Is the spring in Değirmenlik North Cyprus still flowing

dippersgirl



Joined: 04/05/2010
Posts: 795

Message Posted:
09/06/2011 13:54

Kythrea (Greek: Κυθραία; Turkish: Değirmenlik) is a town on the island of Cyprus.



Kythrea is situated near the ancient kingdom of Chytroi which was founded by Chytros. Chytroi was one of the ten city-kingdoms of Cyprus in antiquity. According to one tradition the name Kythrea came from Chytroi. According to another tradition the name Kythrea is derived from the name of the Greek Ionian island Kythera from where millstones were transferred to Kythrea's watermills. The village was watered for millennia by the Kefalovrysos spring. However, shortly after the Turkish invasion of Cyprus the water stopped flowing.

This is a copy of the entry in Wikipedia. Can anybody verify these facts especially the last sentence???

dippersgirl



Joined: 04/05/2010
Posts: 795

Message Posted:
12/06/2011 20:25

Does anybody know about this spring, is it flowing now or not??

ttoli


Joined: 24/03/2007
Posts: 1172

Message Posted:
12/06/2011 20:51

Alot of the springs in freinds Villages, Negrisli and Gecitkale, stopped after the quarrying started on the Besparmak mountains.

rejela


Joined: 09/02/2011
Posts: 293

Message Posted:
12/06/2011 21:53

I was told that an army komutan (officer) in his wisdom, decided that he would get more water out of the spring by blasting it with high explosive, apparently he didn't because the water stopped flowing. When we mess with the forces of nature we tend to mess things up.

dippersgirl



Joined: 04/05/2010
Posts: 795

Message Posted:
13/06/2011 09:39

i am reading the book 'Cyprus as I saw it in 1879' by Samuel W. Baker and it was mentioned there as a very powerful source of water.

Can it all disappear? Is there nothing to see now?

DutchCrusader



Joined: 19/05/2008
Posts: 11281

Message Posted:
13/06/2011 10:07

@ msg dippersgirl: There are still some interesting things to see! The spring provided Salamis/Constantia, once the capital of Cyprus, with water via a circa 50 km (35 miles) long and very impressive aqueduct.

I plan to build a text-pics-maps web page about Kythrea (also known in history as Chytroi, Citerea (Mariti, circa 1750), Cythera and other names, Deyirmenlik = place of water mills, now in Turkish: Değirmenlik) as part of a portal about Salamis.

DutchCrusader



Joined: 19/05/2008
Posts: 11281

Message Posted:
13/06/2011 10:54

msg 6, continued: Here's a preview of the Salamis section I'm building:

▶ [ http://www.allcrusades.com/SALAMIS/salamis_cyprus_overview.html ].

dippersgirl



Joined: 04/05/2010
Posts: 795

Message Posted:
13/06/2011 16:44

Thanks for the info, Hans





rejela, where did you hear of that, in a book or??



Spending more time here now and therefore keen to learn more about the history.

I knew very little until we came here. My East German history did not cover Cyprus at all. Trying to catch up now.

rejela


Joined: 09/02/2011
Posts: 293

Message Posted:
13/06/2011 17:57

Hi Dippersgirl, i heard about it by word of mouth but i can't remember who from. The thing is with natural springs, they follow natural paths through the underlying rock. When blasting takes place the path of the spring can change as new faults in rock occour and the water takes a different route.

dippersgirl



Joined: 04/05/2010
Posts: 795

Message Posted:
14/06/2011 10:24

Thanks for telling me, must go there one day to see what's left

DutchCrusader



Joined: 19/05/2008
Posts: 11281

Message Posted:
28/06/2011 10:51

@ msg 9, rejela: (...) i heard about it by word of mouth but i can't remember who from. The thing is with natural springs, they follow natural paths through the underlying rock. When blasting takes place the path of the spring can change as new faults in rock occour and the water takes a different route. (...)

▶ After corresponding with the Dutchman Wilke Spring (University of Utrecht) who specialises in "Roman waterworks, subject aquaducts") I think there's a different, scientific explanation for the dried up spring(s).

Mr. Wilke Schram is building a web page now about the Roman waterworks in Cyprus and here you can read more about it (the page is in the English language but not fully edited yet).

▶ [ http://www.romanaqueducts.info/aquasite/index.html ], choose Salamis in the column at left (then look for: The springs of Kythrea).