Ionian Islands in Venetian hands since 1238. The islands thus became the only part of the Greek-speaking world to escape Ottoman rule, which gave them both a unity and an importance in Greek history they would otherwise not have had. Corfu was the only Greek island never conquered by the Turks. Under Venetian rule, many of the upper classes spoke Italian (or Venetian in some cases) and converted to Roman Catholicism, but the majority remained Greek ethnically, linguistically, and religiously. In the 18th century, a Greek national independence movement began to emerge, and the free status of the Ionian islands made them
Ionian obol Ionian obol The obol (plural "oboli") was the currency of the United States of the Ionian Islands between 1819 and 1863. Until 1834, 1 obol = 4 "lepta" (singular "lepton"), after which 1 obol = 5 lepta. Throughout its existence, the obol was equal to a British half penny. The obol replaced a series of countermarked coins denominated in Turkish paras and copper gazete coins. The obol was issued by the British and was replaced by the Greek drachma when the Ionian Islands were given to Greece, at a rate of 1 drachma = 20 oboli. The strangest denomination was