Лоренс Даррелл - Prospero's Cell

1571 Don Juan of Austria wins victory of Lepanto over Turks.

1,50 °Corfiot sailors in the battle.

1577-9 Town-walls built.

l716 Second great Turkish siege; 33,000 Turks land at Gouvia and Ypso. Repulsed before the town with great slaughter by John Schulemberg, an Austrian general in Venetian employ.

1797 Corfu with Ionian islands taken by French.

1799 French driven out by mixed Russo-Turkish force.

1807 Corfu returned to French by Treaty of Tilsit.

1814 Ionian Islands taken over by British.

1864 Corfu ceded to Greece.

1923 Shelled and occupied by Italians for two months.

1940 Italian attack on Greece. Corfu used as target ground for Italian Air Force. Town almost completely destroyed.

1941 April. Entry of Germans into Athens.

1944 Battle between Germans and Italian for possession of island. Latest reports indicate starvation rife; town badly damaged; Jews deported; but Church of St. Spiridion still standing. 'During the worst put of the shelling, when the inhabitants were ordered to take refuge in the stoutly built Italian school, a very large number preferred to trust in the Saint, and his Church was crowded with worshippers, who to-day claim yet another miracle; for while the Italian school and other refuges like it were hit repeatedly and demolished, the Church of St. Spiridion was untouched and those in it emerged unscathed. To-day it is still proudly standing (December 1945).'

PLACES TO SEE

Canoni, Gastouri, Paleocastrizza, Pantocratoras, Benitza.

THINGS TO VISIT

Churches of St. Spiridion and St. Theodora (the Cathedral). Monasteries of Myrtiotissa, Paleocastrizza, Pantocratoras. Byzantine Church of St. Jason and Sosipater. Library of Venetian MSS. and rare first editions. Mother of Gorgons — beautiful stone relief in Museum. Two old forts.

FOR SURREALISTS

The Achilleion. A monstrous building surrounded by gimcracksculptures and lovely gardens belonging to the late Kaiser.

The Theatre. Shadowing the final end of the Italian operatic sense.

FOR HUNTERS

Two brackish lakes, one in the north of the island and one in the south, called respectively Antiniotissa and Korissia.

DRINKS TO TRY

Ouzo ([Greek]). Aniseed drink, taken with water. Resembling Arabic zibib and French pernod. Fairly strong intoxicant.

Raki ([Greek]). Distilled fiom raisins. Alcoholic.

Salepi ([Greek]). Tea made from bulbs. Excellent. Swamp orchis provides the bulbs.

Retsina ([Greek]). Resinated wine. Turpentine flavour. Very good with meals but not for solitary drinking or parties.

Mastika ([Greek]). Mastic liquor.

DISHES TO EXPERIMENT WITH

Whitebait fried with lemon. Ask for 'Marides', ([Greek]).

Pipe fish fried with rice. Ask for 'Vellanida' ([Greek]).

Cuttle fish with sauce. Ask for 'soupya' ([Greek]).

Octopus with sauce. Ask for 'Ochtapodi' ([Greek]).

Meat or mince cooked in vine leaves. Ask for 'Dolmades' ([Greek]).

Ionian Meat Balls, highly spiced. Ask for 'Kephtaydes' ([Greek])

Macaroni Pie. Ask for 'Pastischada' ([Greek]).

Red Mullet grilled. Ask for 'Barbouni' ([Greek]).

Fried Egg-plant. Ask for 'Melitzanes' ([Greek]).

Spitted meat. Delicious. Ask for 'Souvlakhia' ([Greek]).

Ionian Welsh Rarebit. Ask for 'Saganaki' ([Greek]).

Roasted Pinna shells.

Sole. Ask for 'Glosa' ([Greek]).

(Crayfish is called Astacos ('[Greek]').

SWEETS TO TRY

Sesame sweet. White flaky blocks made from sesame, honey, and crushed almonds. Ask for 'Halva' ([Greek]).

Yaourti. A sort of junket of curdled milk sprinkled with cinnamon ([Greek]).

Waffles. Ball-shaped waffles of flour with honey. Ask for 'Loukoumades' ([Greek]).

Zante nougat. Sweetmeat called mandolato.

Pasteli. An ordinary nougat.

Other sweetmeats: Trigono, Kadalfi, Baklava, Galactobouri.

BEST VILLAGE FESTIVALS

Gastouri; Kastellani; Analypsis; Pantocratoras; Kassopi.

BEST LOCAL WINES ON THE MARKET

Provata red and white; Lavranos red; Theotoki white wine.

Excellent private cellars can be breached at Aphra, Lakones, and Ypso.

Brief Bibliography in English

Henry Jervis White-Jervis, History of the island of Corfu and of the Republic of the Ionian Islands.

S. Atkinson, An Artist in Corfu (1911).

Viscount Kirkwall, 'Four Years in the Ionian'.

William Goodisson, A.B., A historical and topographical Essay upon the islands of Corfu, etc. (1822).

D. T. Anstead, The Ionian Islands (1863).