But to two writers we can appeal as authorities, both
residents, intelligent men, and directly interested in knowing
the true condition of the island. The first,
the Abbe Giovanni Mariti, was for some years an official of the Imperial and
Tuscan Consulates, and published at Lucca in 1769 his
Viaggi per l' isola di Cipro. He arrived in Cyprus from Leghorn February
2, 1760, and left it on his return to Florence, October 6,
1767. His work owes little to previous writers on Cyprus: he
had read Bordone, Lusignan and probably Meursius, but he
relies almost entirely on his own notes of what he had seen
and heard. And herein lies its value, for he is observant and
conscientious. The book stands as the best account of the
condition of Cyprus in the third quarter of the last century,
and as such I leave it, hardly attempting by additions or
corrections to bring it up to date. I have left most names of
places in his own spelling, indicating in the index, which is
new, their present equivalents. Turkish words appear as
modern Oriental scholars would have them transcribed.
Larnaca, December 12, 1895.
From book: GIOVANNI MARITI. Travels in the Island of Cyprus
Translated from the Italian by Claude Delaval Cobham, C.M.G., Cambridge: at the University Press, 1909
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