page_title: Armenians in Cyprus
section_title: Demography
hierarchical_section_title: Armenians in Cyprus / Demography
caption_attribution_description: English: Table showing the Armenian-Cypriot population between 1881 and 1960. Ελληνικά: Πίνακας που δείχνει τον αρμενοκυπριακό πληθυσμό μεταξύ 1881 και 1960.
context_page_description: Armenians in Cyprus or Armenian-Cypriots are ethnic Armenians who live in Cyprus. They are a recognized minority with their own language, schools and churches. Despite the relatively small number of Armenians living in Cyprus, the Armenian-Cypriot community has had a significant impact upon the Armenian diaspora and Armenian people. During the Middle Ages, Cyprus had an extensive connection with the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia, while the Ganchvor monastery had an important presence in Famagusta. During the Ottoman Era, the Virgin Mary church and the Magaravank were very prominent. Certain Armenian-Cypriots were or are very prominent on a Panarmenian or international level and the fact that, for nearly half a century, the survivors of the Armenian Genocide have co-operated and co-existed peacefully with the Turkish-Cypriots is perhaps a unique phenomenon across the Armenian Diaspora. The emigration of a large number of Armenian-Cypriots to the United Kingdom has virtually shaped today's British-Armenian community.
context_section_description: There is no accurate information as to the number of Armenians living in Cyprus during the Byzantine Era. Although during the early Kingdom of Cyprus there were tens of thousands of Armenians living in Cyprus (mainly in Nicosia and Famagusta – where in the latter they numbered around 1,500 souls in 1360), by the late Frankish Era and certainly during the Venetian Era, the number of Armenians in Cyprus dwindled – for a number of reasons: this was due to the tyrannical rule of the Venetian administration, combined with the adverse natural conditions (which affected all Cypriots), as well as the Hellenisation of the various minorities of the island. In fact, the 1572 survey of population and property of Nicosia after the Ottoman conquest, under beylerbey Sinan Pasha, recorded 90–95 local Armenians in Nicosia, out of about 1,100 inhabitants – all with completely Hellenised names.
  It appears that during the very first years of the Ottoman Era (1570–1878), about 20,000 of the 40,000 recruited Ottoman Armenians had remained in Cyprus. Their number, however, rapidly declined, due to the harshness and the oppression of the regime, the onerous taxation and the natural disasters: according to the Latin Bishop of Paphos, Pietro Vespa, in 1630 there were only 2,000 Armenians in Cyprus (out of a total population of 56,350 – mostly living in rural areas), as a great number emigrated elsewhere and many others embraced Islam or they became Linobambaki. Franciscan missionary Giovanni Battista da Todi recorded only 200 Armenians in Nicosia in 1647, while in 1660 he recorded over 300 Armenians on the island. Cardinal Bernardino Spada, representative of Propaganda Fide, also mentioned 200 Armenians in Nicosia in 1648, out of 3,000 inhabitants, also mentioning that their church was the largest in the capital, with 3 priests. Up until the mid-18th century, despite the limited arrival of Ottoman Armenians and Persian Armenians, their number was rather small. Russian monk Basil Barsky, who visited the island in 1727 and 1735, mentions "some Armenians" living in Nicosia. Visiting Cyprus in 1738, British traveller Richard Pococke mentions "very few Armenians, yet they have possession of an ancient church [in Nicosia]", while for the island as a whole he makes mention to "a small number of Armenians, who are very poor, though they have an Archbishop and a convent in the country". However, by the time Italian Abbot Giovanni Mariti visited Cyprus in 1760 and 1767, they had apparently become "the richest section of the inhabitants [of Nicosia]", which is why thought "there are many Armenians [on the island]". By the mid–19th century, following various waves of Hellenisation (peaceful assimilation) and Turkification (forced conversion), the number of Armenian-Cypriots ranged between 150–200.
  When the Scot John MacDonald Kinneir visited Cyprus in 1814, he estimated about 40 Armenian families in Nicosia (around 200 persons) – out of a total of 2,000 families (about 10,000 persons), as did British Consul Niven Kerr and Greek Vice-Consul Demetrios Margarites in 1844 and 1847, respectively. The first large-scale Ottoman census in 1831, under the supervision of Muhassil (governor) Halil Effendi, counted 114 non-Muslim males in the Armenian quarter of Nicosia and 13 at the Armenian Monastery (with a total male population of 45,365). Therefore, the number of Armenians in Cyprus would have been around 200 (out of a total of about 88,500). Visiting Cyprus in 1835, American missionary Rev. Lorenzo Warriner Pease writes "the number of Armenians [in Nicosia] is between 30 and 40 families". In 1841, about 200 Armenians lived on the island (out of a total of 108,600), of whom about 150-160 resided in Nicosia (with a population of 12,000) – according to the record of population by Muhassil Talât Effendi and the writings of French historians and travellers Louis Lacroix and Count Louis de Mas Latrie. The Latin Vicar General Paolo Brunoni also mentioned 200 Armenians in Nicosia in 1848, as well as some others at the Magaravank. In 1874 Belgian traveller Edmond Paridant-
caption: Table showing the geographical distribution of Armenian-Cypriots (1881–1960)
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