Cyprus, the third largest island of the Mediterranean Sea, is located south of Turkey. The island was conquered by the Ottoman (Turkish) Empire in 1571 and remained under Ottoman rule for three centuries. Cyprus came under British rule in 1878 following the Russo-Turkish War. After 82 years of British rule the island became an independent republic in 1960 under a constitution carefully drafted in an effort to balance the interests of Greek and Turkish Cypriots. Britain retained sovereignty over two large military bases, Akrotíri and Dhekelia, on the south coast. Unfortunately the political compromise dissolved into violence in 1974. Turkish troops intervened and occupied the northern third of Cyprus, establishing the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (Kuzey Kıbrıs Türk Cumhuriyeti in Turkish). United Nations troops administer the Buffer Zone, commonly called the Green Line, a narrow zone separating the Greek and Turkish sections of the island. The Turkish Republic is not recognized diplomatically by any country except Turkey. Since the 1920s the Turkish language has been written in a Latin script; a distinctive feature of the alphabet is that the dotted (İ and i) and dotless (I and ı) forms of the letter I are different letters. The Turkish phrase for a lighthouse is fener (plural fenerler) or deniz feneri ("sea lantern"). Ada or adası is an island, yarımada is a peninsula, kaya is a rock or reef, burnu is a cape, burun ("nose") is a headland, körfez is a gulf, koy is a bay or inlet, boğaz is a strait, nehir is a river, and liman is a harbor. Lighthouses in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus are maintained by the Turkish Cyprus Coastal Safety and Salvage Directorate. ARLHS numbers are from the ARLHS World List of Lights. KTGK numbers are from the list provided by the coastal safely directorate. Admiralty numbers are from volume N of the Admiralty List of Lights & Fog Signals. U.S. NGA List numbers are from Publication 113.
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![]() Zeytinlik Burnu (Cape Elea) Light, Çayırova, April 2008 Flickr Creative Commons photo by Chris and Angela Pye |
Information available on lost lighthouses: Notable faux lighthouses: |
![]() Karakol Light, Mağusa Coastal Safety Directorate photo |
Adjoining pages: North: Southern Turkey | South: Republic of Cyprus
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Posted May 14, 2007. Checked and revised May 21, 2024. Lighthouses: 13. Site copyright 2024 Russ Rowlett and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.