Museum of Archaeology and Natural History / Guzelyurt (2)
The Guzelyurt museum is situated in the former ecclesiastical residence adjacent to the Church of St. Mamas. There is a small car park and it is within walking distance of the town centre.
The Natural History section is on the ground floor and it contains a motley collection of specimens that ranges from samples of the rocks that comprise the island of Cyprus, through to snakes and lizards preserved in formaldehyde, stuffed birds, and strange aberrations of nature, that includes a two headed lamb.
The upper floor contains the archaeological museum and is well laid out in a series of numbered rooms, with the artefacts in Room I, at the start of the exhibition, dating from the Stone Age. One of the rooms is almost exclusively dedicated to the artefacts found at the Bronze Age site of Toumba tou Skoura* and in Room V there are some exquisite pieces of gold jewellery. Not to be missed is the “Golden Treasure of Soli”, a fabulous hoard of bracelets, rings, necklaces and a gold wreath found in 2005 by the water department, in a drain behind the theatre at Soli. Comprising work that is so fine it looks as if it is a recent creation by a master-craftsman using the latest tools and technology, yet it dates from the Classical and Hellenistic period 5th to 4th C BC. The display also contains photographs of the serendipitous discovery.
