I Am Souskiou/Susuz: Brazen, Broken, and Bare

On the morning of July 21st, 1974  my doors swung open and my human hosts vanished, scattered to the winds of the island, never to return.

Since then, I have stood here — exposed, stripped, and silently watching — as time picks at my bones.

From their lofty perches higher up the Diarizos valley, the remnants of the other abandoned villages peer down and sneer, whispering: “Brazen!”

And yes — maybe I am. I do not cower in the folds of the valley or the roof of the hills. I lie open, unashamed and unmistakable, at the mouth of the valley, where the river ends its ancient journey from the Troodos mass.

Let all who pass see me. Let them see what has become of pride.

Left untended, humanity’s structures crumble. We — broken houses, fallen courtyards, cracked fountains — are now audience to a new order. Animals, both living and dead, have reclaimed the space as their own. Feral dogs skulk in our shadows. Goats pick their way through our squares. Pigs, half-wild and shameless, wallow in the shade of once-cultivated fig trees. Carcasses rot where laughter once echoed. The predators have come home. And we, their hosts, have no voice left to turn them away.

Yet our silence holds stories that the earth refuses to forget.

Long before the Greek and the Turk called us home, this place was ancient. Beneath us, a necropolis slept for five thousand years until the archaeologists came. They cracked open the crust of time, and the dead blinked against the sunlight. They told of settlers who knew no flags or faiths, only earth and trade. From the Levant they came, a testament to an illustrious heritage and to a small community that persisted through the rise and fall of empires, something enduring.

Until now.

After five millennia , ancient roots and a quiet persistence against the forces of change give way to decline and abandonment in a blink of an eye.

To think, early settlers in our village played their part in shaping the island’s future as a hub for trade in the eastern Mediterranean. The necropolis spoke of a workshop engaging in copper metallurgy no less , working copper from the surrounding hills into beads, rings, sickles and even axes. But it was the description of the figurines made from the soft volcanic rock found on the Troodos massif and produced in large quantities that caught our attention.  We persuade ourselves that our ancient figurines were the inspiration for those found on today’s coin  - in a small way it helps us come to terms with our current state. A figurine factory and a metallurgical workshop from the copper age thousands of years ago that launched our settlement – now that’s a heritage to help ease the pain of today’s naked ruins.

A jumbled medley of mud and brick, clay and straw, stone and plaster structures rose and fell. But not before they passed on stories of life as a Byzantine, middle ages fief, and later a part of a royal estate of Lusignan kings before becoming a property of the Venetian state no less. This was  followed by centuries as a less aristocratic mixed community of Greek and Turkish Cypriot subsistence farmers.  

Until, that is, our bi-communal harmony turned to tensions that separated Christian from Muslim neighbour.

First, our homes and coffee shops lost the sounds of Greek welcome and church bells heralding Byzantine chants, leaving some of my neighbours empty of life and vulnerable to the elements and predators.  

Soon the sound of the call to prayer and the smell of lokum were also lost to our village.  Even the  Diarizos itself seems to have abandoned us, sucked dry by ever thirsty farms and citrus groves and mantras higher up the valley, a thirst which the Arsinou dam struggles to quench.

Were our Turkish inhabitants prescient when they named our collection of abodes ‘Susuz’ - village without water. Or were they mocking our British installed water fountains with their promise of unlimited potable water, who scream out their date of birth as eerie as a ghost’s wail.

Now we stand unsteady by overgrown tracks, our insides exposed or used as containers for detritus. Or worse,  inhabited by feral squatters and their victims.

Around us goats and sheep graze cautiously, ears twitching at the faintest sound. Semi-wild pigs roam the streets or lie in the shade of fig trees.

Predators and prey play out their ancient dance here.  Animal carcasses tell the grim tale - where life thrives, there is also death.

Brazen, indeed, how animals have assumed our carcasses for their own use, a stark reminder of our village’s transformation from sanctuary to untamed wilderness. Animals, both living and dead, have redefined the space as their own, transforming it into a raw and unfiltered ecosystem.

And yet, among our ruins, two of my cousins stand defiant: the mosque, white and unyielding, and the modest Christian chapel of Ayia Marina, patron of barren women and weary kidneys no less. They are tended by hands that no longer live here — shadows of devotion that return just often enough to remind us what once was. The religious fervour of our human landlords seems to survive even their desertion…

 … two sentinels guarding fading ghosts, for that is all we are.

Souskiou/ Susuz Population Census

Source: PRIO - Cyprus