The Paphos lighthouse has served as a landmark for ships for 138 years

The Paphos lighthouse on the western edge of Kato Paphos has been operating for 138 years and remains an active navigational aid. The stone tower, about 20 m high, rises above the coast next to the harbour and Paphos Castle, serving as a landmark both for passing ships and for the tens of thousands of tourists who visit the Kato Paphos Archaeological Park every year.

Before the British arrived in Cyprus in 1878, sailors were warned of coastal dangers by bonfires. “The only way to warn ships of danger was to burn wood and keep fires burning all night at all the strategic points around the island,” said Theofano Markou, an employee of the port authority. Wind and rain put out the fires precisely when they were needed most.

The British administration brought its own lighthouse service practices to the island, and in 1888 the first organised lighthouse in Cyprus was built in Paphos. “This is the largest and most iconic lighthouse in Cyprus; there is nothing else on the island of this scale or with this architecture,” said Efstathios Raptou, a senior scientific officer at the Department of Antiquities.

For decades, the lighthouse was maintained by keepers. They lived with their families in auxiliary houses beside the tower and monitored the mechanism around the clock, cleaned the mirrors and supplied acetylene or oil. In 1982, the lighthouse was converted to an automatic electronic system, and the keepers left it for good.

The tower itself dates from the British colonial period, but it stands on a site known as the acropolis of Ancient Paphos. The Department of Antiquities restored the auxiliary buildings, landscaped the area and laid paths for visitors. During the work, archaeologists found a reservoir, a pebble floor and a channel from an ancient water-supply system, while the pottery discovered there dates from the early Roman period, the 1st–2nd centuries AD.

The entire area has been on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 1980. The lighthouse remains both an active navigational aid and part of an open-air museum next to the popular Lighthouse beach.