Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 05.djvu/826

* CYPBXJS. 714 CYRENAICA. the island remained tributary until Evagoras • Iq.v.) became King of Salamis (B.C. ■110-374), made himself master of much of the island, and nearly succeeded in casting off the Persian yolce. After the battle 'of Issus, when Alexander ad- vanced into Phoenicia, all the cities of Cyprus declared in liis favor, and sent ships to assist liim in the siege of Tyre. I'ndcr the Persian rule the cities had been allowed a large measure of self- government under the control of kings, who seem to have claimed descent from heroic ancestors. After the death of Ale.ander, the possession of this island, so important for its seemingly in- exhaustible forests (it is now quite bare of trees), became an object of contention among his successors, being especially sought by An- tigonus and Ptolemy. It finally passed into the liands of the latter and was for a long time a valued dependency of Egypt. In B.C. 58-57 the tribune Clodius proposed and Cato effected its annexation by Rome. Under Augustus it was .made a proconsular province, and from this time is scarcely mentioned in ancient histoiy. Cyprus is noticed in Acts iv. 3fi, where it is mentioned as the native place of Barnabas; and in Acts xi. 19-20 it appears prominently in con- nection with the earliest spreading of Christian- ity. During the reign of Trajan (a.d. IIG) it was the scene of a rising of the Jews, wlio are said to have killed 24,000 of the other inhabit- ants. After the division of the Roman Enipire, Cyprus passed under the Byzantine emperors. In 646 the Arabs became masters and destroyed the city of Salamis. Two years later the Greeks recovered sway; but in 802 it was again con- quered by Harun-el-Rashid. who was soon com- pelled to" relinijuish it to the Byzantine rulers. In 1184 Isaac Comnenus made Cyprus an independent sovereignty. In 1191 Richard of England ejected Comnenus, and in 1193 put Guy de Lusignan in possession as compensa- tion for the loss of Jerusalem, of which Guy had been appointed king. For three centu- ries, under this dynasty, the feudal system flourished in C.yprus, the cities of Nicosia and Famagosta were adorned with churches, splendid even in their ruins, and the island seems to have been rich and prosperous. Through the Venetian Catarina Cornaro, the wife of James II., the Republic of Venice came into full possession of the island in 1489 and held the rule for about eighty years. In 1570 the Turks invaded Cyprus, quickly subdued the country districts, took the capital (Nicosia) after a siege, and murdered 20,000 of its inhabitants. Famagosta held out for a year and then made a capitulation, which was immediately violated by the Moslem gen- eral, who slowly tortured to death the governor of the city. From that period Cyprus continued a. part of the Turkish Enipire. In 1878 it was placed under English control by a treaty, which recognized the sovereignty of the Sultan, and assured him an anuiual income of £92,746. In 18S2 a new constitution was promulgated, and under English rule the prosperity of the island has greatly increased. The antiijuities of the island have been the subject of much unscientific and inaccurate exploration, conducted chiefiy for the purpose of obtaining booty. Of these earlier excavations the most productive were those of L. P. di Cesnola, whose collections are for the most part in the Metropolitan Museum in New York. Later excavations in the modern scientific method have been conducted by the Cyprus Ex- ploration Fund, the British Museum, Ohnefalsch- Richter, and others. BiBLiocR.vpiiY. Ungcr and Kotsclij', Die Insel Cypern ihrcr physischcn und cryanischen Xatur nach, etc. (Vienna, 1865) ; Sassenay, Chyprc, hisivire et (jCoijraphie (Paris, 1878) ; de Was Latrie, L'Uv <lc Chyprc (Paris, 187'J) ; Lang, Cyprus (London, 1879) ; Baker, Cyprus As I Saiv It (London, 1879) ; Fyler, Development of Cyprus and Rambles in the Island (London, 1899) ; Mariti, Travels in Cyprus (Nicosia, 1890) ; Cobliam, An Attempt on a Bihliography of Cyprus (Nicosia, 1893) ; Engel, Cyprus (Berlin, 1841) ; Cesnola, Cyprus: Its Cities, Tonibs, und Temples (New York, 1878) ; id., Salnminia (Lon- don, 1882) ; A Descriptive Alius of the Cesnola Collection (New York, 1885) ; Perrot and Chipiez, Histoire de I'art antique, vol. iii. (Paris, 1S84; English translation by Armstrong, London, 1885) ; Ohnefalsch-Ricliter, Cyprus, the Bible, and Homer (London, 1893) ; ]Myres and Richter, Catalogue of the Cyprus Museum (Oxford, 1899) ; the inscriptions in the Cypriote dialect are published in Collitz, Sammlung der grie- chischen Dialekt-Inschriften, vol. i. (GiJttingen, 1884) ; Sclimidt, Sammlung kyprischer Insehrif- ten in epichorischer lichrift (Jena, 1876). CYKANO DE EERGERAC, se'ra'no' de bar'zh-iak'. See Bergekac. CY'RENA'ICA (Lat., from Gk. Kvpnmla, KyrCnuia) . The name of the district whose capital was Cyrene (q.v.). it comprised the tableland on the north coast of Africa from the Great Syrtis to the jiromontoiy of Ardanis (Ras el-ilellaii ), though its boimdaries lUietuated according to the degree of subjection in which the neighboring tribes were held. This plateau of Cyrenaica was, and still is, one of the loveli- est and most agreeable regions of the world. Tiie climate is delicious, mountains on the south sheltering the land from the scorching blasts of the Sahara, and cool sea-winds fanning it on the nortli. From the central plateau, wliose breadth is about 80 miles, the land slopes down in verdant terraces to the Mediterranean. These terraces are cut and watered by mountain streams, form- ing luxuriant ravines. The productions of Cy- renaica mentioned by ancient writers are wheat, oil, wine, honey, fruits of all kinds, cucumbers, truffles, cabbage; flowers yielding the richest perfumes ; and a rare plant called silphium. The country was also celebrated for its breed of _ horses, but was mucli exposed to the ravages of locusts. The chief cities of Cyrenaica were Cyrene, Taucheira (afterwards called Arsinoe), Hes- perides (afterwards called Berenice), Barca, and Apollonia. To each of these five cities (whence in the time of the Ptolemies Cyrenaica was named Pentapolis and Pentapolitana Regia) a certain amount of territory was attached. This favored their individual independence ; and the consequence was that the dynasty of Battus, who led the first Greek colony to Cyrene (q.v.), ex- ercised very little inlluence over Cyrenaica in general. After the death of Alexander the Great, Cyrenaica became part of the Egyptian kingdom of Ptolemy Lagi, and in the second century B.C. a separate kingdom under a branch of the Ptolemaic family. In B.C. 96 it was be- queathed to the Romans by Apion, the last king.