Split, Split Croatia is the largest and most important city in Dalmatia, the administrative centre of Croatia's Split-Dalmatia county. It is situated on a small peninsula on the eastern shores of the Adriatic Sea, in the foothills of Kozjak and Mosor mountains. With a population of 200.000 it is the second largest city in Croatia.
The pretty city of Split has a rich history. Since ancient times it has, in various guises, served as the economic and administrative centre of the beautiful Croatian Adriatic coastal region, today called Dalmatia. The city sits mainly on a peninsula on the eastern part of the island of Ciovo, although it has nowadays spread onto the mainland and encompasses the mouth of the River Cetina. From the 5th to the 2nd century BC Greek colonists settled the mainland and adjacent islands. Later, came the Romans: in particular the Emperor Diocletian, who, being of Dalmatian origin, elected to build a huge palace at a spot then called Salona, in AD303. A town grew up around the palace, and eventually, by the Middle Ages, the city of Split had begun to develop. Diocletian’s Palace still stands in the very heart of the old part of Split, which charms visitors with its cobbled streets. The greater Split area is characterised by its lush vegetation and green areas, particularly Marjan Hill on the west of the peninsula with its ancient indigenous forest. The city makes an ideal base from which to explore the islands, beauty spots, and historic villages in central Dalmatia.
Transportation/ Arriving
By plane
The airport is located 20 kilometers from Split proper. For more information about this self proclaimed "most important airport at the eastern side of Adriatic Sea" visit the Split airport official website:
Split
Aerodrom - Split, 21120 Split, Kastelanska cesta 96, p.p. 2, Tel (021) 203 555, (021) 203 171, Fax: (021) 203 422, Croatian website www.split-airport.hr
Buses
The bus station (Obala Kneza Domagoja bb, tel. 33 84 83/33 84 86. Ticket windows: Open 06:00 - 22:30, Sun 07:00 - 21:30.) is located across the street from the ferry building and adjacent to the train station. Although small, the station is absolutely user-friendly and there is usually at least a few staff members who speak English on hand at all times. Toilets (Open 05:00 - 23:00.) are located to the right of the main ticket window and cost 3Kn. Left luggage (Open 06:00 - 22:00.) is located in front of Platform (Peron) N°3 and costs 2.50Kn/day or 15Kn/day. Currency exchanges are located across the street in the ferry building while the closest ATM is in front of the post office (Hrvatska Poðta) at Domagojeva obala 4. After you've procured some cash you can call mum and tell her how nice it is in Croatia by sauntering up to one of the many kiosks on Obala Kneza Domagoja and procuring a phone card. Most work from 05:00 - 23:00. Public telephones are generously sprinkled along the street. Getting to town is idiot-proof. With the entrance to the bus station behind you the old town will be to your right. Just follow the waterfront and you'll be in town in about six and a half minutes.
Boat / Ferries
The Split ferry building is a bit dishevelled but kind enough to the forlorn non-Croatian speaking foreigner. The main hall (Obala Kneza Domagoja bb, tel. 33 83 33. Local ferry ticket windows: Open 05:45 - 20:30. International and fast ferry ticket windows: Open 07:00 - 20:00.) can be claustrophobic and seemingly totally without order during the high season. Worry not, just push your way through the crowd until you find something resembling a line. Directly outside the main hall there is an automated currency exchange and ATM. To the right of the entrance are the toilets, which cost 3Kn. Café Adria (Tel. 34 76 98. Open 06:00 - 22:00.) is located in front of the ferry building should you want a coffee or light snack. Left luggage facilities, kiosks selling phone cards, and more fast food options are across the street at both the bus and train stations. Getting to town is simple. With the ferry building and the café behind you the old town is located about an eight-minute walk to your left along the waterfront.
Train
The train system in Croatia is far from developed. It is then only logical that the train station (Obala Kneza Domagoja 11, tel. 060 83 34 44. Ticket windows: Open 06:00 - 10:30, 11:00 - 17:00, 17:30 - 22:00.) would also a bit on the retarded side. You're best off checking the schedule in the main hall instead of asking at the information desk for information. They seem to not take their name literally. Following the Izlaz (Exit) signs from the tracks will lead you to the left of the main building. The left luggage facilities (Obala Kneza Domagoja 6. Open 06:30 - 10:30, 11:00 - 17:00, 17:30 - 21:30.) are located to the right of the main building. You must exit out onto the street first as the tracks and the left luggage area are separated by a fence. Storage costs 8Kn/hr or 18Kn/day. If you're feeling lonely, you can purchase a phone card at the kiosk in front of the station (Open 05:00 - 23:00) and call home. Public telephones are generously sprinkled along the street. Finding an ATM or currency exchange and getting to town are a simple process. See By bus station for more information.
By car
Crossing the Croatian border is relatively hassle-free if you have an EU, American or Canadian passport. driving along the narrow corridor that is their coastal highway isn't. Expect large busses to slow down traffic, cars passing on blind curves and absolutely beautiful scenery, which isn't hindered by a large shoulder.
Solin, Salona , Latin Salonae, ancient city of Dalmatia, 5 km North East of modern Split. The origin of the Croatian name Solin is in latinized name Salona, having root in the Illyirian language. In the history this name is first mentioned in the year 119 B.C. during the war between Illyrs and Romans. The time of foundation of this settlement is certainly much earlier. According to old Greek geographer Strabon Salona was the harbour of the Illyrian tribe Dalmati who probably were trading with the Greek seamen. The remains of the walls, objects of the Greek origin found in Salona and its neighbourhood revered to the Greeks as the founders of the town. Some writers take a possible time of foundation the 4th century before Christ. It is obviously that very early Salona had a strong Greek influence and for that first period of time it could be said that it was Greek-Illyrian settlement. In the 1st century B.C. Salona was conquisted by the Romans. In the civil war between Caesar and Pompey the inhabitants joined the Caesar's side and since he has won the town became a Roman colony with the honourable title 'Colonia Martia Julia Salona'. The town extended from the east to the west getting two new parts: besides the Greek-Illyrian older one, it got new Roman one both to the west and east. Thus from that time the writers used the plural form for the name of Solin - Salona.
When Illyric has been arranged as the Roman province, Salona became the cultural, political, commercial and for certain period of time the military centre as well. In further centuries it is the ecclesiastical centre in these sides. In the first centuries A.C. many eastern immigrated in, among them also heralds of the Gospel, establishing in Salona the Christian Municipality. Under the rule of Diocletian it had numerous martyrs. The fact that Emperor Diocletian was born in Salona or in its neighbourhood and that in the closeness he built the famous palace, arise the reputation of this however important centre. The last three centuries of the ancient Salona are specific regarding to the development of the Christian community in the town and its influence to the whole province.
Salona's Bishop became the Metropolitan of the whole province of Dalmatia. That was the time of progressive invasions of the barbarians, some of them like the Eastern Goths by the end of the 5th century came to these sides. While under their stroke declined the Western Roman Empire, Salona enough far away from the main ways of their penetrations, has lived for 130 years more and became refuge for some of the last Western Roman emperors. The town was destroyed by the Avars and Slavens in the year 614. The inhabitants flew before the furry of the Avars and took shelter on the neighbouring islands and in the Diocletian Palace making it soon a new town - Split.
Up to the present time old Solin remains in ruins, only a part of it is investigated, although this unveiled parts prove the size and importance of the city. The longest line reached about 1600 metres and widest one about 700 metres. The area surrounded with walls amounts 72 hectares. In the 2nd century A.C, in the course of the Great Migration?s danger the new part of the town was surrounded with walls and fortified with towers, in the same way as the previous nucleus had been. From that time measure of the walls reaches about 4 kilometres and number of the towers up to 90. In the 6th century during the Byzantine-Gothic wars, some towers were reinforced and got the triangular ends visible even today.
Sights
THE AMPHITHEATRE
At the northwest end of Salona's town limits, subsequently fortified, there is an amphitheatre, which forms part of the town defence system. Its remains are comparatively well-preserved (much worse than the one in Pula, though), showing the benefits of the well known reconstruction made by the Danish archaeologist Ejnar Dyggve. The first excavations, made in the end of the 1840s, were initiated by F. Carrara, who was also responsible for the first and very systematic archaeological research of this town and its archaeological research. In 1850 he published a book on the Salonitan topography and excavations undertaken earlier, which is still very valuable and useful. Excavations of the amphitheatre were continued until much later: before and during the First World War (F. Buliæ), and again in 1929 as part of studies of this edifice performed for the purpose of a comprehensive monograph published in 1932 (E. Dyggve). Finally, in the beginning of the 1980s, it was studied by F. Oreb within a conservation works campaign. Dyggve considers that the amphitheatre was designed by Roman architects who performed similar tasks elsewhere too, and that it was built in the second half of the second century A.D. Today, we can see only the lower parts of its large walls, largely reconstructed in the 1950s. During the Venetian ‚ it was intentionally damaged to prevent it from being used by the Turkish units during their war with Venice in the 16th and the 17th centuries. After that, it was used as a quarry from where stone for house building was being taken, like in many other places.
It is believed that it could have accommodated about fifteen thousand, or even more, spectators. In order to enable fast entrance to and evacuation from the auditorium, a double system of communications was designed: radial, as related to the building ellipse, and circular, as related to the levels of the seat rows. Such a system is quite often at large sports' stadiums of today. Because of its location along the northern and, partly, the western town walls. Its main entrances must have been in the south and the east walls, which is a deviation from the system comprising two entrances in the east - west longitudinal axis. On its northern side, it stood on elevated soil, some of the walls built on marl (still visible) having therefore no foundations, unlike the other sides. On the southern side, and also on parts of the western and eastern sides, it had three floors: two with arcades and the third with rectangular windows.
In the vicinity of the amphitheatre, to its south, there was a cemetery for gladiators killed in the arena. From their epitaphs, we learn their names, origins, homelands and fighting specialities.
BASILICA URBANA;
Salona's main ecclesiastical centre was created next to the first Christian oratorium that was located in a private house, in the so-called domus ecclesiae . It was in an area surrounded on the western side by town walls, in the east by a street leading to the small gates in the north town walls, and on the southern side by the street passing through the old town gate known as Porta Caesarea. In the remains of the private house next to the town walls, the oratorium hall with its semicircular apse is visible, complete with a stone bench for the priests and the altar-screen base. This is believed to have been the first Christian oratorium, called Oratorium A by Dyggve. In its vicinity, to the south, there was another one, that Dyggve called Oratorium B. Buliæ, too, considered this was where the Christian community was meeting at the time of Domnio, the first Salonitan bishop. To the west, there was a door and before it there was a small atrium with a fountain (the thermal and water installations were in the vicinity). Later on, Gabrièeviæ differed in his opinion that the oratorium was built at the time of Venancius, probably the first Christian community in the locality at the beginning of the second half of the third century.
After the Edict of Milan in 313 , the Christian community was granted legality of public worship and the building of a large religious complex, extending to several layers, was started in Salona in the years to come. The building works took several centuries to complete. All the structures required by a Christian community for religious service were erected: firstly one and then another large church, baptistery, the bishop's residence, atrium and ante-rooms. The main approach to the complex was from the south, through a monumental entrance with four columns. From there, one entered the narthex, the common antechamber on the eastern side of both in parallel to the basilicas. The old pavement and stairs approaching the baptisteries complex on the northern side of the narthex are well preserved, too.
The northern church, called by Buliæ the town basilica (Basilica urbana), believing this was the Salona's main, bishopric, church, is a basilica with a nave, two aisles and a large semicircular apse with priest benches along its wall. Construction was commenced by the bishop Simpherius in the fourth century, and ended by his successor, bishop Exigius, cum clero et populo (with clergy and people), as described on a preserved mosaic fragment. The church was dedicated to Christ. Just like other contemporary churches, it was rebuilt several times, especially in the fifth century.
To the south and next to this church, there had been another basilical church, above which a large cruciform church was built at the time of the bishop Honorius II (died 547), in the first half of the sixth century. This bishop is known from documents as the convenor of the ecclesiastical assemblies of Salona in 530 and 533, very important for establishing the ecclesiastical power in Dalmatia.
ST. MARY'S CHURCH AT GOSPIN OTOK;
In the very centre of Salona, on a river islet (Gospin otok - Our Lady's Islet) in the delta of Salona's river Salon, now known as the Jadro, next to the parish church of St. Mary, Our Lady of the Islet (Sv. Marija, Gospa od Otoka), there is an exceptionally valuable archaeological site, now totally covered with earth. The present parish church was built in 1880. To its south there is a grassy area where thousands of believers attended the mass on the occasion of the visit of Pope John Paul II, in 1998.
ST. STEPHEN'S CHURCH AT GOSPIN OTOK;
To the north of the present St. Mary's Church, under the earth, there are remains of a church with a nave and two aisles dedicated to St. Stephen (Sv. Stjepan). It was built on top of Roman remains, which is a rule in Salona, on a river islet. It should be kept in mind here that the river flowed in a completely different in Roman times, through the town centre , this being evidenced by the remains of the so-called Šuplja crkva (Hollow Church) , then the largest old-Christian basilica of Salona, now in the river bed, but not at the time of building the church.
The old-Christian church on Gospin otok and the Queen Helena's sarcophagus with its famous inscription were found, as it often happens, co-incidentally. After the old church on the islet was destroyed in the fire of 1875, the new, present, church was built in its present location in 1880. When the foundations for the new bell tower were dug in 1898, remains of older walls were excavated. The finds attracted attention of the then director of the Split Archaeological Museum, rev. Frane Buliæ, who found them worth excavating. Soon, in the church's atrium, they found fragments of an inscription, one of them reading HEL. Buliæ concluded they were fragments of the front side of a sarcophagus, all covered with an inscription. As the respected expert, he recalled the History of Salona by the Split chronicler, archdeacon Toma where it was stated that the honourable man Dimitrije, also known as Zvonimir, the King of the Croats, resituated to Sv. Dujam's (St. Domnio's) Church (i.e., to the Archbishopric of Split) the churches of St. Stephan and St. Mary with all their properties. These churches were built and donated by the Queen Helena, giving them to the Church of Split to hold them forever. Because of the adoration of some royal graves, they were temporarily given to some friars who celebrated masses in them. In St. Stephan Church's atrium, there was buried the honourable man, King Krešimir, with many other kings and queens.
The detailed research carried out in 1972 next to and within the present church, as well as the above quoted text, cleared some doubts, and it may be well reasonably concluded that on the Islet there was one church, dedicated to St. Stephen, and not two, as it was believed. Namely, above the Roman remains, a three-aisled church was built in the 10th century, in the atrium in which they found the broken sarcophagus with the queen's epitaph. The church certainly existed at the chronicler Toma's time, since he described it in detail, confirming there were royal graves in the atrium. The church is also mentioned in later centuries documents, so it may be concluded that it must have fallen into ruins, neglected, and destroyed at the time of the wars against the Turks in the 16th and the 17th centuries.
The new inhabitants of Solin, colonised by the Venetian authorities after conquering Klis , did not reconstruct St. Stephen's Church but, next to its ruins, built a new one at the beginning of the second half of the 17th century. The church was to be destroyed in a fire in 1875. According to L. Katiæ, it was built before 1670, since the first baptism in the church on Islet was recorded in the church books on the Mary's Nativity Day of that year. St. Stephen's Church is depicted in the watercolours by P. Zeèeviæ (1807-1876), according to new research made by A. Duplanèiæ. We consider however, that the humble building, as depicted in Zeèeviæ's watercolour, that it was a church similar in appearance and size to the many churches built throughout Dalmatia in the Baroque.The church of Our Lady of the Islet was mentioned in many documents dated in the 12th, 13th, 14th and subsequent centuries. Before the church, it was understood that certificates were issued and agreements were made, yet from none of these documents can it be determined which building of Solin this was. Therefore, this locality is still a subject of scientific disputes. We have presented our opinion.
GRADINA;
Among the remains of the Solin buildings, of particular interest is the complex known as Gradina (Hill-Fort), next to the very river and the Roman town's eastern walls. A church of an unusual ground plan, built over the Roman ‚poque remains, is today situated within a medieval fortress. This was built, according to some authors (F. Buliæ and Lj. Karaman), by the Split archbishop Ugolino de Mala Branca (1349-1388) to protect the people of Split from the people of Klis. Today, it is in a fortress built during the Venetian-Turkish wars, in the 16th century . It was researched in 1909-1911 and again in 1923-1925, its ground plan and volume have recently been presented in drawings by J. Marasoviæ, which is a convincing reconstruction. The church was for the first time correctly dated to the time of the Byzantine emperor Justinian (527-567) by M. Prelog, some fifty years ago.
Accepting this as a correct attribution, we hold that the church was dedicated to the Virgin Mary who, as confirmed by documentary evidence, was celebrated in Salona in the beginning of the 6th century, and the church at Gradina is from exactly that period. In the 10th and the 11th centuries it was repaired and reconstructed, keeping its original dedication. The ancient tradition of the adoration of Virgin Mary in Salona-Solin is still preserved, and the tradition can be suggested to have been in the following sequence. When, namely, adoration of royal graves in St. Stephen's Church at Gospin Otok was neglected and forgotten in later, the church at Gradina was abandoned and ruined, or the Ugolino's fortification built around it, adoration of the Virgin Mary was moved to the islet. St. Stephen's Church then became the Solin parish church. It is certain that the church at Gradina was not functioning by the 16th century. Having in mind the old-Christian tradition of adoration of the Virgin Mary in Salona, the Virgin Mary's sanctuary now known as Our Lady of the Islet (Gospa od Otoka) in Solin is undoubtedly the oldest church in Croatia. It is worth mentioning the tradition of trade fairs, along with religious celebrations, on the Mary's Nativity Day in Solin since ancient times this was of great importance for the economy of a large area both along the coast and into the hinterlands which stretched all the way to Bosnia in the past. At the trade fairs, they exchanged products of town handicrafts and rural industries. Today, the trade fair has no such importance, yet it is an attractive local and religious tradition. The trade fair tradition in Solin was interrupted by the Venetian authorities several times, in 1743, for instance, because of the plague that appeared in the far away Sarajevo.
TOWN BATHS;
In line with the ancient Roman customs and traditions, in towns, besides the private baths, situated in luxurious private homes and villas, there were also several public thermal - baths. The best preserved Salonitan thermal are in the so-called Peter's Street, to the east of the town basilicas, i.e. the Christian Episcopal cemetery complex . This street was in the eastern, new part of the town, leading northward, to the town's secondary gate. This area was excavated at the beginning of the twentieth century by F. Buliæ and subsequently by W. Gerber.
These thermal are of somewhat smaller dimensions, yet they contain all the ambiance and rooms characteristic of Roman baths. These are an open peri style, with a large pool, dressing rooms, cold- and hot-water swimming pools and other auxiliary rooms. Several indicators (sequence of constructing and inscriptions were taken from other places and built into the thermal structures) lead to the conclusion that the baths were built in the end of the second or the beginning of the third century, above remains of a private building rebuilt to serve the new purpose. Like other buildings in Salona, the thermal were rebuilt several times, but the initial layout is still quite evident.
In the late Roman, when Christian ideals got more established, public life and frequenting thermal was avoided and thermal lost their initial purpose: walls were partly painted white, and on the large columns there were cut crosses, symbols of the new ideology. Since water installations were required for both the thermal and the baptistery, some archaeologists (E. Dyggve, S. Piploviæ) deem that the thermal could have been turned into baptisteries at those early Christian times. Still, it appears impossible. Only fifty metres to the west there is an entire cathedral complex with baptistery, just about fifty metres away - unnecessary.
TOWN WALLS;
The town's elliptic core was surrounded by walls built over several centuries. They are quite well preserved on the northern side, where there are about a hundred square towers. The walls extend from the amphitheatre to the town north-eastern gate, by which the road led into the hinterland, firstly to Klis, and then by one branch to Andetrium and by the other to Osinium (Sinj) and further on to the Cetina, Tilurium and deep into the Balkans. The oldest wall remains, probably date from the Roman Republic times, were built in large stone blocks (megalithic walls, often from the Hellenistic and early Roman times). These are situated in the centre of the town, at their eastern end there is preserved the somewhat later town gate known as Porta Caesarea . This was built in the first century A.D. It is hard to say when the first fortifications were built, they were probably intended to protect the trapezoidal town, where the Roman consul Cecilius Metel wintered in 119-118 while fighting here against the Illyrians. At the time of August's peace, after conquering the Delmats and other Illyrian tribes, Salona started spreading out from its old, original town core, both westward and eastward. The eastern, monumental town gate thus remained right in the town centre, losing its original purpose, like the gate in the western walls of which no remains have been preserved. In the fourth century, above the eastern gate, a decorative keystone was built in, showing the goddess Tycha .
The town spread without an overall plan, using vacant areas to the north and the south of the road that, like the Salon, passing through the eastern part of the town, influenced the urban topography and building of public and private buildings. In the beginning, up until the time of Marcus Aurelius and the dangers created by invasions of the Marcomanns and the Quadis, these parts of the town were not fortified.
Initially, and probably for a long time later, the town's protection was improved by the natural relief of the land that gradually descends from Mount Kozjak's slopes towards the coast, forming several hills and valleys that made defence easier. The soil eroded over the centuries from the mountain and levelled the land with the wall crest in many places, today this is used as a path along the town perimeter.
The same happened south of Manastirine, and is still visible on the way from Tusculum in a southerly direction, down the cypress-lined walk, where partly excavated walls with square and pentagonal towers can be seen. The towers are believed to have been added in the sixth century, at the time of the war between the Ostrogoths and the imperial army that was fought here. Having taken Salona, the emperor's general Constantinian repaired and improved fortifications fearing attacks of the Gothic army that withdrew into the continent, towards Burnum, Aseria (Benkovac), Scardona and Skradin.
The largest part of the earliest walls that protected the eastern part of the town were erected in about 170, this being certified by two inscriptions cut into a stone slab and built into the outer, northern, side of the walls, near the Porta Andetria. The two complete and valuable inscriptions say that a Delmatian cohort (cohors secunda Delmatarum), commanded by the tribune Granius Fortunatus, built 800 (Roman) feet and the 2nd and the 3rd sections of the legion, supervised by the centurion Publius Elius Aminitianus, 200 feet of walls and several towers in the north part of the town. One lost inscription read that, at the same time, the first Delmatian cohort erected 800 feet of wall and one tower. That would be equal to about 430 metres of walls in total.
At the same time, the western part of the town, the Dyggve's Urbs occidentalis, also, was probably surrounded with walls that the amphitheatre was made a part of.
Thus Salona got a roughly elliptical shape, of axes of about 1600 and 700 metres, and about 500 hectares in area. After this, during the third and the fourth centuries, defence was no particular issue in the town since there was no significant danger. It seems that some larger works were performed at the time of the emperor Teodosius I (379-395), whereas the above-mentioned works, from the times of the Byzantine-Gothic wars, are certain.
Within the ellipse, the majority of the Salonitan monuments are situated there, outside it there were pagan and Christian cemeteries, the latter with cemetery churches. Of course, on the large area of the Roman land plotting (colony centuriation; <) both westward and eastward, to the present Trogir, Split and Stobreè, there were residential and industrial buildings, cemeteries, industrial installations, etc., confirmed by discoveries appearing at almost every present-day construction works.
Klis, Among many historical and archaeological sites in the wider Salonitan area, closely connected with Salona - Solin, of particular importance is the castrum fortress of Klis, deserving, therefore, more attention in this book as well. This "hard town" built on rock, above the mountain pass where the ancient road led from the coast into the hinterland, on a high mountain face (330 m above the sea level), between the mountains of Kozjak and Mosor, it was created over a millennium, to get most of its final appearance in the 17th century, after the Venetian-Turkish wars.
The site was undoubtedly of importance in the proto historic era as well, to keep this importance under different circumstances, and remained undisturbed until as late as the Second World War when the defence of Split was organised there, just like the defence of Salona a long time before that. The oldest, prehistoric, signs of life here are archaeological finds from caves and shelters (e.g. Krèine near Mihoviloviæi, now next to the road to Sinj, Kapina near Kuèine). The presence of the Illyric tribe of Delmats being evidenced by hill-forts on elevations (Žižina glavica, Gradina at Kosa, Ozrina, Markezina greda, etc.; <). At that time, the first century B. C., there must have been a stronghold at the site of the present fortress, too, controlling everything that was going on in the Salonitan area, even the sea in front of it, as far as to the islands of Šolta and Braè. In the wider Klis area, there are valuable and interesting discoveries from the Roman ‚poque, as well: sanctuaries and relief’s of the shepherds' god Silvan, cut into the mountain rock, remains of agricultural complexes, objects of everyday use (vessels, tools and accessories, jewellery, coins, etc.).
There are valuable historic records on Klis, written by the Greek historian Procopius (6th century), the Byzantine emperor Constantine Porphirogenitus (10th century), the historian and deacon of Split, Toma (13th century, <). Procopius, in his book The Gothic War described fights between the Goths and the imperial army mentioning that there was also a fortification near Salona which was undoubtedly Klis. Porphirogenitus in his work On Ruling the Empire, when describing the conquest of Salona, mentions Klis explicitly, whereas Toma does that in many chapters of his History of Salona. From the subsequent centuries, there are many documents contributing to a better insight of Klis and its history.
No traces have been found of the oldest fortification, the one from the pro historic, Roman and Byzantine , this was probably situated at the top of the rock. Subsequent buildings on such a small and narrow space on top of the rock have totally destroyed all previous traces. Another important factor in this destruction was played by changes in military techniques and war practices. Those changes were in line with both the demands of the Klis masters and military rules brought about by the new ideas in the advanced Middle Ages, especially the gradual development of artillery. An altar-screen pilaster, decorated with a cross typical of the 5th and the 6th centuries, was built into later walls. It is considered that it was not brought from somewhere else, but that it had belonged to a local church of that time. These churches being built within many fortresses constructed by the imperial army in the 6th century all along the eastern Adriatic coast and islands.
This first fortress, indirectly described by Procopius and Constantine, was a strongly guarded place it was most probably used by the Croatian prince Trpimir (about 845-865), who built a monastery and rebuilt an old-Christian church in the historic part of Rižinice in the present Rupotine. In the church, there was an altar screen bearing an inscription with the prince's name and title: ...pro duce Trepimero... among some other words on fragments of a larger dedicating inscription. Klis was the seat of the medieval Croatian county of Pomorje that extended behind Split and Trogir.
The successive fortress structures created consecutive layers one above another, gradually took more and more space on the western part of the rock; the previous foundations being left under the subsequent ones, up until the Austrian era. Many features have kept their traditional names; either after their Venetian builders or after the functions they had in the then defence system. These are, for instance, bulwark Foscolo, position Avanzato, Mezzo, Scala, Bembo, Malipiero, Madonna, Oprah kula (Oprah tower), barutana (powder-store), zgrada kneza (prince's house) etc.
In the 13th century, the fortress and the town below it were named the Municipality of Klis (Communitas Clissae), with a proper local administration, judge, notary and seal. At the time of the Hungarian and Croatian kings (12th-15th centuries) and the first decades of the Venetian administration in Dalmatia, Klis was for most of the time ruled by Croatian feudalists. Holding a fortress on a road yielded significant incomes, and the nobility was ready to fight each other over control of such a valuable possession. Among the first were the Šubiæi, masters of the fortress even before the years (1242) when the Hungarian king Bela IV fled before the Tatars to Dalmatia and specifically to Klis and then to Split and Trogir . In the centuries to come, this feudal family ruled a large area along the sea coast and in the hinterlands, bringing to these parts the spirit of the contemporary European culture. Namely, Klis was one of the seats of this powerful and highly esteemed family.
Nothing except some indications have been preserved of the oldest defence structures and fortifications of Klis. From the Turkish time, there is the mosque, now called St. Vid's Church. Most of the present structural remains are from the Venetian and the Austrian times. Much of the earlier architectural styles can be recognised in drawings made by military engineers and cartographers, for instance, in the drawings by G. Santini made in 1668, shortly after the Venetian takeover of Klis.
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