Corfu

The Pontikonisi (‘Mouse Island’), which is connected to mainland Corfu by a causeway. According to legend, the island was formed when Odysseus' ship was turned to stone by Poseidon, god of the sea.

Northernmost and second largest of the Ionian islands of Greece, off the coast of Epirus in the Ionian Sea; area 1,072 sq km/414 sq mi; population (2003 est) 115,200. Its businesses include tourism, fruit, olive oil, and textiles; livestock raising and fishing are important sources of livelihood. Its largest town is the port of Corfu (Kérkyra), population (2003 est) 36,900. Corfu was colonized by the Corinthians about 700 BC. Venice held it 1386–1797, and Britain 1815–64.

Identified with Scheria, the island of the Phaeacians in Homer's Odyssey, Corfu was settled by Corinthian colonists c. 730 BC. It passed under Roman rule in 229 BC, and in AD 336 became part of the Byzantine Empire. Held by a series of foreign powers, most notably for over four centuries by the Venetian republic, Corfu was ceded to Greece by the British in 1864. It was occupied by the French in World War I. In 1923, after Italian officers trying to establish the Greek-Albanian border were slain in Greece, Corfu was bombarded and temporarily occupied in retaliation by Italian forces.