Towers and castles at Butrint
On the shore of Butrint, just opposite the Triangular Fortress, stands a solitary two-storey square blockhouse of impressive proportions with elegantly battered sides. It seems abundantly clear that the tower was designed to work in tandem with the Triangular Fortress on the opposing bank in protecting the valuable fish weirs. It survives today to its full height and is entered by a steep staircase and drawbridge at first floor level. The structure gains its strength from its base being internally divided by thick walls into four sections, each filled with rocks and soil. The batter is designed to absorb the impact of projectiles.
Within the tower a vaulted ceiling supports the upper floor; the second storey was accessed via a timber spiral staircase. Narrow, brick-lined musket ports are present on all four sides of the tower with larger openings for cannon on each floor on the south facing wall overlooking the Vivari Channel. A further opening on the east face was to admit the drawbridge chains that ran through a groove in the upper floor to a winding mechanism. A bolted door provided another layer of security behind the raised drawbridge.
Numerous similar towers, each the property of feudal landowners, though not associated with fishing, once stood in northern Corfu to guard the buildings and inhabitants from piratical attack; one survives on the coast opposite Butrint at Pandeleimon.
Late Venetian Butrint was protected by outlying watchtowers, one of which can be seen on a spur overlooking the Vivari Channel above the modern road. Both Butrint and Corfu are visible from this point and the tower therefore occupied an important signalling position as well as maintaining watch over navigation in the channel. The ruin is a sub-square structure, c. 3.0 x 2.50m, containing only one chamber and entered through a single doorway reached by ladder access from the south side. The walls survive up to c. 2m high.
A second tower was located on the Vrina Plain as shown in a painting by Edward Lear of 1863. Today, however, there is no trace of the building; in the early 1990s older residents of the village recalled the demolition of the remains of such a structure when the communist collective farm of Vrina was first built. This tower, referred to in accounts as the tower of Jaco or Jacco [Vrina], occupied a pivotal position in a battle between the French general Chabot and the forces of the Ottoman despot Ali Pasha in 1798, when one hundred Turco-Albanians were ensconced in the tower with many more concealed in the surrounding hills. The French lost over 50 troops in the encounter, and after having initially retreated to the Triangular Fortress, evacuated the fort for Corfu. With this act, and the seizure of the territory by Ottoman forces, so ended the Venetian enclave at Butrint.
- The Venetian Tower
- The stairs and drawbridge of the Venetian Tower
- The Watch Tower along the Vivari Channel
- View of the Vrina Plain including the Tower of Jaco, by Edward Lear