Bellapais Abbey - "The Abbey of Beautiful Peace"

Bellapais Abbey, or "the Abbey of Beautiful Peace", is the ruin of a monastery built by Canons Regular in the 13th century on the northern side of the small village of Bellapais, now in Turkish-controlled Northern Cyprus, about five kilometers from the town of Kyrenia. The ruin is at an altitude of 220m above sea level, and commands a long view down to Kyrenia and the Mediterranean sea. The site of the Abbey may have served the Bishops of Kyrenia as a residence, and as a place of refuge from Arab raids in the 7th and 8th centuries. The first occupants known to have settled on or near the site were the Canons Regular of the Holy Sepulchre, who had fled Jerusalem after its fall in 1187 to Saladin. The canons had been the custodians of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Aimery de Lusignan founded the monastery, with the first buildings dating to between 1198-1205. The abbey was consecrated as the Abbey of St. Mary of the Mountain. The White Canons (Norbertines or Premonstratensians) succeeded the founding canons in 1206. Consequently, documents from the 15th and 16th century refer to Bellapais as the "White Abbey". Info:Wikipedia