Governorate of Dalmatia Dalmazia veneziana | |||||||||
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Province of the Republic of Venice | |||||||||
(1000) 1409–1797 | |||||||||
Capital | Zadar | ||||||||
Demonym | Dalmatian | ||||||||
• Type | Governorate | ||||||||
History | |||||||||
• Established | (1000) 1409 | ||||||||
• Disestablished | 1797 | ||||||||
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Today part of | Croatia |
Venetian Dalmatia (Latin : Dalmatia Veneta) refers to parts of Dalmatia under the rule of the Republic of Venice, mainly from the 15th to the 18th centuries. [1] Dalmatia was first sold to Venice in 1409 but Venetian Dalmatia was not fully consolidated until 1420. It lasted until 1797, when the Republic of Venice fell to the forces of Napoleon Bonaparte and Habsburg Austria.
The Republic of Venice had possessions in the Balkans and in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, including Venetian Albania in the Adriatic Sea and the Venetian Ionian Islands in western Greece. Its possessions in Dalmatia stretched from the Istria peninsula to what is today coastal Montenegro: they included all the Dalmatian islands and the mainland territories from the central Velebit mountains to the northern borders of the Republic of Ragusa. With the 1718 Treaty of Passarowitz, Venice enlarged its possessions in Dalmatia to their greatest extent: it made some small advances, taking the areas of Sinj, Imotski and Vrgorac in the Dalmatian hinterland. [2]
Conflicts between Venetians and Croats, as well as other Slavic nations or tribes on the Adriatic coast, including Narentines, began very early, in the 7th and 8th century, because the Venetians demanded free passage for their merchant galleys and did not want to pay taxes. By the mid-9th century was formed Byzantine theme of Dalmatia limited to the islands and coastal cities of the Dalmatian city-states, hence, the medieval region of Dalmatia was a wide and long sea area of Eastern Adriatic, but with a very narrow coastline land area. Nearby the coastline and in its hinterland the control and influence was in the hands of Slavs, mostly Croatian dukes and kings who had royal courts at Klis, Bijaći near Trogir, [3] Knin, Nin, [4] and Biograd na Moru among others. [5]
Beginning with Doge Pietro II Orseolo, who ruled Venice from 991 AD, Venetian attention towards mainland Veneto was definitely overshadowed by a strong push towards the control of the Adriatic Sea. Inner strife was pacified, and trade with the Byzantine Empire boosted by the favourable treaty (Grisobolus or Golden Bull) with Emperor Basil II. The imperial edict granted Venetian traders freedom from the Kommerkion tax paid by other foreigners and the Byzantines themselves. In 1000 AD an expedition of Venetian ships in coastal Istria and Dalmatia secured Venetian suzerainty in the area, and the Narentine pirates were suppressed permanently. On this occasion Doge Orseolo named himself "Duke of Dalmatia", starting the colonial empire of Venice. He was also responsible of the establishment of the famous "Marriage of the Sea" ceremony. At this time Venice had a firm control over the Adriatic Sea, strengthened by the expedition of Pietro's son Ottone in 1017. From the 1030s however, after the fall of Doge Otto Orseolo, Croatian kings Stjepan I and his son Petar Krešimir IV succeeded in taking almost the whole coast back, so the latter carried the title King od Croatia and Dalmatia.
During the 1074 invasion of the Normans died Petar Krešimir IV, and in February 1075 the Venetians banished the Normans and secured the Dalmatian cities for themselves. The doge Domenico Selvo self-titled himself as the doge of "Venice, Dalmatia and Croatia" (later only of "Dalmatia"), but did not have nominal power over Dalmatia and Croatia. In October 1075 was crowned Demetrius Zvonimir as the king of "Croatia and Dalmatia" by the Holy See and his power was felt even on the islands of Krk and Cres. His death in 1089 caused succession crisis in Croatia and Dalmatia, but although doge Vitale I Michiel made with Coloman, King of Hungary agreement of 1098—the so-called Conventio Amicitiae—determined the spheres of interest of each party by allotting the coastal regions of Croatia to Hungary and Dalmatia to the Republic of Venice, Coloman in 1105 successfully conquered coastal cities of Dalmatia. [6] [7]
During the 12th century, after Croatia entered a personal union with the Kingdom of Hungary, kings Coloman and Béla II managed to return a considerable territory of Dalmatia and Croatian Littoral to their kingdom, but occasional conflicts almost never ceased. The creation of Venice's overseas empire began with the conquest of Dalmatia and reached its greatest nominal extent at the conclusion of the Fourth Crusade in 1204, with the declaration of the acquisition of three octaves of the Byzantine Empire. [8] Venice with the help of crusaders captured Zadar in 1202. In 1203, Pope Innocent III excommunicated the entire crusading army, along with the Venetians, for taking part in the attack. After wintering in Zadar, the Fourth Crusade continued its campaign, which led to the siege of Constantinople. [9] Hungarian king Louis the Great launched a large campaign in 1356–1358 and forced Venice to withdraw from Dalmatia. Zadar Peace Treaty was signed on 18 February 1358 and Venice lost influence over whole coast from eastern Istria to southern Dalmatia.
In 1409, during the 20-year Hungarian civil war between King Sigismund and the Neapolitan House of Anjou, the losing contender, Ladislaus of Naples, sold his rights on Dalmatia to the Venetian Republic for a meager sum of 100,000 ducats. Sigismund tried to recover the territory but Venice defeated his troops in the Battle of Motta (1412). Croatian Littoral and eastern Istria remained parts of Croatia, where Croats, together with their allies, rejected Venetian efforts to subject them. The more centralized merchant republic took control of the coastal cities by 1420 (with the exception of the Republic of Ragusa); they were to remain under Venetian rule for a period of 377 years (1420–1797). [10] The southernmost area of Dalmatia (now part of coastal Montenegro) was called Venetian Albania during that time.
In the period between the start of the Ottoman–Venetian War (1499–1503) and the end of Ottoman–Venetian War (1537–40), the Ottoman Empire made significant advances in the Dalmatian hinterland - it did not occupy the Venetian cities, but it took the Croatian possessions between Skradin and Obrovac (forming Croatian vilayet and then Sanjak of Klis), eliminating them as a buffer zone between the Ottoman and Venetian territory. [11] Venetians still perceived this inner hinterland as once part of Croatia calling it as "Banadego" (lands of Ban i.e. Banate). [12] The economy of the Venetian cities in Dalmatia, severely impacted by the Turkish occupation of the hinterland in the previous war, recovered and held steady even throughout this war. [13]
The Uskok War was fought by the Austrians, Slovenes, Croats, and Spanish on one side and the Venetians, Dutch, and English on the other. It is named for the Uskoks, soldiers from Croatia used by the Austrians for irregular warfare. Since the Uskoks were checked on land and were rarely paid their annual salary, they resorted to piracy. In addition to attacking Turkish ships, they attacked Venetian merchantmen. The conflict began in January 1616 in the Gorizia Hills and lasted until 1617. The Treaty of Peace (now known as the Preliminary Treaty of Paris and the Treaty of Madrid) resolved that pirates would be driven from the maritime areas of the House of Habsburg. The Venetians returned to Austrians all the places occupied by them in Istria and Friuli.
The Dalmatian front was a separate theater of operations, which was involved in the early phase of the war. The conditions there were almost reverse to those in Crete: for the Ottomans, it was too far away and relatively insignificant, while the Venetians operated near their own bases of supply and had undisputed control of the sea, being thus able to easily reinforce their coastal strongholds. [14] The Ottomans launched a large-scale attack in 1646, and made some significant gains, including the capture of the islands of Krk, Pag and Cres, [15] and most importantly, the supposedly impregnable fortress of Novigrad, which surrendered on 4 July, after only two days of bombardment. [16] The Turks were now able to threaten the two main Venetian strongholds in Dalmatia, Zadar and Split. [17] In the next year however, the tide turned, as the Venetian commander Leonardo Foscolo seized several forts, retook Novigrad, temporarily captured the fortress of Knin and took Klis, [18] [19] while a month-long siege of the fortress of Šibenik by the Ottomans in August and September failed. [20] During the next few years, military operations stalled because of an outbreak of famine and plague amongst the Venetians at Zadar, while both sides focused their resources in the Aegean area. [21] As other fronts took priority for the Ottomans, no further operations occurred in the Dalmatian theater. [22] Peace in 1669 found the Republic of Venice with significant gains in Dalmatia, its territory tripled, and its control of the Adriatic thus secured. [23]
In October 1683, the population of Venetian Dalmatia, principally Uskoks of Ravni Kotari, took arms and together with the rayah (lower class) of the Ottoman frontier regions rose up, taking Skradin, Karin, Vrana, Benkovac and Obrovac. [24]
In the Morean War, the Republic of Venice besieged Sinj in October 1684 and then again March and April 1685, but both times without success. [25] In the 1685 attempt, the Venetian armies were aided by the local militia of the Republic of Poljica, who thereby rebelled against their nominal Ottoman suzerainty that had existed since 1513. [25] In an effort to retaliate to Poljica, in June 1685, the Ottomans attacked Zadvarje, and in July 1686 Dolac and Srijane, but were pushed back, and suffered major casualties. [26] With the help of the local population of Poljica as well as the Morlachs, the fortress of Sinj finally fell to the Venetian army on 30 September 1686. [27] On 1 September 1687 the siege of Herceg Novi started, and ended with a Venetian victory on 30 September. [28] Knin was taken after a twelve-day siege on 11 September 1688. [29] The capture of the Knin Fortress marked the end of the successful Venetian campaign to expand their territory in inland Dalmatia, and it also determined much of the final border between Dalmatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina that stands today. [29] The Ottomans would besiege Sinj again in the Second Morean War, but would be repelled.
On 26 November 1690, Venice took Vrgorac, which opened the route towards Imotski and Mostar. [29] In 1694 they managed to take areas north of the Republic of Ragusa, namely Čitluk, Gabela, Zažablje, Trebinje, Popovo, Klobuk and Metković. [29] In the final peace treaty, Venice did relinquish the areas of Popovo polje as well as Klek and Sutorina, to maintain the pre-existing demarcation near Ragusa. [30]
The "Linea Mocenigo" [31] in 1718 Dalmatia was named after Sebastiano Mocenigo, one of the last famous Doges of Venice. Indeed, in Dalmatia -after the Treaty of Passarowitz- he obtained some small advances for Venice, taking the areas of Sinj and Imotski in the hinterland. That was the last enlargement of Venetian Dalmatia (that partially enjoyed the "Age of Enlightment" experienced by Venice) until the Napoleonic conquest in 1797. [32] However, Venetians lost Čitluk and Gabela to Ottomans according to this treaty.
In 1797 AD, during the Napoleonic Wars, the Republic of Venice was dissolved. Venetian Dalmatia was included in the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy from 1805 to 1809 AD (the Republic of Ragusa was included in 1808 AD), and later in the Illyrian Provinces from 1809 AD. After the final defeat of Napoleon, the entire territory was granted to the Austrian Empire by the Congress of Vienna in 1815, constituted as the Kingdom of Dalmatia. [33]
Dalmatia was inhabited by autochthonous Dalmatae Illyrians. The Roman–Dalmatae Wars lasted until 33 BC when Octavian installed Roman hegemony in Dalmatia. The defeat of the Great Illyrian Revolt began the integration of Dalmatia which in turn led to the romanization of the region by the early Middle Ages. The languages spoken by the Illyrian tribes are extinct. Dalmatian language evolved from the vulgar Latin of the Illyro-Romans. After the fall of the western Roman Empire Slavic-speaking people arrived in Dalmatia, circa 640 AD. The Slavic Croatian population spoke Chakavian and Shtokavian dialects of Serbo-Croatian language which is today called Croatian language. Romance population created Dalmatian city-states in the early Middle Ages. They had already become a minority in the Middle Ages after the year 1000 AD, living mostly in the coastal areas and with smaller pockets in the hinterland. Merchants and soldiers from Venice settled the Dalmatian cities over the following centuries, mixing with the already present Romance population. During the Venetian rule in Dalmatia Venetian language became the "lingua franca" of all Dalmatia, assimilating the Dalmatian language of the Romanised Illyrians and influencing partially both Croatian [34] and Albanian [35] language.
During Ottoman rule in the Ottoman Dalmatia hinterlands Orthodox and Catholic Slavic-speaking people started arriving as martolos in Ottoman service (also called as "Vlachs/Morlachs" which then was an umbrella term regardless of ethnic origin), [36] and after the Venetian takeover of most of the hinterland during the Great Turkish War the Croat population in the hinterlands was greatly reinforced by new Croat settlers fleeing from Ottoman Bosnia. Over time the Croats assimilated the Catholic Vlachs, while the Serbs assimilated the Orthodox ones. The Romance-speakers in the coastal areas were more resilient to assimilation (in great part due to their prestige status) and after the fall of the Republic, during the national movements of the 19th century, had mostly adopted an Italian national identity.
Dalmatian administration was in the hands of a few Venetian officials, who were headed by a governor (Provveditore generale), who changed every three years. The Venetian nobility competed for this service, because it was honorable and lucrative. The provveditore generale ruled like an independent ruler, having a court in Zadar, a splendid bodyguard and a suit resembling a doge. The power of the provveditore was unlimited, and he was also the last instance for the court, finances, army, even for the church. Venetian Dalmatia was divided into districts (distretto), headed by a prince (conte) appointed by the provveditore. The prince is flanked by two officials, the chancellor (chancelliere) for judicial affairs and the camerlingo for financial affairs. The small number of Venetian officials was poorly paid, so they were forced to take from collected taxes and other public duties to the detriment of the Venetian Republic. However, the taxes were not too high, because the Republic wanted to spread discontent in the hard-won Dalmatia. They were paid only by peasants, because nobles and citizens were exempted not only from all taxes, but also from all duties. Each city municipality had its own statute, so there is no uniqueness in Dalmatia. Likewise, weights and measures differed from place to place. The municipal administration was shared by nobles and citizens, who gathered for assemblies, where municipal affairs were discussed. In some municipalities, only the nobles met for assemblies, and in some the citizens also had their own assemblies. Civil and criminal affairs were handled by the city (municipal) prince, and police affairs were carried out by grand and petty judges. Peasants met in brotherhoods in gatherings, where they discussed their needs. Otherwise, in every village there was a leader called harambaša, who was in charge of civil and military affairs. During peacetime, the peasants formed some companies, and they were called cops. Their duty was to keep an eye on the movement of border Bosnian Turks, and to watch over security at home. At that time, each district had its own colonel, with serdars and serdars as lower officers. The islanders served only in the Venetian navy. The Italian language was spoken mainly in the cities, while Croatian was used in other areas.
The legacy of Venice in Dalmatia is huge and very important, mainly in the cultural and artistic area. Venice was one of the centers of the Italian Renaissance and Venetian Dalmatia enjoyed the benefits of this fact. From Giorgio da Sebenico to the influence on the early contemporary Croatian literature, Venice made its Dalmatia the most western-oriented civilized area of the Balkans, mostly in the cities.
Some architectural works from that period of Dalmatia are of European importance, and would contribute to further development of the Renaissance: the Cathedral of St James in Šibenik and the Chapel of Blessed John in Trogir.
Indeed, the Croatian renaissance, strongly influenced by Venetian and Italian literature, was thoroughly developed on the coastal parts of Croatia. The beginning of the Croatian 16th-century literal activity was marked by a Dalmatian humanist Marko Marulić and his epic book Judita , which was written by incorporating peculiar motives and events from the classical Bible, and adapting them to the contemporary literature in Europe. [37]
In 1997 the historical city-island of Trogir (called "Tragurium" in Latin when one of the Dalmatian city-states and "Traù" in Venetian) was inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage List. "The orthogonal street plan of this island...was embellished by successive rulers with many fine public and domestic buildings and fortifications. Its beautiful Romanesque churches are complemented by the outstanding Renaissance and Baroque buildings from the Venetian period", says the UNESCO report. Trogir is the best-preserved Romanesque-Gothic complex not only in the Adriatic, but in all of Central Europe. Trogir's medieval core, surrounded by walls, comprises a venetian well-preserved castle and tower (Kamerlengo Castle) and a series of dwellings and palaces from the Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque periods. Trogir's grandest building is the church of St. Lawrence, whose main west portal is a masterpiece by Radovan, and the most significant work of the Romanesque-Gothic style in Croatia.
The Encyclopædia Britannica, Eleventh Edition [38] states on page 774 "Antiquities" that:
"... from Italy (and Venice) came the Romanesque. The belfry of S. Maria, at Zara, erected in 1105, is first in a long list of Romanesque buildings. At Arbe there is a beautiful Romanesque campanile which also belongs to the 12th century; but the finest example in this style is the cathedral of Trau. The 14th century Dominican and Franciscan convents in Ragusa are also noteworthy. Romanesque lingered on in Dalmatia until it was displaced by Venetian Gothic in the early years of the 15th century. The influence of Venice was then at its height. Even in the relatively hostile Republic of Ragusa the Romanesque of the custom-house and Rectors' palace is combined with Venetian Gothic, while the graceful balconies and ogee windows of the Prijeki closely follow their Venetian models. In 1441 Giorgio Orsini of Zara, summoned from Venice to design the cathedral of Sebenico, brought with him the influence of the Italian Renaissance. The new forms which he introduced were eagerly imitated and developed by other architects, until the period of decadence - which virtually concludes the history of Dalmatian art - set in during the latter half of the 17th century. Special mention must be made of the carved woodwork, embroideries and plate preserved in many churches. The silver statuette and the reliquary of St. Biagio at Ragusa, and the silver ark of St. Simeon at Zara, are fine specimens of Italian jewelers' work, ranging in date from the 11th or 12th to the 17th century ...".
After the fall of the Republic of Venice in 1797 to the Napoleon Armies, the Dalmatia was incorporated briefly (1805-1809) in the "Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy". In those years the scholastic system was expanded to all the population (following the ideals of the French Revolution) and the Italian language was instituted as the official language in the schools of Dalmatia. In the 19th century, the cultural influence from Venice and the Italian peninsula originated the editing in Zadar of the first Dalmatian newspaper, in Italian and Croatian: Il Regio Dalmata – Kraglski Dalmatin ("The Royal Dalmatian"), founded and published by the Italian Bartolomeo Benincasa in 1806 AD. Furthermore, this Kraglski Dalmatin was stamped in the typography of Antonio Luigi Battara and was the first fully done in Croatian. The decision to launch a newspaper for Dalmatia was made by Napoleon himself, under the initially determined name Dalmata Veneto.
The Provveditore generale (Governor-general) was the official name of Venetian state officials supervising Dalmatia. [39] The Governors of Dalmatia were based in Zadar, while they were under direct supervision of the Provveditore Generale da Mar , who was based in Corfu and was directly controlled by the Signoria of Venice.
Main and most famous Venetian "Provveditori generali" (Governors-general) of Dalmatia:
Governor | Period | Notes |
---|---|---|
Alvise Badoer | 1538 – 1539 | During the Ottoman–Venetian War (1537–1540) |
Cristoforo Valier | 1595 – 1597 | "Sindico" with Francesco Erizzo |
Filippo Pasqualigo | 1599 – 1603 | |
Giustin Antonio Belegno | 1617 – 1622 | |
Leonardo Foscolo | 1645 – 1650 | Ancestor of Italian poet Ugo Foscolo |
Pietro Valier (fl. 1685) | October 1684 — May 1686 | |
Alvise Mocenigo III (1st time) | Dec 1696 – 1702 | He was Governor of Dalmatia and later Doge of Venice |
Alvise Mocenigo III (2nd time) | Apr 1717 – 1720 | The "Linea Moncenigo" in 1718 Dalmatia was named after him |
Alvise Foscari | 1777 – 1780 | |
Andrea Maria Querini | Sep 1795 – Jun 1797 | Last "Provveditore generale" of Dalmatia |
Dalmatia is one of the four historical regions of Croatia, alongside Central Croatia, Slavonia, and Istria, located on the east shore of the Adriatic Sea in Croatia.
Brač is a Croatian island in the Adriatic Sea, with an area of 396 square kilometres (153 sq mi), making it the largest island in Dalmatia, and the third largest in the Adriatic. It is separated from the mainland by the Brač Channel, which is 5 to 13 km wide. The island's tallest peak, Vidova gora, or Mount St. Vid, stands at 780 m (2,560 ft), making it the highest point of the Adriatic islands. The island has a population of 13,931, living in twenty-two settlements, ranging from the main town Supetar, with more than 3,400 inhabitants, to Murvica, where less than two dozen people live. Brač Airport on Brač is the largest airport of all islands surrounding Split.
Zadar is the oldest continuously inhabited city in Croatia. It is situated on the Adriatic Sea, at the northwestern part of Ravni Kotari region. Zadar serves as the seat of Zadar County and of the wider northern Dalmatian region. The city proper covers 25 km2 (9.7 sq mi) with a population of 75,082 in 2011, making it the second-largest city of the region of Dalmatia and the fifth-largest city in the country.
Split-Dalmatia County is a central-southern Dalmatian county in Croatia. The administrative center is Split. The population of the county is 455,242 (2011). The land area is 4.540 km2, the total area is 14.106,40 km2. Split-Dalmatia County is Croatia's most rapidly urbanising and developing region, as economic opportunities and living standards are among the highest alongside capital Zagreb and Istria County.
Morlachs has been an exonym used for a rural Christian community in Herzegovina, Lika and the Dalmatian Hinterland. The term was initially used for a bilingual Vlach pastoralist community in the mountains of Croatia from the second half of the 14th until the early 16th century. Then, when the community straddled the Venetian–Ottoman border until the 17th century, it referred only to the Slavic-speaking people of the Dalmatian Hinterland, Orthodox and Catholic, on both the Venetian and Turkish side. The exonym ceased to be used in an ethnic sense by the end of the 18th century, and came to be viewed as derogatory, but has been renewed as a social or cultural anthropological subject. As the nation-building of the 19th century proceeded, the Vlach/Morlach population residing with the Croats and Serbs of the Dalmatian Hinterland espoused either a Serb or Croat ethnic identity, but preserved some common sociocultural outlines.
The Kingdom of Dalmatia was a crown land of the Austrian Empire (1815–1867) and the Cisleithanian half of Austria-Hungary (1867–1918). It encompassed the entirety of the region of Dalmatia, with its capital at Zadar.
The History of Dalmatia concerns the history of the area that covers eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea and its inland regions, from the 2nd century BC up to the present day. The region was populated by Illyrian tribes around 1,000 B.C, including the Delmatae, who formed a kingdom and for whom the province is named. Later it was conquered by Rome, thus becoming the province of Dalmatia, part of the Roman Empire. Dalmatia was ravaged by barbaric tribes in the beginning of the 4th century.
The Republic of Ragusa was an aristocratic maritime republic centered on the city of Dubrovnik in South Dalmatia that carried that name from 1358 until 1808. It reached its commercial peak in the 15th and the 16th centuries, before being conquered by Napoleon's French Empire and formally annexed by the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy in 1808. It had a population of about 30,000 people, of whom 5,000 lived within the city walls. Its motto was "Non bene pro toto libertas venditur auro", a Latin phrase which can be translated as "Liberty is not well sold for all the gold".
Paul I Šubić of Bribir was Ban of Croatia between 1275 and 1312, and Lord of Bosnia from 1299 to 1312. As the oldest son of Stephen II of the Šubić noble family, he inherited the title of count of Bribir. He was appointed ban in 1273. He was relieved from duty in 1274, following his involvement in disputes between the Dalmatian coastal cities of Trogir and Split, and was returned to office in 1275.
The Treaty of Zadar, also known as the Treaty of Zara, was a peace treaty signed in Zadar, Dalmatia on February 18, 1358. Under the treaty, the Venetian Republic lost influence over its Dalmatian holdings in exchange for ending hostilities with Louis I of Hungary. Both had been contesting control of a series of territories along the eastern Adriatic coastline in what is now Croatia.
Dalmatian Italians are the historical Italian national minority living in the region of Dalmatia, now part of Croatia and Montenegro.
The Stato da Màr or Domini da Mar was the Republic of Venice's maritime and overseas possessions from around 1000 to 1797, including at various times parts of what are now Istria, Dalmatia, Montenegro, Albania, Greece and notably the Ionian Islands, Peloponnese, Crete, Cyclades, Euboea, as well as Cyprus.
Split, is the second-largest city of Croatia after the capital Zagreb, the largest city in Dalmatia and the largest city on the Croatian coast. It lies on the eastern shore of the Adriatic Sea and is spread over a central peninsula and its surroundings. An intraregional transport hub and popular tourist destination, the city is linked to the Adriatic islands and the Apennine Peninsula. More than 900,000 tourists visit Split each year.
The Narentines were a South Slavic tribe noted as pirates on the Adriatic Sea in the 9th and 10th centuries. They occupied an area of southern Dalmatia centered at the river Neretva. Named Narentani in Venetian sources, they were called Paganoi, "pagans", by the Greeks, as they were still pagan after the Christianization of the neighbouring tribes. They were fierce enemies of the Republic of Venice, attacking Venetian merchants and clergy traveling through the Adriatic, and even raiding close to Venice itself and defeating the doge several times. Venetian–Narentine peace treaties did not last long, as the Narentines quickly returned to piracy. They were finally defeated in a Venetian crackdown at the turn of the 10th century and disappeared from sources by the 11th century.
The Theme of Dalmatia was a Byzantine theme on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea in Southeastern Europe, headquartered at Jadera.
Italians of Croatia are an autochthonous historical national minority recognized by the Constitution of Croatia. As such, they elect a special representative to the Croatian Parliament. There is the Italian Union of Croatia and Slovenia, which is a Croatian-Slovenian joint organization with its main site in Rijeka, Croatia and its secondary site in Koper, Slovenia.
Dalmatian city-states were the Dalmatian localities where the local Romance population survived the Barbarian invasions after the fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 400s CE. Eight little cities were created by indigenous inhabitants who maintained political links with the Eastern Roman Empire which defended these cities, enabling their commercial trade.
The city of Split was founded as the Greek colony of Aspálathos (Aσπάλαθος) in the 3rd or 2nd century BC. It became a prominent settlement around 650 CE when it succeeded the ancient capital of the Roman province of Dalmatia, Salona. After the Sack of Salona by the Avars and Slavs, the fortified Palace of Diocletian was settled by the Roman refugees. Split became a Byzantine city, to later gradually drift into the sphere of the Republic of Venice and the Kingdom of Croatia, with the Byzantines retaining nominal suzerainty. For much of the High and Late Middle Ages, Split enjoyed autonomy as a free city, caught in the middle of a struggle between Venice and the King of Hungary for control over the Dalmatian city-states.
The Croatian–Venetian wars were a series of periodical, punctuated medieval conflicts and naval campaigns waged for control of the northeastern coast of the Adriatic Sea between the city-state of Venice and the Principality of Croatia, at times allied with neighbouring territories – the Principality of the Narentines and Zahumlje in the south and Istrian peninsula in the north. First struggles occurred at the very beginning of the existence of two conflict parties, they intensified in the 9th century, lessened during the 10th century, but intensified again since the beginning of the 11th century.
The Oltramarini or Schiavoni regiments comprised the overseas infantry of the Republic of Venice. They were a Dalmatian infantry corps organized within the Venetian navy as the elite infantry. They especially stood out in the wars against the Ottoman Empire throughout the Venetian overseas possessions, but also for their service in Terraferma, the Venetian possessions in the hinterland of Venice in northern Italy. In addition, they performed the duties of the bodyguard, first of the provveditore, and later as the personal guard of the Doge himself.
Становништво Млетачке Далмације, на првом месту Котарски ускоци, још у октобру 1683. дигло се на оружје заједно с ра- јом у пограничним крајевима Турске. Устаници су "сами заузели Скрадин, Карин, Врану, Бенковац и Обровац