“In the Congress held at Berlin in 1878 to settle the final peace terms, Turkey ceded the island of Cyprus to Great Britain, and this gave us Cyprus Avenue, Gardens, Park, and Street”. "Empire Battle Memories" John J Marshall, Belfast Telegraph - Friday 07 March 1941.
"Cyprus Avenue" is familiar to many beyond Belfast as the title of a song by Van Morrison from his 1968 album "Astral Weeks". In August 2015 he gave two open-air concerts in Cyprus Avenue to mark his 70th birthday. Oddly, he did not sing "Cyprus Avenue" in either show, although he did sing "On Hyndford Street", which namechecks Cyprus Avenue, along with numerous other streets and landmarks of East Belfast, which Morrison knows from his childhood.
"That the names Cyprus Avenue, Cyprus Park, Cyprus Gardens, Sunbury Avenue, Sandford Avenue and Kirkliston Drive be adopted for the Streets hitherto known thereby on property off North Road and Beersbridge Road in the added area and that the Works Committee be requested to erect Street signs in the places indicated by the Surveyor" (Improvement Committee, 16th April 1901).