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Kritou Tera is a village located in the Paphos wine area, ten kilometers south of Polis and two kilometers southeast of Dhrousha. The origin of the name is obscure. Goodwin suggests that critou derived from erokratos, “judge of love” and terra appears to be a Greek Cypriot use of the Latin word for “land.” Turkish Cypriots, on the other hand always called the village Giritutera and never adopted an alternative name. 

 

Kritou Terra was a mixed village with a Greek Cypriot majority until 1964. As may be seen from the chart above, in the Ottoman census of 1831, Christians (Greek Cypriots) constituted almost 75% of the population. This ratio increased to 81% in 1891, almost fifteen years after the British arrival. By 1946, the Greek Cypriot proportion of the population had increased to 84%, and by 1960, Greek Cypriots were at 88%.

Displacement:

As a result of local tensions that resulted from the intercommunal conflict of late 1963, all the Turkish Cypriots of Kritou Tera fled the village in January 1964 and sought refuge in Tera/Çakırlar(339) village. They stayed there until 12 August 1975, when they were evacuated under the escort of UNFICYP and transferred to the Turkish-controlled north. They were mainly settled in Larnaca tis Lapithou/Kozan(238) village, although some families were dispersed to other villages in the north.

Current Inhabitants:

Currently the village is occupied only by its original Greek Cypriot inhabitants, though many of the youth have preferred to migrate to urban areas in recent years. According to the 2001 census, there were only 92 persons living in the village, a drop from 316 in 1976.  

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• Fehmi, Hasan (2003), “Güney’de Kalan Değerlerimiz,” Lefkoşa (Nicosia): Özyay Matbaacılık.
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• Standing Cypriot Commission for the Standardization of Geographical Names (2007), “Οδηγος Τυποποιησης Ονοματων (Guide to Standardized Names),” Nicosia: Ministry of Education and Culture.
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• Yorgancıoğlu,  Oğuz: Kıbrıs’ta Türkçe Yer Adları ve Veriliş Yöntemleri Üzerine Bir Araştırma Kıbrıs Araştırmaları Dergisi, Cilt : 2, Sayı : 3, Yıl : 96

Websites:

• http://www.cyprus-village.com/ (for the villages)
• http://news.karpasha.com/
• http://human-rights-archaeology.blogspot.com/
• http://kypros.org/Occupied_Cyprus/ (for the villages in the north)