Kassiopi Castle

Kassiopi Castle occupies the northeastern coast of Corfu, looking across the Corfu Channel towards the mainland. It was one of three Byzantine fortresses that guarded the island before Venetian rule, completing a defensive triangle with Gardiki in the south and Angelokastro in the northwest. Its origins are uncertain but appear to be Byzantine, probably dating to the sixth century under Emperor Mauricius. The castle saw limited action: Count Bohemund of Taranto took it in 1081 during the first Norman invasion, and Alexios I Komnenos recovered it in 1084 after naval battles in the channel. The Angevins held it from 1267, and when the Venetians arrived in 1386, local resistance led them to order its destruction. It was only after the second great siege of Corfu in 1716 that the Venetians rebuilt it, though by then the population had dispersed to the highlands of Mount Pantokrator.

The perimeter runs 1.073 kilometres in a quadrilateral shape, with nineteen alternating circular and rectangular towers. The interior, some 35,177 square metres, is empty of structures and given over to olive trees. The main gate survives, flanked by two two-storey towers, with a forewall that may have held an iron securing mechanism. The vertical walls, nearly two metres thick at the gate, were designed against pre-artillery siege engines. The rectangular towers predate the cylindrical ones, a sign of this fortress's provincial and secondary status.