St. Mary of Carmel Church, Famagusta

The St. Mary of Carmel church is situated in the northwest corner of the medieval walled city of Famagusta, on the east shore of Cyprus. The church is built within an area fortified by an arrow-shaped bastion (Martinengo Bastion – Tophane), at close vicinity to other important religious monuments (St. Mary Church of the Armenians, Tanner’s Mosque and St. Anne Church of the Maronites). It is a Gothic style stone masonry structure. The main building material used in the construction of the monument is a local porous calcarenite rock with the following properties:

• Apparent Density (EN 1936): 1690 kg/m³
• Open Porosity (EN 1936): 35%
• Compressive Strength (EN 1926): 3.5-4.0 MPa 

The aforementioned tests for the characterization of the monument's stone were carried out in 2016, in the framework of a combined laboratory and in situ investigation that was conducted to determine the physico-mechanical properties of the building materials of the Martinengo Cluster Churches in Famagusta, Cyprus. Sampling and testing was assigned to the Building Materials and LEDRA Laboratories of the University of Cyprus by the United Nations Development Programme – Partnership for the Future, which is funded by the European Union.