Settlement on Lusignan Cyprus after the Latin Conquest: The Accounts of Cypriot and other Chronicles and the Wider Context

The accounts of various chronicles of the thirteenth to the sixteenth centuries on settlement in Cyprus in the years following the Latin conquest, from the end of the twelfth to the early thirteenth century, will be examined and com­pared. The details provided by the chronicles, where the information given derived from, the biases present in the various accounts, the extent to which they are accurate, especially in cases where they are corroborated or refuted by documentary evidence, will all be discussed. The chronicles that will be referred to are the thirteenth century continuation of William of Tyre, that provides the fullest account of the settlement of Latin Christians and others on Cyprus after the Latin conquest, the fifteenth century chronicle of Leon­tios Makhairas, the anonymous chronicle of “Amadi” that is probably date­able to the early sixteenth century although for the section on thirteenth cen­tury Cypriot history it draws on earlier sources and the later sixteenth century chronicle of Florio Bustron. Furthermore, the Chorograffia and Description of Stephen de Lusignan, two chronicles postdating the conquest of Cyprus by the Ottoman Turks in 1570, will also be referred to on the subject of settle­ment in thirteenth century Cyprus. By way of comparison, the final part of the paper examines the extent to which the evidence of settlement in other Medi­terranean lands derives chiefly from chronicles or from documentary sources.