Many towers were built to protect the island, such as the Kassiopi Tower.. Then Corfu came under Norman rule, followed by Venetians, who marked a prosperous period in the history of Corfu.

In 1267, Charles of Anjou, French King of Sicily, took the island and attempted to replace the existing Orthodox religion by the Catholic one. The Christian Orthodox were persecuted and all the church converted to Catholic churches. But the attempt of conversion fell and Corfu returned under Venetian rule in 1386. Corfu stayed under Venetian domination for a long period of four centuries during which a big amount of buildings, monuments, and other constructions were built becoming the symbols of Venetian architecture in Greece.

Many insurrections were exploding because of the exploitation of the nobles, but those insurrections were severely repressed. Napoleon Bonaparte conquered Venice and, in 1797, Corfu became part of the French State. Napoleon came as a liberator and publicly burnt the Libro d’Oro (Golden Book), which was the book enumerating the privileges of the Nobles. In 1799, the allied fleet of the Turks, the Russians, and the English disembarked on the island of Corfu. After killing the inhabitants of Mandouki in the port, they conquered the entire island.

The Ionian State was established from Constantinople in order to create the Septinsular Republic but this attempt failed and, in 1807, Corfu returned under French domination. The period that followed was a period of prosperity with many agricultural and social improvements. It was then that the Ionian Academy was founded, public services were reorganized and schools were built.