but a trap. It is a monologue. It dictate to the terms of Turkey, which we have to accept... and I do not understand why we should not insist on dialogue to discuss and resolve first the withdrawal of Turkish troops and settlers and the restoration and protection of basic rights and freedoms for all residents of the island. Which is absurd in this position? Being the absurd when we insist on dialogue to discuss the implementation of the resolutions of the United Nations? These positions are not guidelines, they are reasonable. It is the essence of the whole matter.35

In consequence of his strong opposition to Vasiliou’s desire for dialogue with the Turkish Cypriots, Chrysostomos attempted to establish a greater political role for himself, first by trying to unite the displaced organisations into one political party. In October 1990, Chrysostomos encouraged the displaced organisations, particularly that of Morphou, to form a party. But DIKO and EDEK, the two parties most closely minded with him, 36 were opposed because they worried that it would draw support from their voters. Nevertheless, for the 1991 parliamentary elections, Chrysostomos favoured the Cyprus Refugee Party (PAKOP), but it never acquired considerable electoral strength and gradually dissolved after receiving a paltry 0.5 per cent of the vote (1,887 votes) in the 1991 parliamentary elections.37 This failure did not deter Chrysostomos, who realised that he could best influence Cypriot politics through putting his authority behind a candidate of his choice in the presidential elections in cooperation with DIKO, the party that was formed to represent Makarios’ view, and EDEK, whose leader, Vassos Lyssarides, claimed to also represent Makarios’ views. And this is what he did in the 1993 elections. In June 1989, Javier Pérez de Cuéllar, the UN Secretary General since 1982, presented the two sides a ‘set of ideas’ that he hoped would form the basis of discussions that would ‘solve’ the Cyprus ‘problem’. These were hotly debated by Greek Cypriot political elites, with President Vasiliou strongly in favour of negotiating, while from the beginning DIKO, EDEK and later DISY were against. Then in 1992 the new UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali submitted a revised ‘set of ideas’ to the Security Council, and after much reluctance the two sides negotiated and together accepted 91 out of 100 of the proposals. The stumbling block was Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash, as well as the 1993 Greek Cypriot Christodoulou, ƈ ƑƯƱƥƟơ ƴƹƭ ƆƫƫƧƭƯƴƯƵƱƪƩƪƾƭ ƓƷƝƳƥƹƭ ƪơƩ Ƨ ƋƽưƱƯƲ, 621-2. Andrekos Varnava & Christalla Yakinthou, ‘Cyprus: Political Modernity and the Structures of Democracy in a Divided Island,’ in The Oxford Handbook of Local and Regional Democracy in Europe, (eds.) John Loughlin, Frank Hendriks and Anders Lidstrom, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2011, 467-8. 37 Achilles C. Emilianides, Religion and Law in Cyprus, Wolters Kluwer, 2011, 139. 35 36

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presidential elections.38 DIKO and EDEK were as one in strongly opposing the Ghali ‘set of ideas’, and so was the other presidential candidate, Glafkos Clerides, although less vociferously, but he was not supported by DIKO or EDEK because according to their logic his party, DISY, had given political refuge to the extreme right that had supported the Athens-Junta backed coup against Makarios in 1974. 39 So in agreement with Chrysostomos, DIKO, EDEK and the archbishop put forward a common candidate for the presidential elections. This was the first serious and open involvement of the archbishop in the presidential electoral process. Chrysostomos had already laid the ground work by establishing a television and radio station, Logos, (the word), in order ‘to transfer to the last corner of our island the voice of the gospel and of the Greek tradition and to help raise the morale and spiritual level and to strengthen the spirit of resistance of our people’.40 The common candidate was Paschalis Paschalides, formerly Minister of Commerce during the transition period between British rule and independence (1959-60), a close associate of the archbishop, and the president of a Greek mining company (NIMS) which was ‘controlled’ by the Church of Cyprus. To the great disappointment of DIKO, EDEK and Chrysostomos, Paschalides only secured 18.6 per cent of the vote (66,300 votes), thus failing to pass to the second round, despite the fact that in the parliamentary elections of 1991 DIKO had secured 19.6 per cent and EDEK 10.9 per cent of the vote.41 Clearly, Vasiliou was able to attract those that had voted for DIKO and EDEK in the 1991 parliamentary elections, since he topped the poll in the first round with 44.2 per cent, even though the only official backing came from AKEL, which had secured a mere 30.6 per cent in the 1991 parliamentary elections. Without a doubt the result of the election was a major setback to Chrysostomos’ efforts to fashion a more active role in politics. After this set-back, Chrysostomos never found the allies or the strength to mount another attempt at political influence, and mostly supported the views of DIKO and EDEK. Chrysostomos was popular among the displaced and had excellent cooperation with the majority of their leadership, but never succeeded in harnessing this support into political capital. His popularity amongst displaced groups can be explained by his unwavering support for their right to return, as well as the financial support the Church of Cyprus Ker-Lindsay, ‘A History of Cyprus Peace Proposals’, 18-9. For the politics of Cyprus see, Varnava & Yakinthou, ‘Cyprus: Political Modernity and the Structures of Democracy in a Divided Island’, 455-77. 40 See Fylaktou memorial, 18 December 2011, http://www.churchofcyprus.org.cy/article.php?articleID=2110. 41 Emilianides, Religion and Law in Cyprus, 139-40. 38 39

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gave to the displaced persons’ organisations. Between 1974 and 1977 the Church of Cyprus gave 700,000 Cyprus pounds to help the displaced, and Chrysostomos continued, after he became archbishop, to provide such financial support, despite the fact that at the time when he became archbishop, the church had serious economic problems.42 His failure to have any major influence on politics was perhaps because DIKO and EDEK maintained a similar view on the Cyprus ‘problem’, and another party would have muddied the waters. Despite never achieving the political influence he aspired to, Chrysostomos continued to intervene in politics and the Cyprus ‘problem’. For example at the 1998 anniversary of the Greek ‘no’ to Benito Mussolini, he made another impassioned speech that linked the Greek ‘no’ to the Greek Cypriot struggle for freedom today. He repeated that he was against a federal solution for Cyprus, because he believed that this would lead to an influx of Turkish settlers. He concluded by saying that: ‘United, we should all pursue the restoration of the human rights of Greek and Turkish Cypriots and the withdrawal of all Turkish troops and settlers’.43 Of course, in reality, Chrysostomos had never made any effort to understand the human rights of Turkish Cypriots.

Illness, Replacement and Death In April 2000 Chrysostomos suffered a severe head injury when he fell from the staircase of the Archiepiscopal Palace and he never recovered, falling into a coma in 2005 after being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. Although remaining as archbishop, in early 2006 the Cypriot bishops asked the Patriarch of Constantinople to convoke a Pan-Orthodox Synod to decide what was to be done since his condition was irreversible and he was still in a coma. A Pan-Orthodox Synod was convoked by Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople in Chambésy in Switzerland in May 2006 and it was decided that Chrysostomos was to be removed from office due to serious health problems. Bishop of Paphos Chrysostomos was elected as locum tenens and archiepiscopal elections were held on 24 September 2006, when, despite obtaining around 10 per cent of the popular vote, Chrysostomos of Paphos was made archbishop. One year later, on 22 December 2007, at the age of 80, Chrysostomos I died. He remained, for some, the ‘passionate prelate’.44

See the tribute on Archbishop Chrysostomos I on the web page of the Church of Cyprus, http://www.churchofcyprus.org.cy/article.php?articleID=4. 43 Cyprus Mail, 29 October 1998. 44 See Fylaktou memorial, 18 December 2011, http://www.churchofcyprus.org.cy/article.php?articleID=2110. 42

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Conclusion Passionate, but flawed, more so than his predecessor whom he tried to emulate, Chrysostomos was an ultra-nationalist, who had an uncompromising position on the Cyprus ‘problem’, which he could only see from the Greek Cypriot point of view. He found it difficult to accept that he was not going to have the same influence as Makarios III, his mentor and idol, and was unsupported by most politicians and the public when he did try to exert political influence, particularly in the early 1990s. His approach was logical for someone who not only succeeded Makarios, but who was also a product of Makarios’ ethnarchic state, as well as of the war of 1974. Yet Chrysostomos could have been a source of reconciliation for all Cypriots had he had the abilities of self-criticism and, as The Times claimed was the failure of Makarios III, the ability to empathise with and eventually represent Turkish Cypriots. In this sense, although Chrysostomos never had the same influence on the politics of the island as his predecessor, like his predecessor he did very little to bring about the reconciliation of both communities on the island. To be sure, few Greek Cypriot political elites acted differently, and so post-1974 the previous struggle for enosis was replaced by the struggle to ‘overturn’ the defeat of 1974 and bring about a reunification of the island based on Greek Cypriot ethnic majority rule. But Chrysostomos, being the ethnarch, could and should have stood above the politicians as a higher moral authority. Ultimately, Chrysostomos’ views were well respected by those who agreed with them, yet his legacy, like that of his predecessor, can only be understood in terms of a missed opportunity to heal the wounds of the previous violent decades. This, however, did not conform to the ethnarchic tradition he had inherited and which he wanted to uphold.

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Figure 20: Portrait of Archbishop Chrysostomos I at the Archbishopric in Nicosia. Source: Archbishopric, Nicosia. Courtesy of the Holy Archbishopric, Nicosia, Cyprus.

CONTRIBUTORS

Editors Andrekos Varnava was born and raised in Melbourne to Cypriot born parents, obtained a BA (Honours) from Monash University (2001) and his PhD in History from the University of Melbourne (2006). He is the author of British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915: The Inconsequential Possession (Manchester University Press, Studies in Imperialism Series, hardback 2009, paperback 2012); and the co-editor (with Hubert Faustmann) of Reunifying Cyprus: The Annan Plan and Beyond (I. B. Tauris, hardback 2009, paperback 2011) and (with Nicholas Coureas and Marina Elia) The Minorities of Cyprus: Development Patterns and the Identity of the Internal-Exclusion (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2009). He has published articles in Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies (2005), The Cyprus Review (2005 & 2x 2010), Journal of Military History (2010) and War in History (2012), and has forthcoming articles in Accounting History (2013) and Historical Research (2014). He has also published chapters in numerous books, including The Oxford Handbook of Local and Regional Democracy in Europe (Oxford University Press, 2010) and Liberal Imperialism in Europe (Palgrave, 2012). He was Assistant Professor in History at the European University – Cyprus from October 2006 to January 2009. In January 2009 he was appointed Lecturer at Flinders University and in 2012 was promoted to Senior Lecturer in Imperial and Military History. Michalis N. Michael was born in Cyprus and obtained a BA in Turkish Studies (1996) from the University of Cyprus (Department of Turkish and Middle Eastern Studies) and his MA (1998) from the University of Crete (Department of History and Archaeology). He followed this with his his PhD (2004) from the University of Cyprus (Department of Turkish and Middle Eastern Studies). He is the author of The Church of Cyprus during the Ottoman period: The Gradual Formation of an Institution of Political Power (Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia 2005, in Greek) and the co-editor (with Matthias Kappler & Eftihios Gavriel) of Ottoman Cyprus: A Collection of Studies on History and Culture (Harrassovitz Verlag, Wiesbaden 2009) and forthcoming (with Anastassiades Tassos & Chantal Verdeil), Studies on Ottoman Communities, Modernity and Statehood, Klaus Schwarz Verlag, Berlin, 2013. He has published articles in Archivum Ottomanicum (2009), Chronos (2010), Social Compass (2009), Religions (2010), Thetis (2009), Historica (2005, 2007, 2009), Turkish Historical Review

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(2011) and has chapters in several books, including Nationalism in the Troubled Triangle: Cyprus, Greece and Turkey (Palgrave Macmillan, London 2010), Cries and Whispers in Karamanlidika Books (Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2010), Histories of Ottoman Larnaca (National Research Foundation, Athens 2012). He is an Assistant Professor of Ottoman History at the Department of Turkish and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Cyprus.

Contributors Sia Anagnostopoulou is an Associate Professor of History at the Department of Political Science and History at Panteion University, in Athens. She has also taught at the Department of Turkish and Middle Eastern Studies, at the University of Cyprus, between 1995 and 2004. Her publications include Mikra Asia, 19os ai.-1919: Hoi Hellenorthodoxes koinotites. Apo to Millet ton Romion sto Helleniko Ethnos (Asia Minor: The Greek Orthodox Communities, 19th century-1919. From the Rum Millet to the Greek Nation), published in 1997; Tourkikos Eksighronismos: Islam kai Tourkokyprioi sti Daidalodi Diadrome tou Kemalismou (Turkish Modernity: Islam and the Turkish Cypriots in Relation to Kemalism), in 2004; and a collection of articles From the Ottoman Empire to the Nation-States: The Case of Greece and Cyprus, also in 2004. Kyprianos D. Louis is currently Chief Education Officer at the Ministry of Education and Culture of the Republic of Cyprus. He earned his PhD in Modern History from the University of Ioannina (Greece). His thesis was titled ‘Forms of Economic Relations in Cyprus (1817-1839): Georgakis Markantonides and the Morphou and Derviû Efendi Farms (Çiftliks)’. He has also been a scientific coordinator for the Oral Heritage Archive of the Cyprus Research Centre. He has published several articles on the Ottoman history of Cyprus. Irene G. Pophaides completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Oxford and her postgraduate studies at the University of Cambridge in the discipline of Historical Studies. Her research interests include the exploration of the emergence and development of national loyalties and identities, the creation and evolution of national movements, as well as the multiple processes by which the ideologies of national identity are transmitted and received, with a particular emphasis on Cyprus. She is simultaneously interested in ecclesiastical history and how it had evolved in the later years of the Ottoman Empire. She has taught on the history of Cyprus and Greece and on modern European and contemporary history. Her first monograph will be published in the series ‘Cyprus Historical and Contemporary Studies’

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of Cambridge Scholars Publishing, and will explore the emergence of national identities in Cyprus during the first five decades of British rule. Alexis Rappas is currently a LabexMed postdoctoral fellow at the Institut de Recherche et d’Etudes sur le Monde Arabe et Musulman (IREMAM) and a part-time lecturer at Sciences Po Paris. He was trained as a historian of European colonialism at the European University Institute (PhD 2008). His work examines European colonialism in post-Ottoman settings and his current research focuses on an entangled history of British rule in Cyprus and Italian rule in the Dodecanese. His recent publications include ‘Greeks under European Colonial Rule,’ Byzantine and Modern Greeks Studies, XXXIV, 2, 2010; ‘The Labour Question in Colonial Cyprus, 1936-1941: Political Stakes in a Battle of Denominations,’ International Labor and Working Class History, 76(1), 2009 and ‘The Elusive Polity: Imagining and Contesting Colonial Authority in Cyprus during the 1930s,’ Journal of Modern Greek Studies, XXVI, 2, 2008. After studying History at Amherst College, USA, where he earned his BA degree in 1989, Dr Theoharis Stavrides received his MA in 1992 and his PhD in 1996 from the Department of History of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of Harvard University. From 1996 until 2007 he worked as a Researcher in the Research Centre of Kykkos Monastery in Nicosia, Cyprus. Since September 2007 he has been an Assistant Professor of Ottoman History in the Department of Turkish and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Cyprus. His research interests focus mainly on the study of the history of the early Ottoman Empire and the history of Cyprus during the Ottoman period. He is the author of The Sultan of Vezirs: The Life and Times of the Ottoman Grand Vezir Mahmud Pasha Angelovic (1453-1474) with Brill Academic Publishers, 2001, and most recently a collection of his articles was published as Studies on the History of Cyprus under Ottoman Rule, by Isis Press, Istanbul, 2012.

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Matalas, Paraskevas, ŻƨƭƯƲ ƪơƩ ƐƱƨƯƤƯƮƟơ: ƐƩ ƑƥƱƩưƝƴƥƩƥƲ ƬƩơƲ ƓƷƝƳƧƲ, University of Crete Press, Iraklion 2002.[Ethnicity and Orthodoxy: The Adventures of one Relation]. Mayes, Stanley, Makarios: A Biography, Macmillan, London, 1980 Michael, Michalis N., ‘Local Authorities and Conflict in an Ottoman Island at the beginning of the Nineteenth Century’, Turkish Historical Review 2 (2011) 57-77. —. ‘Myth and Nationalism: The Retrospective Force of National Roles through Mythical Past’, Ayhan Aktar, Niyazi KÖzÖlyürek and Umut ÖzkÖrÖmlÖ (eds), Nationalism in the Troubled Triangle: Cyprus, Greece and Turkey, Palgrave Macmillan, London 2010, 149-159. Michael, Michalis N., Kappler Matthias, Gavriel Eftihios (eds), Ottoman Cyprus. A Collection of Studies on History and Culture, Harrassowitz Verlag, Wiesbaden 2009. Michael, Michalis N., ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƐƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞ ƑƥƱƟƯƤƯ (1571-1878). ƈ ƳƴơƤƩơƪƞ ƳƵƣƪƱƼƴƧƳƞ ƴƧƲ Ƴƥ ƨƥƳƬƼ ưƯƫƩƴƩƪƞƲ ƥƮƯƵƳƟơƲ, Cyprus Research Centre, Nicosia 2005 [The Church of Cyprus in the Ottoman Period (1571-1878). Its Gradual Formation into an Institution of Political Authority]. Michaelides, Sophronios, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƪơƴƜ ƋƟƴƩƯƭ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơƲ, Holy Bishopric of Kition, Larnaca 1992. [History of the Church of Kition]. Mitsides, Andreas, ‘ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥưƟ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ’, in Papadopoullos Theodoros (ed.), ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ [History of Cyprus], vol. VI, Makarios III Foundation, Nicosia 2011, 519-823 [‘The Church of Cyprus in the Turkish Period’]. Mouskos, George Christodoylou, Ɛ ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ žưƹƲ ƴƯƭ ŻƦƧƳơ (Makarios How I Lived Him), Nicosia, 1984. Myrianthopoulos, Konstantinos I., ƗơƴƦƧƣƥƹƱƣƜƪƩƲ ƋƯƱƭƝƳƩƯƲ, Ư ƅƩƥƱƬƧƭƥƽƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, 1779-1809, ƞƴƯƩ ƓƵƬƢƯƫơƟ ƥƩƲ ƴƧƭ ƊƳƴƯƱƟơƭ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥưƟ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ (1570-1878), Typographeion Mouson, Nicosia 1934. [Hadjigeorgakis Kornesios. The Dragoman of Cyprus, 1779-1809, or Contributions to the History of Cyprus under the Turks (1570-1878)]. Myriotis, Panos, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ ƴƯ ƖƫƯƣƩƳƬƝƭƯ ƒƜƳƯ (Makarios the Flaming Cassock), Nicosia, 1977; —. Ɛ ƆƨƭƜƱƷƧƲ ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ 1913-1977 (The Ethnarch Makarios 1913-1977), C. A. L. Graphies, Cyprus, 1977. Orr, Charles W. J., Cyprus Under British Rule, Robert Scott Roxburghe House, London, 1918 (reprinted, Zeno, London, 1972). Paionidis, Panicos, ƂƭƤƱƝơƲ ƇƩơƱƴƟƤƧƲ, ƷƹƱƟƲ ƶƼƢƯ ƪơƩ ưƜƨƯƲ, Nicosia, 1995. [Andreas Ziartidis, without fear and passion]. Papadopoullos, Theodore, ‘Orthodox Church and Civil Authority’, Journal of Contemporary History, II, 4, October 1967, 201-9.

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—. «ƆƨƭơƱƷƩƪƼƲ ƒƼƫƯƲ ƴƧƲ ƐƱƨƯƤƼƮƯƵ ƊƥƱơƱƷƟơƲ» (The Ethnarchic Role of the Orthodox Hierarchy), Kypriakai Spoudai, XXXV, 1971, 95-141, 115. —. ƋƾƤƩƮ ƓƷƯƫƥƟƹƭ ƌƥƵƪƹƳƟơƲ Nicosia, 1991 [Codes of Schools Nicosia]. Papadopoulos, Chrysostomos, Ɔƪ ƴƧƲ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƩơƳƴƩƪƞƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƟơƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, Ekklesiastikos Keryx, Larnaca 1912 [From the Ecclesiastical History of Cyprus]. —. ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥưƟ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ (1571-1878), Typographeion Phoinix, Athens 1929. [The Church of Cyprus in the Turkish Period (1571-1878)]. Papageorgiou, Spyros, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ. ƑƯƱƥƟơ ƤƩơ ưƵƱƼƲ ƪơƩ ƳƩƤƞƱƯƵ, Epifaniou, Nicosia 2002. [Makarios. A March through Fire and Iron]. —. Ɣơ ƋƱƟƳƩƬơ ƎƴƯƪƯƵƬƝƭƴơ ƴƯƵ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƯƽ (1959-1967), vol. 1-3, Epifaniou, Nicosia 2000. [The Critical Documents of the Cypriot Problem]. Papaioannou, Charilaos, ‘ƋƾƤƧƮ Ƃŷ ƴƧƲ ƂƱƷƩƥưƩƳƪƯưƞƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ. ƑƟƭơƮ ƴƹƭ ƥƭ ơƵƴƾ ưƥƱƩƥƷƯƬƝƭƹƭ ƥƣƣƱƜƶƹƭ’, ƖƹƲ 1 (1911) 225-244 [‘Codex I of the Archbishopric of Cyprus. A table of the documents contained in it’]. Patrick, Richard A., Political Geography and the Cyprus Conflict: 1963-1971, University of Waterloo, Ontario 1976. Pavlides, Andros, ƍơƪƜƱƩƯƲ, vol. I, Andreou Publications, Nicosia 1981. [Makarios] Pericleous, Chrysostomos, ƔƯ ƅƧƬƯƸƞƶƩƳƬơ ƴƯƵ 2004. ƔƯ ưƥƱƩƶƥƱƥƩơƪƼ ƪơƩ ƤƩƥƨƭƝƲ ưƥƱƩƢƜƫƫƯƭ, Papazissis, Athens 2007. [The Referendum of 2004. The Regional and International Environment]. Persianis, P., Church and State in Cyprus Education, Nicosia, 1978. Philippou, Loizos, ƈ ƆƪƪƫƧƳƟơ ƋƽưƱƯƵ ƥưƟ ƔƯƵƱƪƯƪƱơƴƟơƲ, Kypriologiki Vivliothiki, Nicosia 1975. [The Church of Cyprus in the Turkish Period]. Philippou, Stavroula & Andrekos Varnava, ‘Constructions of solution(s) to the Cyprus Problem: Exploring Formal Curricula in Greek Cypriot State Schools’, in Andrekos Varnava and Hubert Faustmann (eds), Reunifying Cyprus: The Annan Plan and Beyond, I. B. Tauris, London 2009, 194-212. Prodromou, Prodromos, ƋƽưƱƩƯƩ ƑƯƫƩƴƥƵƴƝƲ, 1878-1950: ƋƯƩƭƹƭƩƪƼƲ ƍƥƴơƳƷƧƬơƴƩƳƬƼƲ ƪơƩ ƑƯƫƩƴƩƪƞ ƆƫƟƴ, Aigaion, Nicosia 2010. [Cypriot Politicians, 1878-1950: Social Transformation and Political Elite]. Protopapas, Dimitris, ƈ ƜƴƵưƧ ƳƵƣƪƱƼƴƧƳƧ ƥƭƼƲ ƤƩươƱơƴơƮƩƪƯƽ ƳƵƳƴƞƬơƴƯƲ ƪƯƬƬƜƴƹƭ: ƪƼƬƬơƴơ ƪơƩ ƤƧƬƯƴƩƪƝƲ ƥƪƫƯƣƝƲ, ƋƽưƱƯƲ 1940-1955, unpublished Thesis, University of Athens, 2002. [The Informal Formation of a Bipolar System of Political Parties: Political Parties and Municipal Elections] Rappas, Alexis, ‘The Elusive Polity: Imagining and Contesting Colonial Authority in Cyprus During the 1930s’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 28/2 (2008) 363-397. —. ‘The Labor Question in Colonial Cyprus, 1931-1941: Political Stakes in a Battle of Denomination’, International Labor and Working-Class History, 76/1 (2009) 194-216.

320

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Richter, Heinz A., ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, C. Sarropoulos, Estia, Athens 2007. Roudometof, Victor, ‘From Rum Millet to Greek Nation: Enlightenment, Secularization, and National Identity in Ottoman Balkan Society, 14531821’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 16/1 (1998) 11-48. —. ‘Orthodoxy and Modernity in Cyprus: The 2006 Archiepiscopal Elections in Historical Perspective’, Journal of Contemporary Religion, XXIV, 2, 2009, 189-204. Roudometof, Victor & Michael N. Michalis, ‘Redéfinition des frontières Eglise-Etat à Chypre après 1878: Perspective historique sur l’Eglise orthodoxe chypriote’, Social Compass, 56/1 (2009) 35-48. Sant Cassia, Paul, ‘The Archbishop in the Beleaguered City: An Analysis of the Conflicting Roles and Political Oratory of Makarios’, Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, VIII, 1982, 191-212. —. ‘Religion, Politics and Ethnicity in Cyprus During the Turkocratia (15711878)’, European Studies of Sociology, 27/1 (1986) 3-28. Stavrides, Theoharis, ‘ƈ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƪƞ ƆƪươƟƤƥƵƳƧ ƳƴƧƭ ƋƽưƱƯ ƪơƴƜ ƴƧƭ ƐƨƹƬơƭƩƪƞ ƑƥƱƟƯƤƯ (1571-1878)’, in Papadopoullos Theodoros (ed.), ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƋƽưƱƯƵ [History of Cyprus], vol. VI, Makarios III Foundation, Nicosia 2011, 379-468 [‘Greek Education in Cyprus in the Ottoman Period (1571-1878)’]. —. Studies on the History of Cyprus under Ottoman Rule, Isis Press, Istanbul 2012. —. ƐƩƪƯƵƬƥƭƩƪƼ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƥƟƯ ƪơƩ ƋƽưƱƯƲ: Ɣơ ƑơƴƱƩơƱƷƩƪƜ ŻƣƣƱơƶơ ƴƹƭ Ɔƴƾƭ 1600-1878, Kykkos Monastery Research Centre, Nicosia 2001 [The Ecumenical Patriarchate and Cyprus. The Patriarchal Documents of the Years 1600-1878]. Storrs, Ronald, Orientations, Ivor Nicholson and Watson, London 1937. Theoharides, Ioannis P., ‘ƂƭƝƪƤƯƴƯ ƶƩƱƬƜƭƩ ƣƩơ ƴƧƭ ƥƶơƱƬƯƣƞ ƴƯƵ ƔơƭƦƩƬƜƴ ƳƴƧƭ ƋƽưƱƯ’, ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƤơ ƋƝƭƴƱƯƵ ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƾƭ ƆƱƥƵƭƾƭ, 13-15 (1984-1987) 447-458 [Unpublished Firman on the Tanzimat Implementation in Cyprus]. Tillyrides, Andreas, ‘Archbishop Sophronios III (1865-1900) and the British’, Kypriakai Spoudai, 1978. Tzermias, Paul, A History of the Cyprus Republic, vol. II, Libro, Athens 1998. Vanezis, N. P., Makarios: Faith and Power, Abelard-Schuman, London 1971. —. Makarios: Life and Leadership, Abelard-Schuman, London 1979. —. Makarios: Pragmatism v. Idealism, Abelard-Schuman, London 1974. Varnava, Andrekos, ‘“Martial Races” in the Isle of Aphrodite’, Journal of Military History, LXXIV, 4, 2010, 1047-67. —. British Imperialism in Cyprus, 1878-1915: The Inconsequential Possession, Manchester University Press, Manchester 2009. Varnava, Andrekos & Hubert Faustmann (eds.), Reunifying Cyprus: The Annan Plan and Beyond, I. B. Tauris, London 2009

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Varnava, Andrekos, Nicholas Coureas, & Marina Elia (eds.), The Minorities of Cyprus: Development Patterns and the Identity of the Internal-Exclusion, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne, 2009. Varnava, Andrekos, Yakinthou Christalla, ‘Cyprus: Political Modernity and the Structures of Democracy in a Divided Island’, in Loughlin John, Hendriks Frank and Lidstrom Anders (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Local and Regional Democracy in Europe, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2011, pp. 455-77. Vittis, Andreas, ‘ƋƽƱƩƫƫƯƲ Ƅ’: Ɛ ŹƣƩƯƲ ƪơƩ ƌƼƣƩƯƲ ƂƱƷƩƥưƟƳƪƯưƯƲ (19161933)’, ƆưƩƳƴƧƬƯƭƩƪƞ ƆưƥƴƧƱƟƲ ƴƧƲ ƋƵưƱƩơƪƞƲ ƆƴơƩƱƥƟơƲ ƊƳƴƯƱƩƪƾƭ ƓưƯƵƤƾƭ, V, 2001, 23-40. Yakinthou, Christalla, Political Settlements in Divided Societies: Consociationalism and Cyprus, Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2009. Zacharakis, Christos, ŹƪƱƹƲ ơưƼƱƱƧƴƯ. ƆƩƤƩƪƯƽ ƷƥƩƱƩƳƬƯƽ, Athens, 2008. [Top Secret. Special Handling]. Zannetos, Filios, ƊƳƴƯƱƟơ ƴƧƲ ƭƞƳƯƵ ƋƽưƱƯƵ, vol. I-III, Philocalias, Larnaca 191012 [History of the island of Cyprus].

INDEX Abdül Hamid Bey, 159. Abdül Hamid II, 117. Abdülaziz, 112, 178. Abdülmecid, 101. Acheson Plan, 275. Acre, 58-59. Afro-Asian Conference, 258. Agapi tou laou, club, 202, 229. Agathaggelos, Ecumenical Patriarch, 71. AKEL, 232, 236, 243, 245-246, 248, 261, 263-265, 271, 280, 285, 304, 307. Akritas Organization, 269, 278. Albania, 230. Alexandria, 112-113, 156, 158, 173, 183-184, 187, 226, 230, 252, 285. Alexianos Panagiotis, 21. Ali Bey al-Abbasi, 23-24, 33, 37. Ali Effendi, 36. Altiparmak, 34. American-British-Canadian Plan, 301, 305. American Episcopal Church, 207. Anatolia, 198. Anderson John, 157. Anglican Church, 235. Anglo-Turkish Convention, 116-117. Anthemius, archbishop of Cyprus, 50. Anthimus, Ecumenical Patriarch, 112, 115. Antim I, Bulgarian Exarch, 112. Antimus, bishop of Kitium, 277, 283, 285. Antioch, 112, 113, 156, 230, 252. Apostolos Loukas, 173. Apostolos Varnavas, journal, 206. Archiepiscopal Question, 12-13, 173, 177, 182, 185-188, 201, 211, 213, 216, 219-220, 222, 224-227, 235, 237.

Archipelago Islands, vilayet, 95, 115. Ardahan, 117. Armitage Robert, 255, 260. Arta, 180. ASDAK, 272. Asia Minor, 90, 166, 200. Athens, 90, 107-108, 111, 113, 123, 165, 172, 199, 215, 217-218, 224225, 228, 234, 236, 240, 242, 244, 247, 249-250, 258, 262, 267, 273275, 278, 283, 287-288, 299, 307. Athienou, 103, 137, 155. Athinagoras, Ecumenical Patriarch, 242. Attaleia, 107. Autocephalous, 18. AyvalÖk, 57. Aziz Pasha, 116. Baghdad Pact, 263. Balkan Wars, 231. Bandung, Indonesia, 258. Bartholomew I, Ecumenical Patriarch, 308. Basil, bishop of Achialos, 160. Battershill Denis William, 228, 230, 235-236. Batum, 117. Beaconsfield Lord, 116, 130. Belgrade, 258. Benoit Astier, French consul, 25. Benson Edward, 129. Benson Edward, archbishop of Canterbury, 129. Bernardo Caprara, Venetian consul, 31. Biddulph Robert, 124-127, 131, 135, 158. Black Sea, 9, 90. Boston, 242. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, 306.

The Archbishops of Cyprus in the Modern Age Britain, British (Empire, rule), 4, 6, 89, 11, 13, 15, 124, 133, 135, 157, 168, 193, 195, 198, 200, 204, 213, 238, 240, 257, 259, 262, 274, 295; British East Africa, 159; British Legation in Athens, 224; British Levant Company, 107. Bucharest, 43. Bulgaria, 112, 171, 228. Bulgarian Exarchate, 110, 112, 149, 179. Bulwer Henry, 127, 149-151. Bureau of Entharchy, 213. Byzantine Empire, 3, 169-170. Carne John, 60. Castle Barbara, 263. Catholic faith, Catholics, 7, 9. उevikel Nuri, 25, Chalkida, 39. Chamberlain Joseph, 123, 135, 137138, 157. Chambésy, 308. Charalambos (Kyprianos’s uncle), 45. Charalampos, bishop of Kyrenia, 83. Charter of the Church of Cyprus (1914), 219. Chios, 89. Christis Th., 231. Christodoulos P., 173. Christodoulou Miltiades, 304. Christofi Georgios, 173. Chrysanthos I, bishop of Kitium, 31, 38, 48, 152. Chrysanthos, archbishop of Cyprus, 7, 8, 10, 17, 20-28, 30, 32-33, 35, 37-40, 45-49. Chrysanthos, bishop of Kyrenia, 125126, 151. Chrysanthos, bishop of Paphos, 31, 38. Chrysanthos, bishop of Tamassos, 31. Chrysoroyiatissa monastery, 107. Chrysostomos I, archbishop of Athens, 17. Chrysostomos I, archbishop of Cyprus, 8-9, 14, 293-310.

323

Chrysostomos II, archbishop of Cyprus, 1, 9. Church of England, 222-223. Church of Evangelists of Boston, 242. Church of Greece, 242, 250-251, 253. Churchill Winston, 159-160, 165. CIA, 278. उiftlik, 27, 29, 32. Clauson John, 159, 169, 172. Clergy Association, 206. Clerides Glafkos, 280, 284, 302, 307. Clerides Ioannis, 220, 225, 266. Codex I, 20-21. Cold War, 2, 255, 263, 271. Collins A.E., 157. Columbia University, 215, 262. Committee of the Struggle of Cyprus, 253. Communism, 207, 242, 257, 262. Communist Party of Cyprus, 203, 232, 236. Constantine, King, 171, 199. Constantinides Paschalis, 151, 153154, 182-183. Constantinople (see also: Istanbul), 17, 27, 55, 111-113, 115, 120, 125, 156, 158, 179, 183-184, 187-189, 234, 242, 253, 308. Constantios I, Ecumenical Patriarch, 79. Co-ordinating Committee of the Cyprus Struggle (SEKA), 247. Corley Felix, 294. Cox Bertram, 157. Crete, 22, 117, 181. Crimean War, 90, 108. Cuéllar Perez Javier, 306. Cypriot Brotherhood in Greece, 224. Cypriot Political Organisation, 164, 170. Cyprus Question, 4, 14, 265, 289, 296, 298-301, 305, 309. Cyprus Refugee Party (PAKOP), 306. Cyprus Regiment, 235. Cyprus Research Centre, 3. Cyprus Society, 128, 129, 132. Czechoslovakia, 275.

324 Damaskinos, archbishop of Cyprus, 71-72. Damaskinos, bishop of Kitium, 83. Damaskinos, bishop of Kyrenia, 62, 71, Danube, 90. Danubian principalities, 43, 50, 52, 90. Dardanelles, 89. David French consul, 59. Dawe Arthur, 225. Dekembriana, 236. Demetriou Andreas, 261. Democratic Union (DU), 266. Denktaû Rauf, 261, 299, 302, 305-306. Derby Lord, 117, 125, 131. Dervis Dr., 221. Dervis Themistokles, 243, 249. Didimoticho, 187. DIKO, 306-308. DISY, 306-307. Dimogerontia, 74-75, 83, 94, Dodecanese, 201. Douglas Albert John, 223. Duke of York, 200. Eastern Roman Empire, 2, 15. Economides Kyprianos (later bishop of Kitium), 179. Ecumenical Patriarchate, 184-186, 188. EDEK, 280, 285, 306-308. EDMA, 266. Education Bill, 207. Egglezakis Benedict, 43, 50, 207. Egypt, 58, 73, 90, 116-117, 120, 133, 173, 198, 252. Egyptian Brotherhood, 119-120, 122. Emfiejis G., 192. England, 117, 123, 128, 134, 150, 153, 169, 202, 214, 218, 224. Eniaion Komma, 284, 288. Enlightenment, 8, 101, 108, 121-122. Enosis, 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 13, 106, 118-121, 123, 133-134, 137-140, 148, 153, 156-157, 159-161, 163-171, 175, 178, 181, 186, 191-196, 199-204, 208, 211, 213-214, 216, 225, 230231, 233, 240, 243-257, 259-261,

Index 266-268, 271-272, 277, 279, 284, 309. EOKA, 2, 257-258, 260-261, 263, 266-267, 269; EOKA B, 279-280, 285-286, 295. Ephraim the Athenian, 22-23. Epiphanios, bishop of Paphos, 154. Epirus, 108, 180-181. Epitropi tou koinou, 74-75, 83. ESEA, 280. Euboea, 38-39, 48. Europe, 3, 5, 88, 90, 96, 246. European Union, 8. Evangelical School, 107. Executive Council, 125, 129. Fairfield Edward, 150, 152. Famagusta, 25, 137, 159, 178, 297, 303, 305. Fascism, 242. Fethi Ahmed Paûa, 86. Filiki Etairia, 42, 53, 54, 57, 79. Filimonas Ioannis, 60. Foini, 106. Foot Hugh, 262. France, 89, 114. Franks, 4. Freemasonry, 54, 81, 154, 185. French Revolution, 8, 44, 114, 121. Friendly Society (see also: Filiki Etairia), 7, 42. Fylaktou Andreas, 298. Gabriel IV, Patriarch, 28. Galatopoulos A. Christodoulos, 220, 231-232, Garoufalias, 272. Gavrielides Andreas, 231. Gennadios, archbishop, 165. Gennadios, bishop of Paphos, 277. George V, King, 162-163; George VI, King, 224. Georgia, 230. Georgiades Demetrios, 158, 182-184. Georgiou Philippos, 48, 104. Gerasimos bishop of Thessaloniki, 28. Gerasimos, abbot of Kykkos, 150, 153.

The Archbishops of Cyprus in the Modern Age Germanos, archbishop of Thyateira, 223. Germany, 168, 270. Giaur (Deli) Imam, 79. Gibraltar, 108. Gil Osman Pasha, 21. Giovanni Mariti, 21, Gizikis Phaidon, 286. Gladstone, 130-131, 157, 159. Gobbi Hugo, 304. Great Idea (Megali Idea), 108-109, 111, 170-171, 180, 240, 245, 249. Greco-Ottoman War (also GrecoTurkish War), 135, 199, 202, 259. Greece, 8, 111, 118, 133-135, 157-159, 164, 169, 172, 180-181, 186, 191, 193-196, 199, 211, 214, 235-236, 243-244, 249-254, 258-259, 261, 263, 265, 269-271, 274, 278, 281, 284, 288, 299, 301. Greek Civil War, 242, 244-245,288, 295. Greek Kingdom, 11, 89, 108, 168, 180. Greek philological association of Istanbul, 91. Greek struggle of Independence, 53, 57, 69, 171, 197, 201. Green Line, 270. Gregorios VI, Ecumenical Patriarch, 61, 83. Grivas George, 244, 251, 253, 257258, 261-267, 269, 272-273, 278279, 285-286. Haci Baki, 10, 22, 26-32, 37, 39. Hackett John, 57, 207. Hadji Georgios Constantinidis, 73. Hadji Hristodoulos Apegitos, 73, 78, 86. Hadji Ioannis Vikis, 83. Hadji Iosif dragoman, 31. Hadji Kirgenis Saripoglos, 73, 83, 85, 86. Hadji Zacharias Apostolidis, 73. Hadjigeorgakis Kornesios, 10, 23, 30, 32-36, 39, 46-47. Halil Aøa, 21.

325

Halil Hamid Pasha, 28-29. Halki Theological School, 150. Haralambos monk, 107. Harcourt Lewis, 167. Harding John, 260-261. Hariton, bishop of Paphos, 71, 99. Hasan Aøa, 36. Hasan Pasha Kapudan Pasha, 29-30. Hatt-i Hümayûn, 32, 84, 95. Hatt-i úerif, 73, 76, 83-84, 87, 95. Hatzikostas Stergios, 53. Hatzivassiliou Evanthis, 118. Haynes William Smith, 153-155, 156, 190. Hellas (see also: Greece), 212. Holy Cross monastery, Jerusalem, 225. Home Robert Colonel, 117. House of Commons, 129, 194. House of Lords, 194, 200. Ieremias IV, Ecumenical Patriarch, 38, 47, 49. Imperial Treasury, 30. India, 116-117, 133. Indian Ocean, 88. Ioakeim III, Ecumenical Patriarch, 124, 158, 160, 184. Ioakim II, archbishop of Cyprus, 62, 71. Ioannides Polycarpos, 261. Ioannikios monk, 79, 81, 86. Ioannikios, archbishop of Cyprus, 91. Ionian Islands, 70, 89-90, 118, 120, 123, 159. Ipatros Demetrios, 53. Ipsilantis Alexandros, 53. Ireland, 198. Irving Dramatic Club, 132. Istanbul (see also: Constantinople), 19, 27, 29, 32, 34-36, 46, 47, 48, 50, 62, 72-73, 75, 77, 86, 90-91, 98-99, 102, 223, 226, 259. Italian city states, 90. Italy, 238. Izmir, 28-29, 59. Jassy, 43. Jerusalem Patriarchate, 57.

326 Jerusalem Theological School, 110, 122, 149. Jerusalem, 58, 90, 104, 112-113, 149, 156, 158, 183, 184, 187, 217, 223, 225, 230, 234. Jewish, 3. Journas George, 242. Junta, 276, 278-279, 281, 283-288, 307. Kalavros, cypriot doctor, 162. Kalopanayiotis, 172. Kapodistrias Ioannis, 78. Karamanlis Constantine, 261, 264. Karaolis Michael, 261. Karpasia, Karpass, 25, 34, 81, 127, 297, 303, 305. Karpasia Coordinating Committee, 303. Kars, 117. Kassandria, 187. Katalanos Nicolaos, 153, 159, 201. Kennedy F. John, 270. Kenyon Edward, 129. Kepiadis George, 56, 57, 60. Kersahw A.E., 156. KÖbrÖslÖ Mehmet Paûa, 101. Kimberley Lord, 130-131. King-Harman Charles, 158-161, 188. Kitium, 27, 183, 186, 196, 220-222, 225, 227, 229, 242, 295. Klavdia, 26. Klavdia, 26. Knutsford Lord, 132, 149. Kocabashi, 19. Kofinou, 276. Koinon ton Kyprion, 93-94. Komnos Spyridon, 180. Konstantios archbishop of Mount Sinai, 48-49. Kornaros Ioannis, 33, 56. Kostopoulos, 272. Koumbarides Xenophon, 246. Kountourioties, 172. Koutsoftas, 279. Küçük FazÖl Dr., 255. Küçük Kaynarca Treaty, 22. Küçük Mehmed, 56-62, 70.

Index Kütahya, 201. Kykkos monastery, 1, 91, 103, 150151, 155, 160, 189, 196, 241, 245, 295. Kypriako Ethniko Komma, KEK, 236, 243. Kyprianos oikonomos (later archbishop), 34, 38. Kyprianou Spyros, 271-272, 294-295, 299, 302-305. Kyprianos, archbishop of Cyprus, 7, 10, 23, 41-51, 53-55, 59, 61-67, 81, 105, 138, 186. Kyprianos, archimandrite, 22, 24, 2627. Kyprianos, bishop of Kitium, 7, 100, 103, 118-120, 125, 130, 150, 180. Kyprianos, bishop of Kyrenia, 246, 261, 277. Kyrenia, 21, 27, 104, 124, 128, 129, 131, 134, 137, 149, 151, 153-154, 160, 181, 184, 190-191, 196, 214, 221-222, 224-225, 227, 229, 231, 244, 248, 261, 295, 297, 303, 305. Kyriakides Kyprianos, 229. Kyriakidis I. Phidias, 231-232. Kyriazis Neoklis, 76. Kyrillos I, archbishop of Cyprus, 91. Kyrillos II (Papadopoullos), archbishop of Cyprus, 12, 134, 136-138, 140,148-155, 157-177, 191, 208, 237. Kyrillos II, Patriarch of Jerusalem, 149. Kyrillos III archbishop of Cyprus, 12-13, 106, 177-183, 186, 188193, 195-198, 200-208, 210, 211, 216, 222-223, 237. Kyrillos Vasiliou, bishop of Kyrenia, 137, 152, 155, 160, 188. Kyrillos, bishop of Kitium, 123. Kyrou Achilleas, 224. Lago Mario, 201. Lambeth, 224. Lambrou, 123. Land and Registry Office, 116.

The Archbishops of Cyprus in the Modern Age Lang Cosmo William, archbishop of Canterbury, 222-223. Lanitis Nicolas, 134, 192. Larnaca, 11, 22, 26, 37, 57-58, 69-70, 72, 74, 79-82, 85, 101, 103-104, 119-120, 130-131, 134, 136, 150, 153, 163, 179, 215, 225, 231-232, 297. Laurentios, bishop of Paphos, 99. League of Nations, 201. Legislative Council, 124, 125, 129-130, 138, 152-153, 158, 163, 165, 167, 175, 190, 195, 197-198, 202, 214, 245. Lemnos, 117. Leondios (Savva), archbishop of Cyprus, 13, 211, 212-213, 216222, 224-226, 229-230, 232-239. Leontios monk, 25-26. Leontios, bishop of Kitium, 62, 71, 80. Levant, 2, 62. Liassides Achilles, 151, 153, 182. Limassol, 21, 52, 74, 85, 100-101, 103-104, 120, 123-125, 131, 133134, 150, 152-153, 164, 178-179, 181, 212, 217, 220, 230-231, 286, 297. Lino-bambaki, 153. Locum Tenens, 13, 211, 213, 218, 220-222, 224, 229-235. Loizou I., 192. London, 130, 151, 164-165, 192, 194, 259, 265, 287. Lorenzo Giovanni Santi, consul of the Netherlands, 61-62. Luke Harry, 6. Lyssarides Vassos, 271, 280, 306. Macedonia, 108. Machairas monastery, 23, 43, 45, 151, 155, 189, 220, 245. Madame Tussauds, 2. Mahmud II, 48, 58, 61, 107. Makarios I, archbishop of Cyprus, 11, 88, 91, 95-105, 110. Makarios I, bishop of Kitium, 31. Makarios II, bishop of Kyrenia, 244.

327

Makarios III, archbishop of Cyprus (Michael Mouskos), 1-7, 13-15, 107, 240-242, 245-258, 260-268, 270-274, 277-298, 302-303, 305307, 309. Makarios Macheriotis, 229. Makarios, bishop of Kyrenia, 200, 217-219, 226, 237. Makrakis Apostolos, 186. Makronissos, 247. Malta, 89, 133, 157, 198. Mansoura, 273. Marathasa, 20, 91, 106, 149, 178. Marathon battle, 265. Markides I. Vias, 231. Markides Sotiris, 231. Maronites, 9. Maroudhia, 32. Marseille, 79. Martin J.F.R., British High Commissioner, 303-304. Mayor Lord, 129. Mechain French consul, 58-59, 62. Mediterranean, 9, 57, 88. Megali Idea, see: Great Idea. Megali tou Genous Sholi, 91. Mehmet Ali Pasha, 115. Meletios, archimandrite, 150. Meletios, bishop of Kitium, 29, 31, 38, 48. Meletios, bishop of Kyrenia, 100. Meletios, bishop of Petra, 104. Meletios, Ecumenical Patriarch, 48. Meletios, Patriarch of Alexandria, 222-223. Menon Krishna, 259, 264. Mesologgitis Kleovoulos, 122. Metaxakis Meletios, archimandrite, bishop of Kitium, 160, 205. Michaelides Periklis, 122-123. Michel de Vezin, British consul, 26. Midhat Pasha, 115. Miller William, 6. Mitsotakis Constantine, 299. Moldavia, 44, 50. Montgomery John, 225. Morea, 22.

328 Morphou, 286, 297, 303, 305. Moscow, 275. Mt. Athos, 27, 104. Mt. Sinai, 48. Muhammad Ali of Egypt, 58, 89. Mussolini Benito, 308. Myrianthus, archimandite, 150. Nafplion, 76. Napoleonic Wars, 88-89. Nasser Abdel Gamal, 258. National Assembly, 115. National Council, 197, 199-200, 245, 303. National Front, 279. National Guard, 272, 278, 282. National Organisation, 202, 245. NATO, 259, 261, 263-264, 271, 274, 276, 281. Naville Ernest, 150. Nelson Lord, 128. Neophytos, bishop of Paphos, 105, 125-126, 151. Netherlands, 61. New Democracy, 299. New York, 252, 262, 264, 304. Nicodemos, bishop of Kitium, 214, 216-218. Nicolaides N., 192. Nicosia High School, 109, 134. Nicosia, 1, 21, 34, 37, 40, 43, 45-46, 48, 55, 62, 64, 74, 77, 85, 95, 100, 103-104, 107, 109-110, 119, 135137, 141, 143, 145-146, 151-153, 160, 164, 173, 176, 188, 210, 213, 217, 219-220, 231, 239, 243, 270, 274, 282-283, 290-292, 295, 302, 310. Nikolopoulos Georgios, 122. Non-Aligned, 258, 270, 272, 274. Norway, 77. Ohnefalsch-Richter Magda, 162. Oktovriana (Greek Cypriot uprising), 204, 212-213, 220, 236. Olympus, 297. Ommanney, 157. Omodos, 103. Orr Charles, 118.

Index Orthodox Christian Union of Youths (OHEN), 229, 246. Otto King, 108-109. Ottoman (Empire, rule), 2, 4, 6-11, 13-15, 18, 20-22, 25-26, 30, 41, 52-53, 55-56, 71-72, 76, 88-90, 92, 97, 99-101, 105, 108, 116, 168, 170, 179, 212, 240; Ottomanism, 84, 97. Pacific Ocean, 88. Pacifico, 108. Pact of Jerusalem, 216, 218. Paisios archbishop of Cyprus, 20. Palaeologos Aristotle, 151. Paliometochon, 279. Palmer Richmond Herbert, 215, 227228, 235, 245. Panaghides Andreas, 279. Panagoulis Alexandros, 278. Panaretos, archbishop of Cyprus, 1011, 69-73, 76-81, 83, 85, 86, 87, 91, 105. Panaretos, bishop of Paphos, 62. Pancyprian Gymnasium, 101, 295. Pancyprian National Assembly, 251, 256. Pano Panayia, 241. Papadopoullos Theodore, 3-5. Papadopoulos George, 278, 282. Papadopoulos Kyrillos (later archbishop Kyrillos II), 185, 190. Papadopoulos Tassos, 280. Papaflessas, 293. Papagathangelou Papastavros, 261. Papageorgiou Spyros, 257. Papagos Alexandros, 254. Papaioannou Charilaos, 48. Papaioannou Ezekias, 304. Papandreou Andreas, 300, 305. Papandreou George, 273-274. Paphos, 21, 27, 36, 124, 130, 134, 152-153, 182, 196, 199, 211, 216, 220, 225, 230-231, 233, 241, 295297. Paris, 86, 89, 162, 194. Paschalides Paschalis, 307. Paschalis N., 192.

The Archbishops of Cyprus in the Modern Age Paul, King of Greece, 229, 250. Pavlides Kyrillos, 220. Pavlidis Onoufrios, 99. Pavlou Iakovos, 229. Pelopidas Antonios, 53. Pentadaktylos, 297. PEO, 265. Percy Arnold, 235-236. Peristianis Evangelis, 77. Peristianis Konstantinos, Russian consul, 35, 77, 82. Persians, 265. Petridou Angeliki, 173. Phanariot rulers, 43, 44, 45, 50, 53. Phaneromeni, 103, 135, 201, 219, 255. Pheidippides, 265. Philaretou Andreas, 5. Philemon, bishop of Gaza, 104. Philippidis Chrysanthos, bishop of Trebizond, 225. Philippou Loizos, 72, 220. Philotheos, archbishop of Cyprus, 17-20. Photios, Patriarch of Alexandria, 160, 187. Photius II, Ecumenical Patriarch, 223. Physsenzides Nearchos, 170. Pierides Zenon, 225. Piraeus, 108-109. Pisan Bartolomeo, 36. Pissas Michalakis, 249. Plastiras Nikolaos, 250. Plaza Galo, 270, 274. Poland, 230. Political Committee for Cypriot Struggle (PEKA), 261. Political Organisation of Cyprus, 196197, 199-200. Polymedia, 160. Prastio, 178. Prodromos, 91, 106, 149, 178. Progressive Party, 280, 284. Provisional Turkish Administration of Cyprus, 276. Radical National Union of Cyprus, 231. Rasputin, 2.

329

Reaya, 19. Regnault, french consul, 34-35. Reûit Mustafa Paûa, 86. Rhodes, 89, 95. Richter fon Otto, 52. Richter Max Ohnefalsch, 144. Rifki Ali, 136. Ripon Lord, 133. Riza Ali Halit, 267. Rizarion Ecclesiastical School, 107. Robinson Roland, 130. Roman Empire, 2. Romania, 123, 228, 230. Ruffin French consul, 58. Russia, 5, 9, 35, 77, 90, 116-117. Russo-Ottoman war, 110, 116. Said Mehmet, 72. Salisbury Lord, 117, 130. Samos, 89. Sampson Nikos, 280, 284, 287. Santon Viscount, 117. Selim III sultan, 32, 35. Sendall Walter, 134-135, 153. Serbia, 230. Severis D., 192. Simmons John, 117. Sinclair Hugh, 124, 135. Skarinou, 232. Skarpas Loudovikos, Greek consul, 224-225. Smith Haynes, 138, 157-158. Smyrna, 58, 89, 107-108, 111. Society for Cypriot Studies, 231. Sophronios III, archbishop of Cyprus, 7, 11-12, 15, 103, 105-111, 113, 115-116, 118-142, 144-146, 149155, 157, 164-165, 167, 175, 177179, 182, 192. Soutsos Michael, 43, 44, 45., Soviet Union, 274. Spyridon, bishop of Trimythous, 31, 37. St. Barnabas, 92, 107. St. George Church, 80. St. George’s Hall, 132. St. Irakleidios monastery, 86. St. John Cathedral, 18, 98, 149, 296.

330 St. John Malountas, 57. St. Lazarus church, 22. St. Panteleimon of Myrtou, 100. St. Paul, 107. St. Stephens church, 112. Stambalia, 117. Stanley Lord, 126. Stanley Mayes, 297. Statos, 295. Stephanopoulos Stephanos, 275. Stevenson Malcom, 196. Storrs, 217. Strovolos, 43, 52. Stubbs Reginald, 214. Sublime Porte, 29-30, 46-49, 55, 57, 59-60, 70-73, 76, 78, 85, 87, 90, 94, 98, 125, 179. Süleyman Baki, 21. Süleyman Baki, 37. Sweden, 77. Switzerland, 57, 308. Syria, 57, 252. Tanzimat, 10-11, 69-70, 72-73, 83, 87, 93-94, 96-98, 105, 108, 240. Tarsus, 107. Terra Santa, 58. Theodotou Theophanis, 165, 192, 197. Theoharides P. Ioannis, 60. Theseus Nicolaos, 57, 79-81. Theseus Theophilos, 57, 81. Thessaly, 108, 180. Thrace, 166. Timios Stavros monastery, 86. TMT, 261, 263. Tornaritis G, Criton, 231. Treaty of Guarantee, 274. Trebizond, 226-227. Treis Elies, 20. Triantafillidis A., 72, 86. Tribute, 200. Trieste, 79. Trikoupis Charilaos, 60. Trooditissa monastery, 91, 107, 158. Troodos, 110. Turco-Russian war, 21-22, 35.

Index Turkey, 124, 166, 253, 255, 259, 262263, 269, 271, 274, 281, 288, 299, 306. Turkish Cypriot community, 9, 213, 255, 259, 267, 269, 271, 274, 276, 279, 281, 287, 289, 299, 302-303, 305-306, 308. Turner William, 55. Tzermias Paul, 294. United Nations, 250-252, 254, 257259, 262-264, 274, 276, 287, 289, 301-303, 305-306. United States, 215, 252, 259, 283, 295, 299, 301. University of Athens, 103, 107-109, 180, 242, 295. University of London, 194. University of Oxford, 129. Vanezis P. N., 4-5. Varosha, 302, 304. Vasiliou George, 305-306. Vasiliou Kyrillos (later archbishop of Cyprus Kyrillos III), 182-187, 189-191. Vasiliou Panayiotis (later archbishop Kyrillos III), 178. Vassiliades S. George, 231-232. Vatopedi monastery, 104. Venetians, 4. Venice, 19, 24. Venizelos Eleftherios, 165-166, 170, 172, 194-195, 199, 201-202. Venizelos Sophokles, 250. Veria, 187. Victoria Queen, 129-130, 135-136. VOLKAN, 261. Vondiziano Antonio, British consul, 35-36, 77. Waldheim Kurt, 304-305. Wallachia, 43-45, 50. War Office, 117, 133. Western Thrace, 251. Wholley Charles, 236. Wilkinson Justice, 232-233. Wolseley Garnet Major-General, 118120, 122-124, 138. World Council of Churches, 242.

The Archbishops of Cyprus in the Modern Age World War, 8, 13, 148, 167-168, 177, 191, 193, 202, 213, 234, 240. Yorkadjis Polycarpos, 269, 272, 278, 280. ‘X’ paramilitary organisation, 244, 251, 253, 257. Yugoslavia, 228. Zaharakis Christos, Greek ambassador, 293, 294, 299. Zannetos Nicholas, 153.

331

Zannetos Philios, 61, 134, 192, 201. Zeno, Byzantine Emperor, 50. Zenon Alecos, 231. Zenon Evgenios, 195. Zenon Lefkios, 231. Ziartides Andreas, 265. Ziteia, 25, 43, 173. Zurich-London Agreements, 265, 268, 270.