What more than 2,000 clay figures reveal about Northern Cyprus. The silent society of Agia Irini:

In the photographs from Stockholm's Metropolitan Museum of Art, they stand close together: men with helmets, shields, and raised arms, charioteers, horses, bulls, and beings that defy easy categorization. Some figures are barely larger than a hand, others reach almost to a person's hip. No two faces are alike. Many of these clay figures were once painted red and black, and on some, this color lingers to this day like a faint memory.

This island never ceases to amaze us, and Agia Irini is one of the stories that truly captivated us during our research. Those seeing the pictures for the first time might think of it as a small Cypriot relative of the famous Terracotta Army of Xi'an.

This idea leads both to the right and the wrong conclusion: Right, because what you see here is indeed a large community made of clay. Wrong, as soon as you suspect Agia Irini was an army for a ruler. These figures did not guard an imperial tomb. They were gifts from people to a deity – placed in the earth of a sanctuary over generations.

A priest, a field, and a discovery that continues to occupy researchers to this day.

Agia Irini lies on the north coast of Cyprus, west of Kyrenia; the village now bears the Turkish name Akdeniz. In the summer of 1929, one of the most remarkable excavations of the Swedish Cyprus expedition began there, and, as so often in archaeology, chance was the true discoverer: The priest Papa Prokopios had noticed fragments of ancient figurines on his land and taken one of them to Nicosia. It was this tip from the village that led the scholars to the site, above all Einar Gjerstad, who headed the Swedish expedition and later published the find himself.

Subsequent excavations revealed a rural sanctuary: a large, approximately triangular temenos with a series of buildings on its north and east sides.

More than 2,000 figures and groups of figures stood around an altar or a sacred stone. Research dates the use of the site from approximately the 12th century to the end of the 6th or the beginning of the 5th century BC, with most of the surviving terracotta figures belonging to the Archaic period ( Lund University: The archaeological collection of Ayia Irini, Cyprus ).

The shrine was therefore not created for a single celebratory moment. Its community of clay figures grew over centuries, figure by figure, prayer by prayer.

Most of the approximately 2,000 statues and statuettes depict men, often as warriors or charioteers, alongside animals, hybrid creatures, and individual female figures arranged in a circle. Which deity was worshipped here remains unclear to this day—a definitive inscription is lacking, and while names such as Apollo or a deity related to the Phoenician Baal are discussed, they remain interpretations ( Land 2018: Extra-Urban and Rural Sanctuaries in Ancient Cyprus ).

This open ending does not diminish the discovery for us. It prevents it from being prematurely forced into a familiar narrative.

Why a large part of this collection is now in Sweden

Anyone who sees the pictures from Stockholm rightly wonders why such a large part of a Cypriot sanctuary lies in Sweden. The answer lies in the colonial era: Cyprus was under British administration in 1929, and according to the system of sharing finds then in force, foreign expeditions were allowed to keep and export a portion of the excavated objects. According to a scholarly overview of the history of Cypriot collections, a total of 771 crates containing around 13,000 registered objects from the Swedish expedition were shipped to Stockholm in 1931, including a significant portion of the finds from Agia Irini ( Kyprios Character: Collections of Cypriote Antiquities in Foreign Museums ).

Today, the Medelhavsmuseet displays approximately 1,000 figures in a reconstructed semicircular arrangement, as in the sanctuary itself ( Medelhavsmuseet: Cyprus - 7,000 years of history ). Further pieces are kept in the Cyprus Museum in Nicosia ( visitor's guide ), so the entire group of finds is distributed across several collections.

Researchers at Lund University are therefore using three-dimensional scans to at least digitally reunite the separated collections. Just this spring, two votive statues from Agia Irini were also on loan to the Louvre in Paris as part of the cultural program for Cyprus's 2026 EU Council Presidency – a small testament to how far this island story has now traveled.

This story cannot be concluded with a single word. The export took place within the framework of the laws in force at the time, and these laws were simultaneously part of a colonial order in which decision-making power was very unequally distributed. Cyprus legally abolished the division of archaeological finds in 1964 ( Department of Antiquities Cyprus: Historical Background ). Today, Agia Irini therefore serves as a reminder of two things simultaneously: the value of international research, which first evaluated and publicized this find, and the responsibility that remains with the possession of another country's cultural heritage.

The digital reunification of the collection is more than a technical exercise for us - it shows what collaboration can look like today: as a shared access to a shared history, supported by respect for its origin.

Is Agia Irini standing alone in this?

No, and that doesn't make the story any less significant for us, but only more precise. Large groups of terracotta figurines are also known from other sites in the ancient world. Similar figures were placed as votive offerings in the Greek sanctuary of Aphaia on Aegina ( Journal of Greek Archaeology on Aphaia ). Extensive deposits of heads, body parts, human and animal figures are known from Etruscan sanctuaries in central Italy—one find complex from ancient Caere alone comprises more than 800 objects ( Phoebe A. Hearst Museum: The Etruscan Collection ).

We also know of terracotta and masked figures from other sanctuaries in Cyprus itself, such as Kourion, Amathous and Athienou-Malloura.

And then, of course, there is the comparison that immediately comes to mind: the Chinese Terracotta Army in the Mausoleum of the First Emperor Qin Shihuangdi, created in the 3rd century BC for the tomb of a single ruler ( UNESCO: Mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor ).

Agia Irini is older, smaller in scale than most of its figures, and its religious significance is entirely different. No central state established a unified army here. Over a long period, many individuals brought individual offerings to an open sanctuary, one after the other, generation after generation.

Agia Irini is not the only place in the world with a large number of terracotta figures. What is truly exceptional, perhaps without close parallel in the Mediterranean, is the combination: more than 2,000 figures in one place, their diverse sizes ranging from small votive offerings to nearly life-size statues, their striking individuality, the juxtaposition of warriors, charioteers, animals, and hybrid creatures, the community that has grown over centuries, and finally, their largely comprehensible arrangement around the sacred site. For us, the real wonder of Agia Irini lies less in a record than in this unusually complete glimpse into a religious space that would otherwise only be preserved in fragments.

What the characters reveal about the island's culture

First and foremost, they tell the story of an island of connections. Cyprus lay between the Aegean Sea, Anatolia, the Levant, and Egypt, and the Stockholm Museum describes its Cypriot collection accordingly as evidence of lasting contacts with these regions.

On the island, however, such influences were not simply copied, but absorbed, transformed, and translated into a unique visual language – a skill that Agia Irini demonstrates particularly vividly, as images of warriors, bulls, hybrid creatures, and diverse production techniques converge without explicitly stating their origins. Cyprus appears here not as a peripheral region between larger cultures, but as a distinct center where forms, ideas, and people converged.

The social life surrounding the sanctuary can also be cautiously gleaned. Analysis of the pottery suggests that people from various parts of the island visited the site, and simple vessels indicate communal eating and drinking as part of rituals. Agia Irini was therefore likely more than just the small cult site of a single village – rather a place that fostered encounters, made belonging visible, and strengthened relationships across local boundaries.

The numerous male warrior figures likely point to notions of strength, protection, prestige, and masculine representation. Large figures were expensive, and those who donated such a gift also demonstrated their financial means. However, to conclude from this that the Cypriots were a thoroughly warlike society would be jumping to conclusions, especially since we don't associate them with that way of thinking: votive images are not a census, and the small number of female figures doesn't prove that women were hardly involved in the cult.

A sanctuary primarily reveals what people wanted to present to a deity, not necessarily their entire daily lives. Who was allowed to appear here, who sculpted the faces, for which families or vows individual figures were created – all this remains for us one of the quiet, open questions that keep this find so vibrant.

Even the traces of red and black paint remind us how much our image of antiquity is shaped by loss. What appears earthy and muted today was once colorful and vibrant. People spoke, ate, offered sacrifices, and hoped among the figures. Not a sound remains of any of that – but the fired clay does.

An island that constantly has to reassemble its history.

Agia Irini is located in the north of the island, which has been divided since 1974, while many of its figurines are located in the south and in Sweden. The actual archaeological site lies within a military exclusion zone and is currently inaccessible to both researchers and visitors. We don't want to make this geographical fragmentation into an overly simplistic political metaphor—ancient history cannot resolve the current Cyprus conflict. However, it can suggest one perspective: Cyprus's cultural heritage is older than its current borders and greater than any single narrative about the island. It belongs to the history of both Greek and Turkish Cypriot peoples, to the villages surrounding the archaeological sites, and simultaneously to a global public that wishes to preserve it. Research, digitization, joint exhibitions, and a fair approach to provenance and ownership can forge connections here without denying differences.

More than 2,000 individual figures form a community in Agia Irini, without relinquishing their diversity. No two figures are alike, yet they all stand oriented towards a common center. This is precisely what keeps us drawn to this island: Cyprus rarely offers easy answers, but shows us time and again how much history can be contained in a single piece of land – and how clearly a clay society still speaks to us after two and a half millennia.

In the following articles, we will explore what traces of this era can still be found around Kyrenia. As we repeatedly discover, this island still has several such silent societies to tell their stories.

All our love, Samira & Marten

Sources and further information

Medelhavsmuseet: Cyprus - 7,000 years of history - Scope and presentation of the Stockholm collection, cultural connections of Cyprus.

Lund University: The archaeological collection of Ayia Irini, Cyprus - Dating, character of the sanctuary and digital merging of the collection.

Uppsala University: The Swedish Cyprus Expedition - Einar Gjerstad and the leadership of the expedition.

Louvre: Chypre au Louvre (11.02.-22.06.2026) - Exhibition with two votive statues from Agia Irini as part of the Cypriot EU Council Presidency 2026.

TALA Community News: Travelogue - Agia Irini village - current accessibility of the archaeological site in the military exclusion zone.

Land 2018: Extra-Urban and Rural Sanctuaries in Ancient Cyprus - scientific classification of ritual, ceramics, centrality and imagery of Agia Irinis.

The Cyprus Museum - Visitor's Guide - Classification of the finds in the Cyprus Museum in Nicosia.

Department of Antiquities Cyprus: Historical Background - History of the law on antiquities and the abolition of the division of finds in 1964.

Northern Cyprus in a nutshell - Agia Irini

Kyprios Character: Collections of Cypriote Antiquities in Foreign Museums - Shipping and distribution of the finds of the Swedish expedition.

UNESCO: Mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor - factual distinction from the Chinese Terracotta Army.

Phoebe A. Hearst Museum: The Etruscan Collection - Comparison with a large Etruscan votive deposit from Caere.

Journal of Greek Archaeology: Terracotta Figurines from the Temple of Aphaia on Aegina - Comparison with Greek votive figures.