Kolossi Castle

Stand still for a moment at the foot of the tower. Under your shoes there is dry, pale earth. Around you there are reeds, eucalyptus and the low green lines of farmland. The air carries a faint smell of warm stone and dust. The castle in front of you is not a sprawling fortress. It is a single square block of honey-coloured limestone, rising straight up from the coastal plain a few kilometres west of Limassol. It looks plain at first. Give it a few minutes, and it starts to tell a very particular story.

That story belongs to the Crusades. In 1191, Richard the Lionheart, King of England, seized Cyprus on his way to the Holy Land. Soon afterwards the island passed to the Lusignans, a French noble family who ruled it as a kingdom for nearly three centuries. Under their rule, Latin military orders took over land across the island. These were religious brotherhoods of fighting knights. Kolossi became one of their most valuable estates.

The main order here was the Knights Hospitaller, also called the Knights of Saint John. They began as a brotherhood caring for sick pilgrims in Jerusalem, and grew into a powerful military and landowning force. When the Crusader states in the Holy Land fell, many knights moved to Cyprus. Kolossi became their Grand Commandery, which means the headquarters of their Cypriot estates. For a short period in the early fourteenth century, the rival Knights Templar also held it, before their order was dissolved.

Here is the first surprise. The tower you see is not the original castle. An earlier fortification stood here in the thirteenth century. The present keep is a rebuilding from the fifteenth century, in the 1450s, ordered by a Hospitaller commander named Louis de Magnac. So when you look at these walls, you are looking at a late medieval tower. It was built when the great age of crusading was already over, and the knights were managing farms as much as fighting wars.

Walk around to the east face of the tower and look up. Set into the wall is a carved marble panel shaped like a cross. It holds several coats of arms. Among them are the arms of the Lusignan royal house, the arms of the Hospitaller order, and the personal arms of Louis de Magnac himself. It is a kind of medieval signature. In one panel, the builder records who ruled the island, who owned the land, and who paid for the stone.

Now notice how the tower is entered. There is no grand door at ground level. The entrance sits on the first floor, reached today by a small bridge. In the past, a drawbridge could be raised to cut off access. Directly above the doorway, look for a projecting stone box with openings in the floor. This is a machicolation. Defenders could drop stones or hot liquids on anyone trying to force the door. It is a small detail, but it shows that the knights still expected trouble.

Inside, the tower has three levels. The ground floor held storage rooms and cisterns for water. The upper floors held the living quarters. Each level has large vaulted rooms with thick walls and small deep windows. Look for the stone fireplaces built into the walls. They are a reminder that this was a home as well as a fortress. Somewhere on the walls you may also find traces of a faded painted Crucifixion. The colour is weak now, but it shows the religious life of the men who lived here.

A narrow spiral staircase climbs to the flat roof. The steps are worn and uneven, so take them slowly. At the top, the view opens in every direction. To the south you can see toward the sea and the long flat land near the salt lake. To the north, the hills of the Troodos range rise in soft blue layers. From here it is easy to understand why the castle was placed on this plain. The land was flat, fertile and well supplied with water.

That water leads to the second surprise. Kolossi was rich not because of battles, but because of sugar. The Hospitallers grew sugar cane on these fields and processed it on site. Cane sugar was a luxury in medieval Europe, and Cypriot sugar travelled to markets across the Mediterranean. Beside the tower you can see a long stone building with high pointed vaults. This was the sugar factory, where the cane was crushed and the juice was boiled down.

Look also for the remains of an aqueduct and a water mill near the factory. Water came across the plain in channels and turned the mill wheels that pressed the cane. Standing here, try to imagine the noise. There were grinding stones, workers, carts, fires under large pots, and the heavy sweet smell of boiling juice. The quiet you hear today is very different from the busy estate of five or six hundred years ago.

There is one more product connected to this place, and it is still made today. Commandaria is a sweet dessert wine from the villages in the hills north of here. Its name comes from the Commandery, the same Hospitaller estate that was run from this tower. The knights shipped the wine to Europe, and it gained a strong reputation. Many people say it is one of the oldest named wines in the world still in production. If you see a bottle in Limassol, you will know where the name began.

You may hear local stories that link Richard the Lionheart directly to this castle. Some say he celebrated here, or that he stayed nearby after his wedding in Limassol. These are popular tales rather than proven history. The tower you see was built long after Richard left. But the stories show how strongly people here connect this landscape with the Crusader era. After the Lusignans, the Venetians ruled Cyprus, and then the Ottomans. The fields around Kolossi continued to be farmed through all those changes.

Before you leave, walk once more around the base of the tower. Touch the stone if you can. Notice how the blocks are cut and fitted, and how some show patches of later repair. Look again at the marble panel of arms on the east wall, at the bridge to the first floor, and at the long vaults of the sugar factory. As you walk back toward the road, listen to the wind in the trees and the sound of traffic far away. This quiet tower once controlled sugar, wine and land across this plain. Now it simply stands in the sun, and lets you look.