HISTORY ETHNOGRAPHY NATURE WINE-MAKING SITE MAP
Selected and rare materials, excerpts and observations from ancient, medieval and contemporary authors, travelers and researchers about Cyprus.
 
 
 
 
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SIR SAMUEL WHITE BAKER
CYPRUS AS I SAW IT IN 1879
page 139

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generally in dense thickets upon the mountain sides through which beaters could have hardly moved. The high cliffs above us formed an excelled example of an old sea-bottom, showing the varioi strata of sedimentary deposits at different periods I made a collection of fossil shells, which were great numbers but in limited variety, and chief bivalves. Although the village of Gallibornu was more important in size than many we had passed, there wa a total lack of supplies. It was impossible to purchas bread, and we were obliged to send messengers tl considerable distances to procure flour, which subsequently employed a woman to bake. The people generally were very poor throughout the country, and the cultivated area appeared insufficient for the support of the population. Every yard land was ploughed, but the entire valley of Gallibornu was fallowed, and did not possess one blade of corn, as the soil required rest after the yield ol the previous season. None of these people have an idea respecting a succession of crops in scientific rotation, therefore a loss is sustained by the impover ishment of the ground, which must occasionally li^ inactive to recover its fertility. There is absolutel) no provision whatever for the cattle in the shape of root-crops or hay, but they trust entirely to the bruised barley-straw and such seeds as the cotton and lentil. A t this season the Carpas district possessed an important advantage in the variety of wild vegetables which afforded nourishment for man and beast; the valleys teemed with wild artichokes and with a variety of thistles, whose succulent stems were a favourite food for both oxen and camels.

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