14/09/2026
The Macabre Theatre of Justice in Cyprus
In medieval and early modern Cyprus, exécution and death did not necessarily mark the end of a punishment. Heads, limbs and bodies could be displayed, mutilated or deliberately used to send a political message.
From the walls of Kyrenia to the Pillory Bridge of Nicosia and the berlina of Famagusta, here are ten particularly striking examples of the macabre theatre of justice in Cyprus.
1. Martin Rousseau — Kyrenia, 1233
One of the most extraordinary cases occurred during the war between the supporters of the Ibelins and Lusignan barons , against the Imperial party of Frederick II (holy roman empire who tried to seized Cyprus).
Martin Rousseau was condemned for his role in the conflict of conspiracy and treason, against the Ibelin side he was fighting for.
Date: 1233
Context: during the struggle between the Ibelins and the Imperial forces, knight Martin Rousseau was caught selling information, and hour time attack plan, during the night to the impérialist ennemy, during the siège of Kyrenia Castle, where the last imperialist was still resisting inside.
Place: Kyrenia Castle
Ex*****on: his companions and ennemis caught in the secret meeting, were hanged.
Rousseau's fate: instead of being treated in the same manner, his dead body was placed in a trebuchet and thrown against the walls of Kyrenia Castle.
The punishment therefore continued beyond death. Rousseau's co**se itself became part of the military spectacle, deliberately hurled against the fortress defended by the opposing faction, to send a message, political treason for money is more than a crime.
Primary source: Les Gestes des Chiprois.
2. /Before to continu the following list, let s have a look, first on : / the geography of the macabre theatre of Nicosia :
The medieval Pediaios ran through Nicosia and was crossed by a series of bridges which have disappeared from the modern cityscape.
The most important for this story was the Bridge of the Pillory, which appears under several names in the sources:
Bridge of the Pillory, Berlina, Bridge of the Prisons, Kato Mesi, Piazza / Lower Piazza, Cotton Market / Nymatopulio
Leventis places it in the eastern part of medieval Nicosia, near the Pediaios, in the vicinity of the churches of St George and Santa Mavra and the Cotton Market. These structures were later demolished when the Venetian fortifications were constructed in 1567–1568, since they lay outside the new walls, near the area east of what became the Famagusta Gate.
This was therefore not simply a bridge. The surrounding open space could accommodate crowds, making it an ideal place for public humiliation and ex*****on. Heads, hands, legs and other body parts were repeatedly displayed there during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
The Bridge of the Jews, however, was a different bridge. It should not be confused with the Pillory Bridge simply because both appear in connection with ex*****ons, but was not far however, situed inside the future venitian wall, in the same eastern part of the city.
3. John Lombardo (Jean Lombard) — Nicosia, 1349
By the fourteenth century, the public display of body parts had become a documented feature of punishment in Nicosia.
John Lombardo was condemned on the orders of King Hugh IV.
Date: 1349
Authority: Hugh IV
Place: the area of the Pillory Bridge
Ex*****on: Lombardo was hanged.
Treatment of the body: his hand and one leg were displayed under the bridge (probably amputed alive) before the rest of his body was hanged after his death on the pillory public square.
Contexte : In 1349, Lombardo asked Hugh IV for permission to leave his service and Cyprus, considering his remuneration insufficient: he was receiving 800 bezants a year. The king actually granted him this permission. But Lombardo was simultaneously involved in helping the king's two sons, Peter — the future Peter I — and John, to leave the island secretly (maybe in exchange of money from them) to travel and visit western Europe, without their father's permission. Hugh IV sent ships in pursuit of his sons and had Lombardo arrested.
His punishment was exceptionally severe:
Prison and torture
The mutilation and public display of a hand and a leg
Hanging of the remainder of his body
Sources: Leontios Makhairas, §82; Strambaldi; Panos Leventis.
4. Henry de Giblet, John/Jean de Gaurelle and Philipp d'Ibelin — Nicosia, 1373
This episode should be understood as one political affair, not three isolated ex*****ons.
Context and Political background: Queen Eleanor's desire for vengeance following Peter I's murder and keeping the control of the kingdom for her young son peter 2nd and genoese occupation :
Following the assassination of King Peter/Pierre I in 1369, Queen consort Eleanor of Aragon sought vengeance against those whom she regarded as responsible, Henri de Giblet, John Gaurelle, Phillipe d Ibelin, John Gorab, and the two brothers of Peter , John and James Lusignan. When the Genoese invaded Cyprus in 1373, the political circumstances finally gave her the opportunity when she allied with them, for fight back after they seized the regency from her for young king Peter 2nd. Genoese and Éléonor won this military batlle against the own brothers of peter 1st , Prince john of Tyr and James/Jacques (futur king James 1st), and the barons, and captured them.
Date: 22 November 1373
Victims: Henry de Giblet, John de Gaurelle and Philip d'Ibelin
Place: the Pillory in Nicosia
Ex*****on: all three were beheaded
Afterwards: their heads were publicly displayed
Public proclamation: a crier announced the justice of God and the king and warned others against raising their hand against their lord.
But the most revealing aspect is perhaps the men who escaped the same fate.
John Gorab, another prominent participant in Peter I's assassination, survived. He later held the important office of auditeur, or chief judge, under subsequent rulers.
Peter's brothers, John and James, also survived. James was jailed in Genoa (later freed after the death of peter 2nd, and crowded king James 1st), and Prince John, powerful respected by the entire cypriots military order and too politicment important, was asking asking to move as connétable of dieudamour (st hilarion) castle, and stay far of her, without exil was asking or imposed to him (she will have her vengeance in an other way, but that is an other story).
The episode therefore cannot be understood simply as the systematic punishment of every person involved in Peter's murder. The choice of those who were executed — and those who were spared — was itself deeply political.
Primary source: Leontios Makhairas, §423.
Additional sources: Strambaldi and other Cypriot chronicles.
5. Public exécution
The Pillory Quarter and the Bridge of the Pillory remained for a long period closely associated with public ex*****ons in medieval Nicosia. The site appears repeatedly in the history of capital punishment: in 1374, during the war between the Lusignan kingdom and the Genoese occupying forces, the Count of Urbino and his brother, who had taken part in the resistance to the Genoese, were captured and hanged at the Bridge of the Pillory by Genoese. Other ex*****ons are associated with the same broader area and with the long tradition of public punishment in Nicosia, probably including the ex*****on of the rebel leader Re Alexis in 1427 in Nicosia even if the pillory quarter is not mentioned in the chronicles. The chronicles also indicate that, during the fighting of 1373–1374, bodies of killed ennemy could be hanged from the outer walls of Nicosia, making the fortifications themselves a highly visible instrument of intimidation during wartime against genoese attack . The famous case of the monks of Kantara should, however, be treated separately: their alleged burning at the stake belongs principally to the later Orthodox hagiographical tradition, and should not be presented as an independently established historical fact without qualification, in the same way re Alexi was pretended tortured in XXth acountabily without primary source during the développement of nationalism hero figure, Machairas never mentionned something else than he was hanged. However , What the surviving evidence does demonstrate is that ex*****on and the public display of the condemned or dead could take several forms in medieval Nicosia, with the Pillory Bridge serving as one of the city's most enduring sites of public punishment.
6. The Bread Market ex*****on — Nicosia, 1385
One of the strangest episodes took place not at the Pillory but beside another bridge of medieval Nicosia.
In 1385, King James I ordered an ex*****on on the roof of the Bread Market, beside the Bridge of the Jews. Not far of Pillory bridge anyway.
Date: 1385
Authority: James I
Place: roof of the Bread Market
Victim: the surviving passage does not give his name
Crime: the passage likewise does not specify the offence
Ex*****on: carried out on the roof
Macabre detail: blood flowed through a gargoyle and fell onto the bread being sold below.
The absence of the victim's name and offence is itself worth respecting: the source preserves the extraordinary staging of the ex*****on, but not the identity or crime of the condemned man.
And this was not the Pillory Bridge.
The Bridge of the Jews appears to have been another crossing of the Pediaios, probably farther west along the river, in the vicinity of the Covered Street and the markets. Its exact location remains uncertain.
Primary source: Makhairas, §611.
Modern discussion: Panos Leventis.
7. The Genoese raiding captain — Nicosia, 1460
Another case concerns piracy and plunder.
In 1460, a Genoese galleon sailed from Famagusta towards the Karpas to raid and plunder. Alexander Tarantin, the bailiff of Karpas, captured the raiders, including their captain.
Date: 1460
Context: piracy and plunder
Origin of the raiders: Genoese Famagusta
Area of operation: Karpas
Captor: Alexander Tarantin, bailiff of Karpas
Captain: his name is not given in the surviving account
Place of subsequent punishment: Nicosia
Ex*****on: the sources present a textual difficulty concerning the precise manner.
Boustronios' account says that the captain's head was cut off, whereas Leventis, following the related passage cited from Boustronios and Florio Bustron, describes the captain as being hanged by his feet on the orders of James II at the Pillory.
Two version but what is certain is the pirate captain captured in the Karpas was brought into the royal capital and subjected to an exemplary public punishment.
Sources: George Boustronios, §§62 and 71; Florio Bustron; Leventis.
8. Hector de Chivides — Kyrenia and Nicosia, 1461
Hector de Chivides provides perhaps the clearest example of a dead man's head being transformed into a political message.
Hector was sheriff of Nicosia and a supporter of Queen Charlotte, making him an opponent of James II.
Kyrenia was under siege, where Charlotte took refuge. According to the account of George Boustronios, Hector left the castle to obtain provisions — including meat for Queen Charlotte — and was caught in an ambush by the forces of James II.
Date: 1461
Context: the struggle between James II and the supporters of Queen Charlotte
Place of capture: outside besieged Kyrenia
Circumstances: Hector left the fortress to obtain provisions
Ex*****on: he was killed and beheaded
Post-mortem treatment: his head was taken to Nicosia
Place of display: the Bridge of the Lower Street / Kato Mesi, i.e. the Pillory/Berlina area
Political message: when prisoners from Kyrenia were subsequently brought to Nicosia, they were shown Hector's head with the words, in effect, “Look at your sheriff.” The symbolism could hardly be clearer. Hector had been the representative of Queen Charlotte inside Kyrenia. His severed head was therefore deliberately brought from the battlefield to the capital and exhibited to the population — and to people from the besieged fortress itself. His co**se had become political propaganda.
Primary source: George Boustronios, §69.
Additional source: Florio Bustron.
9. The berlina of Venetian Famagusta — and the martyrdom of Bragadin
The story does not end with Nicosia.
Famagusta possessed its own public spaces and structures associated with Venetian justice after they took control of Cyprus, including what is described as the berlina or colonna della berlina. (Berlina= Pillory)
The exact identification of the surviving Venetian columns with a conventional “pillory” should be treated cautiously. Nevertheless, Renaissance scholarship has connected these columns with the symbolic public cathédral central place space of Venetian Famagusta.
And in 1571, that same public space acquired a terrifying new meaning.
Following the Ottoman conquest, the Venetian commander Marcantonio Bragadin was subjected to a prolonged and exceptionally brutal punishment.
Date: 1571
Context: Ottoman conquest of Famagusta
Victim: Marcantonio Bragadin
Authority: Lala Mustafa Pasha
Place: Famagusta
Punishment: public humiliation, mutilation, flogging and ultimately flaying alive
After death: his skin was preserved and carried away as a trophy.
Importantly, modern scholarship on Famagusta notes that Mustafa Pasha ordered Bragadin's punishment between the two famous Venetian columns of the city's public space.
Thus a structure associated with the symbolic architecture of Venetian public authority became, after the Ottoman conquest, the setting for the spectacular destruction of one of Venice's most prominent representatives.
The political message was unmistakable.
10. Boyacıoğlu — Nicosia, 1690
The final case takes us well beyond the medieval period and into Ottoman Cyprus.
Boyacıoğlu emerged as a powerful local ağa during the political struggles of the late seventeenth century. His conflict with rival local elites eventually developed into an open challenge to Ottoman authority.
Date: around 1690
Context: Ottoman political conflict and rebellion
Place: Nicosia
Victim: Boyacıoğlu
Ex*****on: he was captured and hanged
Post-mortem treatment: according to the later Cypriot account, his body was exposed together with those of his followers
Additional punishment: some of his followers were reportedly suspended on hooks passing through their jaws from the down chin to the mouth.
This case must be treated differently from the medieval examples.
The detailed account comes from the much later Cypriot historian Archimandrite Kyprianos, who drew on information attributed to oral testimonies of two aged cypriots still alive collected by the French consul Benoît Astier in 1764.
It is therefore not equivalent to the near-contemporary testimony of Makhairas or Boustronios. But it is nevertheless important as evidence for the continuation — and later memory — of spectacular public punishment in Ottoman Cyprus.
Conclusion
These ten cases span almost five centuries and very different political circumstances: civil war, treason, royal justice, political vengeance, piracy, rebellion, military occupation and conquest.
Punition or political violent death sentence could take différent shape, for différent reason, for différent aim, and is not proper to single Cyprus. What connects them here in this article, is the deliberate staging of punishment in public space.
A body could be thrown against a fortress wall, a hand or leg separated from it, a co**se suspended from a city wall, a head hung from a bridge, blood made to fall onto the bread of a marketplace (maybe this one was just accidental) , or the skin of a defeated commander turned into a trophy.
The message was always larger than the individual who had been condemn.
Épilogue
the final and last public théâtral stage punishment will take place much later with 1821 greek nationalism uprising who led to the public ex*****on of several prominent Orthodox clergy in Nicosia .Archbishop Kyprianos was publicly hanged from a tree in Saray Square on 9 July 1821. The Metropolitans of Paphos, Kition and Kyrenia were executed by decapitation. Other clergy, including Archdeacon Meletios and the Abbot of Kykkos, were also executed, although sources sometimes disagree on the method the following days in the same place.
Although ex*****ons continued in Cyprus after 1821 — including numerous hangings under British rule and the final ex*****ons at Nicosia Central Prison in 1962 — the ex*****ons of 1821 appear to have been the last major instance in which death sentences were deliberately carried out in public, in the heart of Nicosia, as a highly visible act of political repression staged publicly before the population, with the ex*****on and the bodies themselves forming part of the spectacle of power.
