Genoese tower

As the Genoese distributed on the coast of Corsica round towers are referred to, which were built from the mid-16th century by the Genoese against the North African Muslim pirates. They added a number of previously established by the Pisans square towers.

Of the total of 150 buildings that made up the Torregiana, are on the coasts of Corsica today, 67 The individual towers had with each line of sight, the crews agreed by optical signals. The tower at Pointe mortella resistance in 1794 for three days of siege by the British Navy before the 38 -strong crew had to surrender. The surprisingly successful defense of the tower was the model for the construction of similar buildings on Guernsey, Menorca, Orkney, in England, Ireland, Canada and South Africa, which was built under the name mutated Martello towers to 1814 the British government.

In France, the model was acquired at the end of the 18th century and for the development of a comprehensive network for purposes of optical telegraphy used ( Chappe telegraph ).

Probably the most famous tower in the English variant of Genoese towers built in 1804 is the Martello tower in Sandycove, Dun Laoghaire in Dublin, where James Joyce lived for a week in 1904, which is described in the first chapter of Ulysses. The tower now houses a Joyce Museum.