Pafos Gate

The Pafos Gate was one of the three entrances that the Venetians built for access through the walls to the city of Nicosia.

It may be inferior in grandeur compared to the Famagusta Gate and the Kyrenia Gate, but it is at the center of a region that has been partially formed due to it, having a particular cultural significance for the capital of Cyprus. Here was the largest number of Cypriot Catholics in population density, here was Nicosia’s “Armenomachallas” (area inhabited by the Armenians), which now steadily degrades in the dead zone and part of it belongs to the occupied areas. Here, the first opening in the walls that was opened next to the gate by the English in 1879, is the only point today in the divided city where the two “sides”, the occupied and the free lands, communicate without the dead zone between them. The extension of this opening, today’s Pafos Street, has been for many years a central commercial artery and a meeting point for the locals. Near the Pafos Gate there are important cultural attractions and buildings, such as the Nicosia Catholic Church, the Kastelliotissa Hall, the Maronite Virgin Mary of Chariton, the Armenian Church and the Melikian School, the Cyprus Parliament, the Municipal Garden of Nicosia and the Archaeological Museum of Cyprus.

Built during the construction of the Venetian walls at the end of the 16th century (1567-69), the Pafos Gate was a crossing and control point that closed with the sunset and opened with the sunrise. It was originally known as the San Domenico Gate, as it replaced an old gate of the Frankish Walls, the “Porta di San Domenico” that had been named after the homonymous abbey that was close by. The road that began just outside the gate led southwest to Paphos, from where its current name eventually prevailed.

As a construction, the Pafos Gate is a simple opening in the wall with a vaulted roof, in which there were 2-3 soldiers, who probably received taxes from those who entered the city within the walls. Recently, the Department of Antiquities of Cyprus uncovered the old cobbled road that led to it and the bases of the Ottoman aqueduct which, until the beginning of the 20th century, provided the city with water. The municipality of Nicosia has decided to redevelop the area and restore the gate, and, additionally, on top of it, it also hosts the homonymous Police Station. The demilitarization of the area and the redevelopment projects have undoubtedly provided a breath of air to the district of Pafos Gate, but walking around it, the visitor will feel an inexplicable nostalgia.