Legends & History
The ancient tales of north Cyprus
Many tourists arrive in northern Cyprus every year. However, it is not just to enjoy the sandy beaches and warm climate. A lot of the tourists have heard about the many legend that surround Cyprus and northern Cyprus and they find it intriguing.
One of the legends is that some of the mythical Olympian gods lived on the island. Among Zeus, Poseidon, Apollo, Athena, Aphrodite, Demeter; and other gods because they felt as if northern Cyprus was a comfortable place to live. These gods felt they had found another Olympian heights on the highest tip of a mountain in Cyprus, Europe.
Another unique quality that Cyprus contains is that geologists claim there are certain rocks on the island that are at least one hundred and fifty million years old.
Five Finger Mountain on the island of Cyprus holds still yet other legends. One in particular is about a bragging and conceited villager who fell in love with a “local” queen and asked for her hand in marriage. The queen of course didn’t really want to marry this man so she sent him on a perilous journey for water. After weeks of passing the young man returned with water. The queen was enraged that he had actually made the journey and told him she really wasn’t going to marry him, as the villager was angered he threw the water on the ground turning the soil into mud. After this, he picked up a clump of mud and threw it at the queen. As the legend goes the queen ducked and it missed her however the young man had thrown it so hard it hit the top of the mountain forming the imprint of five fingers, and this is how the name five-finger mountain came to be.
Yet, another legend about the mountain is said to be about Dehenis. This was a giant hero that was trying to get away from his enemy. Legend says he leaped across the sea and grabbed the tip of the mountain with such force that his handprint is still there today.
Residents of Cyprus in today’s society love to tell the stories of the many different legends on Cyprus Island, and the visitors and tourists love to hear them. The tourists also take as many pictures that they can of different sites, which contain such legends as the one, found with Five-finger Mountain.
And, due to the fact that geologists claim there are rocks on Cyprus that are more than one hundred and fifty million years old, there is also a legend about how Cyprus came to be.
Legend has it that when God was creating the earth he used lumps of clay by dropping them where they would fall. One lump of course fell into the Mediterranean Sea that then created the beautiful paradise island of Cyprus, Europe.
Northern Cyprus has many different legends for many different areas of the island. Therefore the easiest thing to do if you want to learn more about the island legends and see for yourself is to visit the island of Cyprus, Europe and find out for yourself all the different stories surrounding its creation and happenings.