Lost 16th century icon repatriated after being up for auction in 🇨🇭

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A valuable 16th-century icon of the Savior on the Throne, stolen from the Church of Christ Antiphonitis in the village of Kalograia (Kyrenia district, Northern Cyprus), was returned to the Cyprus Museum.

After inspection by the restorers, Minister of Transport, Communications and Public Works, Yiannis Karousos, handed over the icon to Archbishop Chrysostom of Cyprus.

The icon was one of many icons which were taken from the Antiphonitis Church at the start of the Turkish invasion in 1974.

The image was put up for auction in Zurich. The image of the icon in the online catalog of the auction house on the Internet was accidentally seen by the director of the museum of the Kykkos monastery, who reported his find to the Archdiocese and the police.

Representatives of the Cypriot Orthodox Church collected a dossier confirming the origin of the icon, and coordinated it with all competent authorities, including the Swiss Embassy in Cyprus. 

Declared a monument of antiquity, the Church of Christ Antiphonitis (“Responding” – one of the epithets of the Savior) wass erected in the 12th century and is the only one preserved in Cyprus in very good condition. Icons and frescoes were added later and date back to the 15th-16th centuries.

 Source - https://www.pravmir.com/stolen-icon-of-the-16th-century-returned-to-the-church-of-cyprus/, https://www.sightsofnorthcyprus.com/antiphonitis

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On this day 49 years ago the Cyprus war began.