The rectangular tower with machicolations of Kyrenia city walls (1191-1228), Cyprus

Abstract

The ruins of a rectangular stone construction are visible in the old city of Kyrenia; the tower was part of the walled urban defensive system. The city had been already fortified in Byzantine times but during the Longobard war, before the city seize, Frederick II's party, under the direction of Captain Philippo Genardo improved the defences. It is in this phase that we hypothesised the construction of the round southwest corner tower of the city walls (1211-1232). The rectangular tower with machicolations seems to belong to an earlier phase, tentatively placed between the Byzantine and the Frederician one. This chronological framework narrows the available time lapse for the dating (1191-1228), with the terminus ante post quem corresponding to the arrival of the crusaders in Cyprus and the terminus ante quem given by the beginning of the Longobard war. The Venetians in the XVI century demolished the city walls concentrating in the Castle their defensive system. The remaining elements of the older defensive system include two other towers still visible today in the urban tissue of the city. It is possible therefore to reconstruct the complete perimeter of the city walls of Kyrenia overlapping data from the survey, the modern cadastre and the ancient city plans. The research includes the digital survey of the tower using a structure from motion software, the comparative documentation of the masonry types, the historical research on the tower and the transformations of Kyrenia's medieval defensive system in modern times.