Place names in Cyprus: English, Greek and Turkish side by side

By Talk Cyprus. Published 19 October 2026.

Last verified 19 October 2026

Almost every town in Cyprus has a Greek name and a Turkish name, and the bigger ones have an English name too. Kyrenia is Keryneia in Greek and Girne in Turkish. Limassol is Lemesos and Limasol. If you are reading a map, a bus timetable or a road sign, knowing all of them saves a lot of confusion.

This page explains where the different names come from, which ones you will actually see on each side of the island, and lists the main places in all three.

Why there are so many names

Greek and Turkish have both been spoken on the island for centuries, and many places have had a name in each language for as long as there are records. Ottoman land surveys from the 1830s already use Turkish forms such as Lefkoşa, Girne, Mağusa, Baf and Lapta. The English names, such as Nicosia, Kyrenia and Famagusta, come mostly from older European and Italian forms and became standard during British rule.

Other Turkish names are more recent. Turkish Cypriot authorities began giving or standardising Turkish names for many villages from 1958, and many more places in the north were renamed after 1974. Some new names came with the people who settled there: İskele (Trikomo) was named by Turkish Cypriots who moved north from Skala, the old port district of Larnaca, which is called İskele in Turkish. Famagusta’s everyday Turkish name, Mağusa, is centuries old, but the official form Gazimağusa dates from 1975.

The Republic of Cyprus has standardised its own official Greek spellings, which is why you will see Lefkosia, Lemesos, Larnaka and Pafos on signs in the south rather than the English forms. It recognises only the original names for places in the north and does not accept names introduced there after 1974. The authorities in the north use the Turkish names officially.

What you will see on the ground

In the south, road signs are in Greek and English, using the Republic’s official spellings, so Paphos appears as Pafos and Limassol as Lemesos.

In the north, road signs use the Turkish names, often with an English name alongside for the main towns. Smaller villages are usually signposted in Turkish only. Online maps generally follow the names in use locally, so in the north they mostly show the Turkish names.

If you are driving in the north, it is the Turkish names you need to know.

How Talk Cyprus uses names

We follow the same rules on both sides of the island. Where a place has an English name that visitors recognise, we use it, and give the Greek and Turkish names in brackets the first time it appears. Where there is no English name in common use, we lead with the name on the road signs and give the other in brackets. Nicosia is two areas in practice, so we write North Nicosia and South Nicosia. The full reasoning is in our editorial policy. Using a name to help you find a place is not a view on who has the right to name it.

North of the Green Line

On the ground in the north, Güzelyurt, İskele, Alsancak, Esentepe, Boğaz and Bafra are the names on the signs, and they are the names we lead with on this site.

South of the Green Line

Kokkina is a small coastal enclave in the north west, administered from the north but surrounded by the south. Pyla is a village inside the UN buffer zone where Greek and Turkish Cypriots still live side by side.

Spellings to watch for

The same Greek name can be written in Latin letters in several ways, which trips up searches and satnavs. Agia Napa and Ayia Napa are the same place, as are Larnaka and Larnaca, Pafos and Paphos, and Keryneia and Kyrenia. Turkish names use letters English does not, such as ş, ğ, ç, ı and İ, and online maps usually find them without the accents too, so Gazimagusa and Iskele will both work.

If you spot a name we have got wrong, or one we should add, tell us.