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Selected and rare materials, excerpts and observations from ancient, medieval and contemporary authors, travelers and researchers about Cyprus.
 
 
 
 
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CLAUDE DELAVAL COBHAM
Exerpta Cypria
page 40

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PERO TAFUR. AV. WEY. CAPODILISTA. 33 W. WEY. William Wey, Fellow of Eton College, reached Paphos, July 9,1458, and returned to it on August 7, to find the lang, Jean II., dead, and his daughter Charlotte reigning in hie stead. From the Itineraries, published by the Roxbnrghe Club, 4to, Loudon, 1857,1 copy one short passage, and translate another. In Cipresse ye schal haue gratis of sylver and half gratis, and other denars of black money, and besauntis: and hälfe a besaunte ys north XLYIII denars, and VII besanutye and half to a dolcot of Venyee. A grot of Cypres ye worth XXXVIII denars (page 3). From Rhodes we carne to Paphns on July 9. There S. Pani was imprisoned in a spot belonging to the Friars Minor, and there is S. Paul's fountain. Also two miles from Famacosta, in a city called Constautia, S^,Katerina was born. Also in Famacosta is a chapel in the church of the Friars Minor'behind the High Altar and the spot where S. Kateriua learned to read. Also in the city of Nicocen, which is one of the ohief cities of Cyprus, there lies the whole body of the lord Monntford, onee an English Knight, in the abbey of the Order of S. Benedict, and there he is revered as a saint, and two hundred years and a little more have passed since he was buried there. Also outside Nicocea is the body of S. Mamma, whieh exudes oil : also the body of the Abbot Ilarion. CAPODILISTA. Count Gabriele Capodilista, a gentleman of Padua, visited Cyprus in 1458. On Iiis return to Italy a friend, l'ao* Boncambio, edited from hie notes the Itinetarìo della Terra Santa nel 1458, a rare volume in small qn. o, without a date, bnt printed probably at Perugia about 1485. Queen 1 slena Palaeologus, wife of Jean II., died April 11, 1458. Lo Postoleo (le Postulé ou VElu, H. de C nx 'tö, VApostoiUe, πι. 105, VApostttUe, m. 106, Aposielerim Cgprieus, in. 166, 6 Αποστόλης, G. Boustron, el padre elfeae Postulato, Malipiero) was Jaques II. de Lusignan, then titular archbishop of Nicosia. This extract is translated from De Mas Latrie, Histoire, vol. in. pp. 76, 77. Friday, June 16, in the morning, their course brought them close to the island of Cyprus. They passed C. Epiphnnio, and a city called Papho, ruined and almost without inhabitants. At XXIII of the clock they reached a little village called Episcopia, very rich in sugar, which belongs, 1 think, to some Venetian gentlemen of the house of Cornerò. At this place they received news that the Queen nf Cyprus was dead, and that the king, scarcely earing any more for sovereignty, had made a bastard son, called Lo Postoleo, his lieutenant ; also that it was supposed that the Turk was coming to those parts. They stayed a little while iu this village and saw some most lovely gardens of oranges, citrous and carobs, and some other trees called banana, which produce fruit very much like small cuenmbers; when it is ripe it is yellow aud very sweet of savour...and they saw many fields of sugai' cane: and these gardens and fields are watered by running streams, and bulbs and squills grow there in abundance. Miser Gabriel and his companions went on shore at this place Episcopia ; the air there is very bad, and they all got ill, one of a fever, another of a flux, except M. Gabriele who remained well ; but for fifteen days his chest and stomach suffered from nausea from having imbibed that foul and almost pestiferous air; and some of his companions died.

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