According to tradition, the village Choletria
has a life of about 500 years. The "Agia Eirene" (St.
Irene) venue was the first area where Choletria was established
in very old times, which is located very close to today's village.
A half-ruined, small church, the rubbles of some houses, and
an olive-press are still extant today in this venue.
The main reason for abandoning the "Agia Eirene" venue
was that it was placed upon a barrow across from the sea, that
being a great disadvantage in that era; the Saracens and other
aggressors easily spotted the village and -by disembarking
in the shores -they made attacks and pillaged.
Then, for reasons of greater security, the inhabitants were
compelled to move to another place -today being called "old
village" - inside the "Xeros" valley, protected
by the surrounding mountains and having plenty of water and
fertile ground.
The village, having being built at the foothills of the two
mountains and at the banks of the Xeros River, resembled a
great "choletra" (waterspout) because of the fissure
and the form of the ground. It is believed that the community
took its name due to this particularity of the area.
The village's first inhabitants were all stockbreeders. Slowly-slowly
they also started dealing with agriculture.
On the 10th of September, 1953, a powerful earthquake shook
the district of Pafos and -as a result -many villages were
destroyed; Choletria sustained substantial damages. In spite
of the inhabitant's efforts to relocate the village in a new
area, the colonial government did not show a proportional interest.
Some repairs were done to houses that were damaged and a few
shanties were built replacing the ruined houses -and life went
on. This however led to the gradual abandonment of the community.
The winter that came in 1967 hard. The repeated and heavy
rainfall caused large-scale landslides that were dangerous
for the lives of the inhabitants. The winter of 1968-69 was
equally heavy and the situation worsened. There were several
cases of houses that collapsed because of the landslides and
the need to move the village was by then urgent. The village's
inhabitants exerted pressure on the -then -government and all
those that could provide some solution for the problems they
were dealing with. They even went to Archbishop Makarios -the
President of the Republic at the time -who gave his promise
for the transfer of the village.
The operations for transferring Choletria started on the 10th
of March, 1971. However, they stopped in the sorrowful July
of 1974, beginning again on the 18th of August 1974. The operations
continued intensely and on the 11th of January, 1975, the first
family settled in the new village, to be followed by other
families. On the 17th of July, 1975, the new village was supplied
with electrical power and by the end of the same year all the
families resettled in the new village.
The village stands 22 kilometres east of Pafos and it is built
at an average altitude of 150 meters, receiving an average
annual rainfall of about 480 millimetres; vines of wine-making
varieties, cereals, olive trees, carobs, and citrus trees are
cultivated in its region. Choletria is connected via road to
the villages Nata and Anarita in the west and from there on
to Pafos, to Nikokleia and Timi in the south, and to the villages
Stavrokonnou and Kelokedara in the north.
During its long history the community has gone through several
fluctuations of its population. In 1881 its inhabitants were
103, increasing to 149 in 1901, to 235 in 1921, to 313 in 1946,
and to 356 in 1960. Afterwards the village, like all of the
villages in the region, will be struck by the urban pull, resulting
in a decrease of its inhabitants to 226 in 1976 and to 257
in 1982. In the 2001 census the village's inhabitants numbered
241.
Choletria has unique natural beauties to offer to the visitor
during every season of the year. In the springtime the entire
region of the village is ridden with wild flowers, in the summertime
the deep yellow landscape of harvested fields lends another
strange beauty, the autumn with its cool breeze grants a note
of serenity and calmness, while in the winter you face Troodos
with snow upon its mountaintops and the fog that prevails there
providing a different taste of the exquisite Cypriot landscape.
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