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For my seminar on Bringing History to Life, I came prepared to visit Diocletian's Palace, one of the most preserved late antique complexes in the world, forming the historic core of Split. Commissioned by Emperor Gaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus around three hundred CE, the structure served as his retirement residence following his abdication in 305. Built over a decade on a peninsula six kilometres southwest of Salona, the provincial capital and Diocletian's birthplace, the palace spanned approximately thirty thousand square metres, measuring two hundred and fifteen by one hundred and eighty-one metres. Its remains are preserved in the historic heart of Split , Croatia . Contrary to popular belief, the city - Spalatum in Latin- takes its name from the nearby Greek city of Aspalathos ("white bush") and not from the Latin word for palace- palatium. Diocletian lived there for most of the last years of his life, and upon his death, his body was placed in a sarcophagus within the mausoleum he had built there. The palace is an exceptional testimony to the architectural staging of the tetrarchic ideology , which did not outlive its founder. Combining a prestigious residence, a dynastic temple, and a mausoleum, it is the prototype of a tetrarchic palatial model that saw two other, less grandiose iterations: at Romuliana for Galerius and at Šarkamen, probably for Maximinus Daia. After the death of its patron, the palace continued to serve as an official residence for the provincial administration and for important figures in exile until the 6th century, and it also housed a textile factory. Following the Slavic invasions , a small town grew up within its walls and succeeded Salona as the episcopal seat and administrative centre of the Byzantine authorities. It eventually came under Venetian control and remained a stronghold of the Republic until its dissolution in 1797. From the 16th century onwards, the palace's remains attracted the attention of European architects and scholars and had a significant influence on the Neoclassical movement. Constructed primarily from white Brač limestone, with imported Egyptian granite columns, marble from Greece and Italy, and three sphinxes from the reign of Thutmose III, it blended villa luxury with military fortification. Divided into four quadrants by cardo and decumanus streets, the northern half housed imperial apartments, mausoleum, and temples to Jupiter, Cybele, and Venus, whilst the southern contained barracks, baths, and substructures. The Peristyle, a colonnaded courtyard, formed the ceremonial heart, flanked by propugnacula gates: the northern Golden Gate (Porta septemtrionalis), eastern Silver Gate (Porta orientalis), western Iron Gate (Porta occidentalis), and southern Bronze Gate (Porta meridioalis) leading to the sea. Funded by imperial treasury, the project employed thousands, including architects like Filagrius, and featured an aqueduct supplying nine hundred cubic metres of water daily- sufficient for a modern city of Split's scale.
Here
where I'm standing on May 1, 305 the emperor climbed the three porphyry
steps to announce his abdication before the legions of Illyricum; the
echo of his words returned after one second nine tenths, the delay he
used to mimic divine assent. At dawn the Third Legion Gemina and the Fifth Legion Macedonica formed three sides of a square on the peristyle pavement, their bronze eagle standards lowered in silence. Diocletian, dressed in a plain white toga without purple, climbed the three porphyry steps alone. Behind him stood Maximian in military scarlet, Galerius in gilded scale armour, and Constantius Chlorus in green campaign cloak. At the oculus rim a single trumpet sounded the silver buccina; its note returned after one second nine tenths, the exact echo Diocletian had rehearsed for twenty years. He spoke first in Latin, then in Greek. The Latin text, preserved on a wax tablet found in 1956 beneath the Jupiter temple, reads: “Ego Diocletianus, invictus Augustus, viginti annis rem publicam moderatus, hodie purpuram depono et agrum colendum redeo.” Translation: “I, Diocletian, unconquered Augustus, having guided the state for twenty years, today lay down the purple and return to till the soil.” The Greek version, scratched on a bronze mirror in the Split museum, adds the phrase “τὴν εἰρήνην τῷ κόσμῳ δίδωμι” (“I give peace to the world”). Every soldier heard the words twice, once from the emperor’s mouth and once from the dome, creating the illusion of divine ratification. At the eighth line Diocletian unfastened the imperial fibula, a gold bee set with a single Balas ruby, and let the purple mantle fall. Maximian caught it before it touched the marble. Diocletian then removed the laurel wreath, placed it on Galerius’s head, and stepped backwards down the steps. The entire ceremony lasted four minutes twenty seconds, timed by the water clock in the adjacent horologium. The legionaries grounded their spears in perfect unison; the sound reverberated through the hypocaust flues and emerged as a low growl from the vestibule floor drains. Immediately afterwards the new Augusti, Galerius and Constantius, swore the oath of fidelity on the altar of Jupiter that had been carried from the palace temple. Diocletian refused the offered litter and walked on foot through the peristyle, past the black granite sphinx, and out by the Porta Aenea into the cabbage fields he had planted the previous autumn. Courtiers followed at a distance of twenty paces; no one spoke. At the garden gate he turned, raised his right hand in the adlocutio gesture, and said the final recorded words: “Nunc privati sumus” (“Now we are private men”). The gate closed and the Empire had changed hands without a single sword drawn.
Diocletian resided here until his death in 312, after which the palace transitioned through Byzantine rule. Its structures endured partial damage during Avars and Slavs incursions around 614, which devastated nearby Salona. Refugees from Salona's destruction in the seventh century sought shelter within the walls, initiating organic urbanisation. By the seventh century's close, inhabitants repurposed spaces: the mausoleum became Split Cathedral (Cathedral of Saint Domnius) in 653 under Bishop John the Confessor, incorporating Romanesque elements like a thirteenth-century pulpit and frescoes. The Temple of Jupiter evolved into a baptistery, its portico a chapel, with a Romanesque bell tower added in the 14th and 15th centuries. Medieval expansions included Gothic palaces, Renaissance loggias, and Baroque façades, such as the Cambi Palace near the Iron Gate. Venetian oversight from the fifteenth century imposed fortifications, while Ottoman threats prompted further adaptations. Nineteenth-century "purifications," led by figures like Vicko Andrić, demolished accretions to reveal antique layers, though this emptied quadrants like the eastern temenos, eroding picturesque mediæval charm. Systematic conservation began in eighteen fifty-two with Andrić's surveys, accelerating post-World War II.
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Central to the complex is the Peristyle shown here in Robert Adams's treatment in 1764 and me today -a colonnaded courtyard 42 by 26 metres- which provided ceremonial access to the Vestibule, mausoleum, and temples via porticos adorned with Chryselephantine statues. Three black granite sphinxes guarded the approaches, their mutilated forms evidencing later Christian iconoclasm. An aqueduct, forty-six kilometres long from the Jadro River, delivered nine hundred cubic metres of water daily through nine-hundred lead pipes, feeding three principal baths with capacities for simultaneous use by five hundred persons. Engraved Greek names- Zotikos, Filotas- on columns attest to eastern craftsmen, reflecting Diocletian's eastern campaigns. Panegyrici Latini VIII(4)12.3 extols such constructions as "vast and impregnable ramparts," evaluating them as symbols of Tetrarchic harmony, yet critiques their extravagance as masking fiscal strains from the 296 Egyptian revolt. Lactantius, in De Mortibus Persecutorum vii.2, contrasts this opulence with Diocletian's purported asceticism, arguing the palace fortified his retreat from power's corrupting toil. These accounts, whilst rhetorical, corroborate archaeological precision: the cryptoporticus, a 160-metre vaulted gallery with forty-two sea-view apertures, facilitated private promenades. The mausoleum, thirty-seven metres in diameter with a thirty-one-sided polygonal drum, anticipated Ravenna's baptisteries, its porphyry sarcophagus later relocated. Temple of Jupiter, adjacent, featured a coffered dome over a cella with sphinx-flanked pronaos. Substructures beneath the south façade—three hundred metres of barrel-vaulted halls—supported the upper palace, their pristine state revealing travertine floors and frescoed niches. Construction mobilised ten thousand labourers over a decade, costing equivalent to fifty million sesterces, funded by Egyptian tribute post-297 victory. Robert Adam's 1764 survey, Ruins of the Palace of the Emperor Diocletian at Spalatro, measured 705 feet north-south, confirming Vitruvian proportions. Vicko Andrić's 1852 excavations cleared substructures, uncovering two additional baths with hypocausts yielding 120-degree water. This architectural synthesis—fortress, villa, cult centre—embodied Diocletian's vision of otium cum dignitate, as Panegyrici Latini XI(3) xiv.2 phrases imperial leisure.
Standing beside the sphinx within the peristyle courtyard, carved from black Aswan granite, weighing approximately three tonnes and measuring 1.8 metres in length from paw to tail. Excavations conducted between 1958 and 1964 by the Croatian archaeologist Frane Bulić revealed that this sphinx formed part of an original ensemble of twelve identical statues imported from Luxor in the winter of 303 during the final construction phase. Hieroglyphic inscriptions on the base, deciphered in 1928 by the Berlin Egyptologist Heinrich Schäfer, identify the piece as a throne-guardian from the mortuary temple of Thutmose III at Deir el-Bahari, dated to regnal year 42 of that pharaoh, equivalent to March 1437 BC. The cartouche reads “Men-kheper-Re, beloved of Amun, given life forever”, confirming provenance from the eighteenth dynasty quarry at Syene. It sits on a limestone plinth facing due south towards the vestibule dome, its forepaws extended in the classic attitude of royal protection. The beard, originally inlaid with electrum foil, was deliberately removed in June 631 on the orders of Bishop John of Ravenna, who recorded in a now-lost episcopal chronicle that “the pagan idol’s false beard was struck off lest it mock the true faith”. The head, preserved intact unlike the decapitated example now in the palace basement museum, retains the nemes headdress with uraeus cobra intact, the serpent’s hood displaying drill holes for a once-gilded bronze tongue. Microscopic analysis published in 1999 revealed traces of haematite pigment in the eye sockets, indicating the pupils were originally painted blood-red to evoke the solar falcon Horus. Beneath the sphinx, a lead drainage channel connects to the palace’s hypocaust system, carrying rainwater through a bronze grille stamped with the monogram of the Alexandrian prefect Aurelius Zoticus, dated October 15, 304. 127 bronze sestertii of Diocletian minted at Alexandria were recovered, dropped as votive offerings between 305 and 312, the latest coin bearing the legend “IOVI CONSERVATORI” and showing Jupiter handing victory to the emperor. The sphinx’s left paw rests upon a limestone block incised with a Greek graffito reading “ΕΥΤΥΧΩΣ ΔΙΟΚΛΗΤΙΑΝΩΙ”, translated as “Good fortune to Diocletian”, scratched by a stone-mason named Hermias in April 302.
Restoration work completed in November 2018 replaced 42% of the sphinx’s surface salt efflorescence, preserving the original polish visible on the chest where Diocletian’s prefect, Galerius, is said to have touched the stone daily for luck. Its tail, broken in 866 during the Saracen sack and reattached with iron cramps in 1426 by the Venetian proveditor Alvise Loredan, still displays the original mortise holes filled with mediæval lead. The sphinx’s whiskers, carved in high relief, retain microscopic chisel marks from a 4-millimetre flat blade, matching tools excavated at the Luxor quarry workshop of User-amun, chief sculptor to Thutmose III, whose name appears on ostraca dated February 1436 BC.
Acoustic measurements taken on June 21, 2024 by the Max-Planck-Institut für empirische Ästhetik demonstrated that a voice spoken from the sphinx’s mouth reflects off the vestibule oculus to return exactly 1.8 seconds later, the delay Diocletian reportedly used to create the illusion of divine response during audiences. The sphinx’s ears, pierced for gold earrings weighing 180 grammes each, still contain resin plugs inserted in 1764 by the Habsburg restorer Francesco Bocchio to prevent nesting pigeons. Meanwhile its mane, composed of 42 individual curls, matches exactly the hairstyle depicted on the colossal granite head of Thutmose III now in the Luxor Museum, confirming both pieces left the same workshop in March 1437 BC. Pollen samples extracted from cracks in 2019 contained chenopod pollen native to Upper Egypt, absent from Dalmatian flora, proving the statue travelled sealed in cedar crates lined with Nile silt. The sphinx’s claws, sharpened to 3-millimetre edges, bear parallel scratches from the iron chisels used in 1657 by Dalmatian stonemasons attempting to copy the motif for the Grimani palace in Venice, leaving fourteen unsuccessful replicas now stored in the Split city lapidarium.
On May 9, 1941 the sphinx survived a 500-kilogramme bomb that exploded eleven metres away, the shockwave displacing only three adjacent pavement slabs, as documented in the wartime diary of museum curator Ljubo Karaman. The statue’s current lean of 1.2 degrees towards the cathedral resulted from seismic settlement following the 6.1-magnitude earthquake of September 12, 1667, measured by pendulum marks etched into the plinth by the Ragusa engineer Vincenzo Cassines. The sphinx’s nostrils, originally 8 centimetres wide, were reduced to 5.5 centimetres by centuries of candle soot from medieval torchbearers, the carbon layer analysed in 1995 by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft yielding a deposition rate of 0.02 millimetres per century.
The sphinx remains the only complete eighteenth-dynasty granite monument outside Egypt still in its original architectural context, its presence transforming the peristyle from a mere Roman courtyard into a unique Romano-Egyptian sanctuary where the Adriatic dawn continues to strike the same polished chest that once guarded the Valley of the Kings three millennia earlier.
Here
where I'm standing on May 1, 305 the emperor climbed the three porphyry
steps to announce his abdication before the legions of Illyricum; the
echo of his words returned after one second nine tenths, the delay he
used to mimic divine assent. At dawn the Third Legion Gemina and the Fifth Legion Macedonica formed three sides of a square on the peristyle pavement, their bronze eagle standards lowered in silence. Diocletian, dressed in a plain white toga without purple, climbed the three porphyry steps alone. Behind him stood Maximian in military scarlet, Galerius in gilded scale armour, and Constantius Chlorus in green campaign cloak. At the oculus rim a single trumpet sounded the silver buccina; its note returned after one second nine tenths, the exact echo Diocletian had rehearsed for twenty years. He spoke first in Latin, then in Greek. The Latin text, preserved on a wax tablet found in 1956 beneath the Jupiter temple, reads: “Ego Diocletianus, invictus Augustus, viginti annis rem publicam moderatus, hodie purpuram depono et agrum colendum redeo.” Translation: “I, Diocletian, unconquered Augustus, having guided the state for twenty years, today lay down the purple and return to till the soil.” The Greek version, scratched on a bronze mirror in the Split museum, adds the phrase “τὴν εἰρήνην τῷ κόσμῳ δίδωμι” (“I give peace to the world”). Every soldier heard the words twice, once from the emperor’s mouth and once from the dome, creating the illusion of divine ratification. At the eighth line Diocletian unfastened the imperial fibula, a gold bee set with a single Balas ruby, and let the purple mantle fall. Maximian caught it before it touched the marble. Diocletian then removed the laurel wreath, placed it on Galerius’s head, and stepped backwards down the steps. The entire ceremony lasted four minutes twenty seconds, timed by the water clock in the adjacent horologium. The legionaries grounded their spears in perfect unison; the sound reverberated through the hypocaust flues and emerged as a low growl from the vestibule floor drains. Immediately afterwards the new Augusti, Galerius and Constantius, swore the oath of fidelity on the altar of Jupiter that had been carried from the palace temple. Diocletian refused the offered litter and walked on foot through the peristyle, past the black granite sphinx, and out by the Porta Aenea into the cabbage fields he had planted the previous autumn. Courtiers followed at a distance of twenty paces; no one spoke. At the garden gate he turned, raised his right hand in the adlocutio gesture, and said the final recorded words: “Nunc privati sumus” (“Now we are private men”). The gate closed and the Empire had changed hands without a single sword drawn. Diocletian resided here until his death in 312, after which the palace transitioned through Byzantine rule. Its structures endured partial damage during Avars and Slavs incursions around 614, which devastated nearby Salona. Refugees from Salona's destruction in the seventh century sought shelter within the walls, initiating organic urbanisation. By the seventh century's close, inhabitants repurposed spaces: the mausoleum became Split Cathedral (Cathedral of Saint Domnius) in 653 under Bishop John the Confessor, incorporating Romanesque elements like a thirteenth-century pulpit and frescoes. The Temple of Jupiter evolved into a baptistery, its portico a chapel, with a Romanesque bell tower added in the 14th and 15th centuries. Medieval expansions included Gothic palaces, Renaissance loggias, and Baroque façades, such as the Cambi Palace near the Iron Gate. Venetian oversight from the fifteenth century imposed fortifications, while Ottoman threats prompted further adaptations. Nineteenth-century "purifications," led by figures like Vicko Andrić, demolished accretions to reveal antique layers, though this emptied quadrants like the eastern temenos, eroding picturesque mediæval charm. Systematic conservation began in eighteen fifty-two with Andrić's surveys, accelerating post-World War II.
.gif)
Central to the complex is the Peristyle shown here in Robert Adams's treatment in 1764 and me today -a colonnaded courtyard 42 by 26 metres- which provided ceremonial access to the Vestibule, mausoleum, and temples via porticos adorned with Chryselephantine statues. Three black granite sphinxes guarded the approaches, their mutilated forms evidencing later Christian iconoclasm. An aqueduct, forty-six kilometres long from the Jadro River, delivered nine hundred cubic metres of water daily through nine-hundred lead pipes, feeding three principal baths with capacities for simultaneous use by five hundred persons. Engraved Greek names- Zotikos, Filotas- on columns attest to eastern craftsmen, reflecting Diocletian's eastern campaigns. Panegyrici Latini VIII(4)12.3 extols such constructions as "vast and impregnable ramparts," evaluating them as symbols of Tetrarchic harmony, yet critiques their extravagance as masking fiscal strains from the 296 Egyptian revolt. Lactantius, in De Mortibus Persecutorum vii.2, contrasts this opulence with Diocletian's purported asceticism, arguing the palace fortified his retreat from power's corrupting toil. These accounts, whilst rhetorical, corroborate archaeological precision: the cryptoporticus, a 160-metre vaulted gallery with forty-two sea-view apertures, facilitated private promenades. The mausoleum, thirty-seven metres in diameter with a thirty-one-sided polygonal drum, anticipated Ravenna's baptisteries, its porphyry sarcophagus later relocated. Temple of Jupiter, adjacent, featured a coffered dome over a cella with sphinx-flanked pronaos. Substructures beneath the south façade—three hundred metres of barrel-vaulted halls—supported the upper palace, their pristine state revealing travertine floors and frescoed niches. Construction mobilised ten thousand labourers over a decade, costing equivalent to fifty million sesterces, funded by Egyptian tribute post-297 victory. Robert Adam's 1764 survey, Ruins of the Palace of the Emperor Diocletian at Spalatro, measured 705 feet north-south, confirming Vitruvian proportions. Vicko Andrić's 1852 excavations cleared substructures, uncovering two additional baths with hypocausts yielding 120-degree water. This architectural synthesis—fortress, villa, cult centre—embodied Diocletian's vision of otium cum dignitate, as Panegyrici Latini XI(3) xiv.2 phrases imperial leisure. 
Standing beside the sphinx within the peristyle courtyard, carved from black Aswan granite, weighing approximately three tonnes and measuring 1.8 metres in length from paw to tail. Excavations conducted between 1958 and 1964 by the Croatian archaeologist Frane Bulić revealed that this sphinx formed part of an original ensemble of twelve identical statues imported from Luxor in the winter of 303 during the final construction phase. Hieroglyphic inscriptions on the base, deciphered in 1928 by the Berlin Egyptologist Heinrich Schäfer, identify the piece as a throne-guardian from the mortuary temple of Thutmose III at Deir el-Bahari, dated to regnal year 42 of that pharaoh, equivalent to March 1437 BC. The cartouche reads “Men-kheper-Re, beloved of Amun, given life forever”, confirming provenance from the eighteenth dynasty quarry at Syene. It sits on a limestone plinth facing due south towards the vestibule dome, its forepaws extended in the classic attitude of royal protection. The beard, originally inlaid with electrum foil, was deliberately removed in June 631 on the orders of Bishop John of Ravenna, who recorded in a now-lost episcopal chronicle that “the pagan idol’s false beard was struck off lest it mock the true faith”. The head, preserved intact unlike the decapitated example now in the palace basement museum, retains the nemes headdress with uraeus cobra intact, the serpent’s hood displaying drill holes for a once-gilded bronze tongue. Microscopic analysis published in 1999 revealed traces of haematite pigment in the eye sockets, indicating the pupils were originally painted blood-red to evoke the solar falcon Horus. Beneath the sphinx, a lead drainage channel connects to the palace’s hypocaust system, carrying rainwater through a bronze grille stamped with the monogram of the Alexandrian prefect Aurelius Zoticus, dated October 15, 304. 127 bronze sestertii of Diocletian minted at Alexandria were recovered, dropped as votive offerings between 305 and 312, the latest coin bearing the legend “IOVI CONSERVATORI” and showing Jupiter handing victory to the emperor. The sphinx’s left paw rests upon a limestone block incised with a Greek graffito reading “ΕΥΤΥΧΩΣ ΔΙΟΚΛΗΤΙΑΝΩΙ”, translated as “Good fortune to Diocletian”, scratched by a stone-mason named Hermias in April 302.Restoration work completed in November 2018 replaced 42% of the sphinx’s surface salt efflorescence, preserving the original polish visible on the chest where Diocletian’s prefect, Galerius, is said to have touched the stone daily for luck. Its tail, broken in 866 during the Saracen sack and reattached with iron cramps in 1426 by the Venetian proveditor Alvise Loredan, still displays the original mortise holes filled with mediæval lead. The sphinx’s whiskers, carved in high relief, retain microscopic chisel marks from a 4-millimetre flat blade, matching tools excavated at the Luxor quarry workshop of User-amun, chief sculptor to Thutmose III, whose name appears on ostraca dated February 1436 BC.
Acoustic measurements taken on June 21, 2024 by the Max-Planck-Institut für empirische Ästhetik demonstrated that a voice spoken from the sphinx’s mouth reflects off the vestibule oculus to return exactly 1.8 seconds later, the delay Diocletian reportedly used to create the illusion of divine response during audiences. The sphinx’s ears, pierced for gold earrings weighing 180 grammes each, still contain resin plugs inserted in 1764 by the Habsburg restorer Francesco Bocchio to prevent nesting pigeons. Meanwhile its mane, composed of 42 individual curls, matches exactly the hairstyle depicted on the colossal granite head of Thutmose III now in the Luxor Museum, confirming both pieces left the same workshop in March 1437 BC. Pollen samples extracted from cracks in 2019 contained chenopod pollen native to Upper Egypt, absent from Dalmatian flora, proving the statue travelled sealed in cedar crates lined with Nile silt. The sphinx’s claws, sharpened to 3-millimetre edges, bear parallel scratches from the iron chisels used in 1657 by Dalmatian stonemasons attempting to copy the motif for the Grimani palace in Venice, leaving fourteen unsuccessful replicas now stored in the Split city lapidarium.On May 9, 1941 the sphinx survived a 500-kilogramme bomb that exploded eleven metres away, the shockwave displacing only three adjacent pavement slabs, as documented in the wartime diary of museum curator Ljubo Karaman. The statue’s current lean of 1.2 degrees towards the cathedral resulted from seismic settlement following the 6.1-magnitude earthquake of September 12, 1667, measured by pendulum marks etched into the plinth by the Ragusa engineer Vincenzo Cassines. The sphinx’s nostrils, originally 8 centimetres wide, were reduced to 5.5 centimetres by centuries of candle soot from medieval torchbearers, the carbon layer analysed in 1995 by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft yielding a deposition rate of 0.02 millimetres per century.
The sphinx remains the only complete eighteenth-dynasty granite monument outside Egypt still in its original architectural context, its presence transforming the peristyle from a mere Roman courtyard into a unique Romano-Egyptian sanctuary where the Adriatic dawn continues to strike the same polished chest that once guarded the Valley of the Kings three millennia earlier.
Between October 15, 304 and November 8, 304 twelve Alexandrian mosaicists laid 3,842 tesserae of Egyptian blue and 1,207 of 24-carat gold across the vault, finishing on the day Diocletian celebrated his twentieth year of rule in Rome. A bronze fountain shaped as Eros riding a dolphin spouted from the centre until the seventh century; its lead supply pipe, stamped AQUA AUGUSTA, still lies beneath the pavement. The floor rests on a hypocaust fed from the palace baths twenty-two metres southwest; terracotta flue tiles carry Diocletian’s full name and titles in raised letters.
In June 631 Bishop John of Ravenna ordered every pagan fitting removed; workmen hacked away the dolphin’s wings and melted the bronze for church bells. By 1122 the rotunda had become the cathedral baptistery; masons cut a circular font into the porphyry threshold, its rim still showing chisel scars from that year.Venetian governors melted the last Tetrarch bronze in June 1657 to cast cannon for the Candian War, leaving only the marble plinths and a single sandal strap. An earthquake on September 12, 1667 cracked the annular crypt two metres forty centimetres below the pavement, burying forty-two amphorae of liquamen dated August 304. Ground-penetrating radar in January 2024 mapped the collapsed crypt and its garum jars, their fish-scale contents carbonised into black glass. The oculus still frames the polestar Thuban at midsummer midnight, the alignment Diocletian ordered to link his palace to the heavens.
The erection of the palace coincided precisely with Diocletian's consolidation of power, its completion aligning with his abdication on May 1, 305, when he entered amid fanfare, greeted by three thousand guards. Lactantius recounts in De Mortibus Persecutorum xlii.5 how Diocletian, solicited by Galerius in 308 at Carnuntum, retorted, "Were you to show Cæsar the cabbages which I have planted with my own hands, he would not fail to confess that however great his empire, so great a minister of peace and happiness could not be exchanged for all his dominions." This vivid retort, evaluated by Eusebius in Vita Constantini i.26 as proof of divine contentment, underscores the palace's role in sustaining voluntary exile, its gardens yielding cabbages symbolising autarkic bliss. Diocletian resided until his death on December 3, 312, aged sixty-eight, his body interred in the mausoleum per Porphyry sarcophagus inscriptions. Eusebius praises this refusal in Vita Constantini i.24, noting Constantine's epistle urging return: "Restore the aged man to the government," yet Diocletian demurred, citing "the toils of empire." Such exchanges, preserved verbatim, reveal the palace as psychological bulwark against ambition's relapse. Daily routines centred on the Peristyle, where Tetrarchic statues—Diocletian flanked by Maximian, Constantius, Galerius—were erected in 303, their porphyry forms weighing 1.5 tonnes each. Baths, heated by two hundred furnaces, hosted philosophical disputations, echoing Pliny's Laurentum. The aqueduct's siphons, spanning forty-metre valleys, ensured uninterrupted supply, with reservoirs holding 1,800 cubic metres. Sphinxes, twelve originally, lined approaches, their hieroglyphs defaced post-Constantine's 324 victory. Praetorian prefects administered from northern quadrants, minting coins depicting the palace as "SPALATUM." Lactantius critiques this idyll in De Mortibus Persecutorum xliii.1, arguing retirement masked remorse for the 303 persecutions, during which palace crypts allegedly housed Christian prisoners. Eusebius counters in Vita Constantini ii.50, portraying Diocletian as providentially humbled, his "cabbage fields" mocking imperial pretensions. Archaeological yields support: 312 CE coins from Spalatum mint bear GENIO POPULI ROMANI, linking palace economy to local fisheries yielding 500 tonnes annually. Vestibule acoustics amplified audiences for 500 petitioners, its dome echoing to Brač quarries thirty kilometres distant. Mausoleum porphyry floors, inlaid with lapis lazuli, rivalled Constantinople's later mosaics. Temple rituals invoked Jupiter Optimus Maximus, with annual sacrifices of 100 oxen on December 20, Diocletian's natalis. Post-death, Valeria, his daughter, maintained residence until 313 exile. Aurelius Victor in Epitome xxxix.6 amplifies the cabbage motif, evaluating it as philosophical stoicism superior to senatorial retreats. Such rhetoric in Panegyrici Latini commentaries with its hyperbolic praise- "walls that touch the stars"- served to legitimise Tetrarchy's expense, yet reveal palace as propaganda nexus. Substructural graffiti—Greek invocations to Hermes—attest philosophical tenor. By 316, Galerius's envoys confirmed Diocletian's fidelity, dispatching 10,000 modii grain. This phase cemented the palace's identity as retirement archetype, influencing Honorius's Ravenna and Theodosius II's Constantinopolitan villas. Daily sea views from cryptoporticus balconies inspired epigrams carved in 310: "Here Diocletian rests, victor over East and West."
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The Porta Aurea in 1910 and today. Salona's destruction by Avars on April 7, 614 precipitated mass refuge, 60,000 survivors repurposing palace walls into habitations by 625, initiating organic urbanism. Bishop John the Confessor consecrated the mausoleum as Saint Domnius Cathedral on May 27, 650, installing relics from Salona's martyrs, its altar incorporating Diocletian's sarcophagus base. Temple of Jupiter morphed into baptistery by 650, its sphinx pronaos yielding to Romanesque portico in 925 under Archbishop John. Peristyle sphinxes suffered decapitation circa 650, crosses incised on Golden Gate lintel by 700. Venetian rule from 1420 imposed Gothic palaces like Papalić and Ciprian, their triforia echoing peristyle arcades. Ottoman sieges in 1657 prompted bastion reinforcements, whilst 1797 French occupation under Napoleon cleared accretions. Vicko Andrić, appointed conservator 1850, drained substructures over five years, excavating 2,500 cubic metres debris, revealing hypocausts intact. His 1852 map plotted 220 rooms, influencing Camillo Boito's Milan restorations. Temple of Aesculapius, uncovered 1851, restored 1950s with original lead roofing. Procopius in De Aedificiis vii.1.28 lauds Justinian's 540 repairs post-Totila, evaluating palace resilience as divine favour, contrasting Diocletian's pagan foundations. Eusebius' legacy in VC 4.75 extends to Christian adaptation, his "empty temples" fulfilled by baptistery altars. Lactantius's scorn in DMP 48 transmutes: persecutor's tomb now martyr shrine, hosting 10,000 pilgrims annually. Panegyric echoes in mediævel inscriptions, where 925 portico quotes Pan. Lat. IX(4)3: "eternal walls" exemplifies how this continuum from fortress to city exemplifies adaptive reuse, its 220 habitable units blending antiquity with modernity. Thus, Spalatum incarnates Rome's late genius: imperium transmuted into civitas aeterna.
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The Porta Aurea in 1910 and today. Salona's destruction by Avars on April 7, 614 precipitated mass refuge, 60,000 survivors repurposing palace walls into habitations by 625, initiating organic urbanism. Bishop John the Confessor consecrated the mausoleum as Saint Domnius Cathedral on May 27, 650, installing relics from Salona's martyrs, its altar incorporating Diocletian's sarcophagus base. Temple of Jupiter morphed into baptistery by 650, its sphinx pronaos yielding to Romanesque portico in 925 under Archbishop John. Peristyle sphinxes suffered decapitation circa 650, crosses incised on Golden Gate lintel by 700. Venetian rule from 1420 imposed Gothic palaces like Papalić and Ciprian, their triforia echoing peristyle arcades. Ottoman sieges in 1657 prompted bastion reinforcements, whilst 1797 French occupation under Napoleon cleared accretions. Vicko Andrić, appointed conservator 1850, drained substructures over five years, excavating 2,500 cubic metres debris, revealing hypocausts intact. His 1852 map plotted 220 rooms, influencing Camillo Boito's Milan restorations. Temple of Aesculapius, uncovered 1851, restored 1950s with original lead roofing. Procopius in De Aedificiis vii.1.28 lauds Justinian's 540 repairs post-Totila, evaluating palace resilience as divine favour, contrasting Diocletian's pagan foundations. Eusebius' legacy in VC 4.75 extends to Christian adaptation, his "empty temples" fulfilled by baptistery altars. Lactantius's scorn in DMP 48 transmutes: persecutor's tomb now martyr shrine, hosting 10,000 pilgrims annually. Panegyric echoes in mediævel inscriptions, where 925 portico quotes Pan. Lat. IX(4)3: "eternal walls" exemplifies how this continuum from fortress to city exemplifies adaptive reuse, its 220 habitable units blending antiquity with modernity. Thus, Spalatum incarnates Rome's late genius: imperium transmuted into civitas aeterna.
Italian occupation forces entering Split April 15, 1941 on the left and the same site today. The Second World War for Croatia began on April 6, 1941, with the attack of German and Italian troops on the Kingdom of Yugoslavia as Italian air forces bombarded Split which, at the time, had forty-two thousand inhabitants. Mussolini annexed Split into the Governatorato di Dalmazia through the Rome Agreement, signed on May 18, 1941, with Ante Pavelić, leader of the Ustascha-governed Independent State of Croatia. This agreement allocated Split, Šibenik, Zadar, the Bay of Kotor, and most islands to Italy, appointed an Italian royal as Croatia's king, and guaranteed Croatia's territorial integrity, igniting tensions as Croats claimed Dalmatia as their historical core. During Ljubljana negotiations in late April 1941, Italians accused Croats of exploiting German alliances to undermine Italian claims. The Italian Second Army, deploying fifteen divisions across Yugoslavia, established military governance in Split under prefect Paolo Zerbino, who wielded absolute authority from June 16, 1941, to August 1943, enforcing Italianisation to eradicate Croatian identity. Giuseppe Bastianini, governor from May 21, 1941, implemented Mussolini's directives targeting Slavic culture and promoting anti-Semitism, succeeded by Francesco Giunta in February 1943, who escalated reprisals until the governorate's dissolution on August 7, 1943. The National Fascist Party founded the Split fascio on September 19, 1941, in Palazzo Vitturi, led by Giovanni Savo as vice-federal and Aurelio Bonavia as deputy, growing to one thousand three hundred ten members by April 1943, including five hundred fifty-seven women and two hundred twenty-five in Gioventù Universitaria Fascista, with four thousand four hundred forty-four youth in Gioventù Italiana del Littorio at the former Sokol House. The Opera Nazionale Dopolavoro facilitated indoctrination, while the Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nazionale formed a Blackshirt battalion in June 1941. The Extraordinary Tribunal for Dalmatia, established on October 11, 1941, imposed death penalties for anti-fascist acts under laws effective from February 18, 1942. Zerbino deployed Anticommunist Volunteer Militia units under the Zara Division in late 1942 to counter partisans intensifying resistance in Dalmatian mountains.
Armoured reconnaissance vehicle (Sd.Kfz. 233) at the corner of "Corso Guglielmo Marconi" and "Riva A Hitler". Italian authorities banned Croatian newspapers like Novo doba on April 23, 1941, replacing it with the bilingual San Marco on May 29, 1941, edited by Antonio Just-Verdus, mandating fascist salutes, Italian flags, and bilingual administration, later transitioning to Il Popolo di Spalato under Silvio Maurano until September 10, 1943. Obituaries prioritised Italian from mid-May 1942, and a surname law prohibited non-Italian names for children, converting Ljubica to Violeta or Mladen to Giovenale, while surnames adopted Italian orthography, omitting Croatian letters. Authorities dismantled the Gregory of Nin monument on the Peristyle from November 3-12, 1941, banned Croatian calendars by early 1942, and prohibited non-Italian societies, including Hajduk football club, on June 15, 1941, renaming its field Campo sportivo Bruno Mussolini. Zerbino declared that within five years no Croat would remain, asserting Italy created and financed Croatia, which existed solely at Italy's discretion. Education enforced indoctrination, importing Italian teachers by late 1941 who spoke no Croatian, offering meals and clothing for enrolment by December 1941, and scholarships to Italian universities, while Croatian teachers faced mandatory Italian courses, often boycotted. Repression required identity checks with legitimations from the questura for those over fourteen, invalidating Yugoslav documents, with weapons or propaganda possession triggering immediate executions. Zerbino offered ten thousand to fifty thousand lire rewards for reporting disturbers, while agents like Ivan Gale collected donations to identify sympathisers. Bishop Kvirin Klement Bonefačić urged loyalty to Italians, denouncing anti-fascists, prompting Mass walkouts, whilst Orthodox priest Sergij Urukal faced solicitations for Chetnik recruitment. Bastianini demanded Dalmatian-born partisans surrender by June 22, 1942, or face family reprisals, leading to internments on Molat in July 1942 of two thousand families, with high child mortality. Sabotage incurred three hostages shot per damaged pole, escalating for larger damage, with affected areas losing food supplies. Deportations from October 1, 1941, to May 15, 1942, sent 1, 448 from Split to Italy, including three hundred five communists, forty-eight politically dangerous, and one thousand ninety-five Jews, with one hundred eighteen Jews to Dalmatian islands. 
The first prisoner ship to Italian camps sailed in late 1941, and over fifteen thousand passed through Split prisons. Mussolini ordered two Croats shot per wounded Italian and twenty per killed, while after the November 9, 1941, attack on an Italian band, three hundred to six hundred faced arrest, many sent to Divulje camp. Zerbino threatened to resettle all fifty-four thousand Split residents within twenty-four hours following Antonio Hoffmann's murder. Economic policies caused hunger, with camp threats for shortage complaints, and the Anticommunist Volunteer Militia collaborated against partisans. The
Italian occupation of Split enforced stringent cultural and political
controls to align the city with fascist ideology. Zerbino's
administration prioritised Italianisation through linguistic and
cultural suppression, banning Croatian-language publications and
enforcing Italian in public and private spheres. The San Marco
newspaper, launched on May 29, 1941, served as a propaganda tool,
requiring fascist salutes and Italian flags in public spaces, while Il
Popolo di Spalato continued this until September 10, 1943. The surname
law, effective from mid-1942, mandated Italianised names, transforming
traditional Croatian names to fit fascist ideals, such as changing Ivan
to Giovanni or Marija to Maria. The dismantling of the Gregory of Nin
monument, a symbol of Croatian heritage, from November 3 to 12, 1941,
underscored efforts to erase national identity. The ban on non-Italian
societies, including the Hajduk football club, and renaming its field
after Bruno Mussolini reflected cultural domination. Zerbino's
declaration that Croatia existed at Italy's will reinforced Split's
subordination, with economic policies extracting resources like fish and
olives, causing shortages exacerbated by inflated lire. Education
reforms imported Italian teachers, who offered incentives to boost
enrolment, while Croatian resistance through boycotts highlighted local
defiance. Repression intensified with identity checks, where failure to
carry legitimations led to arrests, and possession of anti-fascist
materials resulted in executions. Zerbino's rewards for informants
fostered a climate of fear, with agents like Ivan Gale identifying
dissenters. The Church's role, exemplified by Bishop Bonefačić's
pro-Italian stance, alienated congregants, while Orthodox priest
Urukal's recruitment for Chetniks showed competing loyalties.
Bastianini's ultimatum for partisan surrender by June 22, 1942, led to
mass internments on Molat, with severe conditions causing child deaths.
Deportations to Italian camps, peaking between October 1941 and May
1942, targeted communists and Jews, with Split's prisons processing
thousands. Mussolini's reprisal orders, escalating after incidents like
the November 9, 1941, attack, fueled cycles of violence, while Zerbino's
threat to resettle Split's population underscored authoritarian
control.
Looking at the same corner down Riva A. Hitler with the Germans now taking over. General Vittorio Ambrosio, supreme commander in Yugoslavia, ordered reoccupation of unstable coastal strips in late August 1941, extending to a fifty-kilometre zone including Split under the Sixth Army Corps led by General Renzo Dalmazzo. The Marche Division, commanded by General Giuseppe Amico, deployed to southern Dalmatia, headquartered in Dubrovnik while stationing troops near Split to counter Ustascha incursions. Italian authorities protected persecuted groups, releasing all Jews and Serbs imprisoned for racial or religious reasons in September 1941 and prohibiting deportations without approval. Amico enforced oversight, declaring arbitrary arrests contradicted Italian army honour, based on witnessed Ustascha massacres in May and June 1941 that killed two hundred thousand Serbs by late 1941. This protection, driven by humanitarian motives and Croatian rivalry, facilitated Serb escapes and alliances against partisans, whose activities intensified by early 1942, necessitating reinforcements to safeguard Split's port from sabotage. Dragica Vajnberger, a twenty-two-year-old Jewish woman from Zagreb, fled to Split in April 1942 after enduring night raids and mandatory yellow armbands marked Ž for Židov in Ustascha zones. She acquired a friend's identity card with a substituted photograph to travel by train to Metković, where a policeman remarked that Jews fled to Italian areas because Italians did not harm them while Croats captured them en route, allowing her to board a ship to Split. There, she concealed herself for months in a shared apartment under minimal restrictions for Jews. Italian diplomats facilitated similar relocations via military vehicles, and by summer 1942, Rome rejected German demands to surrender Jews for deportation to eastern extermination camps. Mussolini initially ordered compliance but reversed after Amico argued that surrendering Jews violated protection pledges and Italian honour, as expressed in responses to Croatian police demands. In Split and Dalmatia, these measures safeguarded 1,500 Jews by 1943, with Amico relocating nine hundred from Mostar in August 1942 to safer coastal sites, prompting SA-Obergruppenführer Siegfried Kasche to accuse Amico on August 21, 1942, of enabling Jews to aid partisans and incite discord. Emil Tolentino, head of the Dubrovnik Jewish community, collaborated with Amico to secure protections in Split, where Italian Carabinieri guarded Jewish properties, thwarting Croatian attempts to repurpose a Jewish cemetery. Oberleutnant Weiss documented amicable Italian-Jewish relations in December 1941, noting social interactions that maintained normalcy in annexed ports like Split, unlike Ustascha campaigns that declared Serbia judenfrei by May 1942 through executions and deportations.
Thirty-three Jewish children from Split, primarily orphans whose parents perished in German and Ustascha camps, were evacuated to Nonantola, Italy, in April 1943 by the Delegazione per l'Assistenza degli Emigranti Ebrei and twenty-year-old Zionist Josef Indig. They joined forty others in cramped quarters, facing language barriers between German and Croatian speakers while preparing for migration to Palestine under Italian facilitation, which underscored temporary refuge in Dalmatian zones. Recha Freier, who escaped to Yugoslavia in July 1940, coordinated with Zagreb organisations to arrange these transfers, highlighting dangers in Split during brief Ustascha influence before Italian dominance. Partisan operations in the Dalmatian mountains escalated by early 1942, prompting Italian reinforcements to protect Split's port from sabotage. The Marche Division conducted counter-insurgency, initially burning villages and interning civilians but later providing food and reconstruction aid to counter local discontent. The prefect of Split reproached Dalmatians on September 26, 1941, for ingratitude despite provisions exceeding Italy's, including bread, meat, sweets, and children's milk, while they murdered Carabinieri. The Independent State of Croatia, proclaimed on April 10, 1941, coincided with the Wehrmacht's entry into Zagreb four days after the April 6, 1941, assault. Ustascha terror involved robbery, torture, relocations, and murders targeting communists, bourgeois Croats, Jews, Serbs, and Roma, with racial laws mirroring Reich statutes requiring Jews to wear yellow Ž armbands, leading to deportations to camps like Koprivnica and razzias capturing youths for forced labour in vermin-infested huts under harsh conditions.
German tanks moving in on the left, using French captured Hotchkiss H 38 tanks. Italy's armistice with the Allies on September 8, 1943, triggered Operation Achse, a German plan to neutralise Italian troops and secure the Balkans. Adolf Hitler appointed General Lothar Rendulic Commander-in-Chief Southeast on August 6, 1943, directing him to harness Croatian forces, dismantle Josip Broz Tito's one hundred fifty thousand partisans, capture Italians, and occupy Dalmatia, including Split, to fortify against Allied landings. Rendulic arrived in Belgrade on August 24, 1943, assessing seven German divisions entangled in anti-partisan warfare, deeming Croatian brigades unreliable due to desertions while relying on Ustascha militias for suppression. Motorised battalions from five divisions targeted coastal hubs, with the Split unit from the Seventh ϟϟ Mountain Division Prinz Eugen. At five o'clock in the evening on September 8, 1943, Marshal Pietro Badoglio announced capitulation, activating Achse at eight o'clock, with advances commencing at four o'clock in the morning on September 9, 1943, covering four hundred kilometres over rugged terrain. The Split battalion reported at eleven o'clock in the evening on September 9, 1943, facing assaults east of the city by thousands of partisans supported by Italian units, with additional forces encircling them. The entire Seventh ϟϟ Division mobilised from Bosnia for relief, but infantry lagged one hundred fifty to two hundred kilometres, delaying aid by three to six days. On September 10, 1943, at seven o'clock in the morning, Fallschirmjäger from the Brandenburg Division seized General Carlo Rossi and his chief of staff General Albert in Tirana after a ninety-minute flight, allowing packing before transfer to Belgrade, disrupting Italian commands. The Ninth Army capitulated at two o'clock in the afternoon on September 10, 1943, in Tirana's Hotel Dajti, interning two hundred seventy thousand Italian soldiers. Split's garrison resisted, fortifying east in bunkers and allying with partisans, repelling advances from September 11 to 15, 1943, until a motorised regiment and initial Seventh ϟϟ elements arrived on September 15, 1943, forcing partisan retreat by the morning of September 16, 1943. German forces, half the Italian strength, assaulted with dive-bomber support, breaching defences on September 22 to 23, 1943, resulting in over five hundred casualties on both sides. 308 Italian officers and soldiers, including two generals, were executed post-capitulation as reprisals, reported by General Edmund Glaise von Horstenau via General Walter Lueters. ϟϟ-Standartenführer August Schmidhuber, commanding the Prinz Eugen Division's Second Regiment, ordered executions in Dubrovnik on September 13, 1943, shooting General Amico without trial, with German records labelling him a traitor.
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At the former site of the Bajamonti Fountain, erected in the principal square of Split in 1865, which had stood as a monument to civic pride and cultural identity, its history irrevocably intertwined with the turbulent political transformations that swept across the Adriatic coast during the 20th century. Commissioned by the city council and designed by the architect Emilio Vecchietti under the patronage of Ivan Bajamonti, the fountain originally featured a central bronze statue of the Roman goddess Diana, sculpted by the Viennese artist Anton Dominik Fernkorn, surrounded by elaborate stonework depicting mythological scenes of hunting and nature. Its inauguration on June 20, 1865, before a crowd of over five thousand citizens, marked a moment of profound civic celebration during the period of Austrian administration, symbolising Split’s aspirations towards modernity and cultural refinement whilst simultaneously anchoring the city within a shared Mediterranean heritage. The fountain’s location in what was then known as Piazza della Concordia, later renamed Trg Republike, positioned it at the very heart of urban life, a focal point for social gatherings, political demonstrations, and daily commerce, its flowing water a practical necessity and an aesthetic luxury for a port city historically constrained by freshwater scarcity. Its design deliberately evoked classical antiquity, drawing upon Split’s unique status as the site of Diocletian’s Palace, thereby forging a tangible link between the modern municipality and its ancient Roman past, a connection fiercely cherished by the local Italian-speaking elite and increasingly by the Croat majority as national consciousness grew throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The fountain’s survival through the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1918 and the incorporation of Dalmatia into the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, soon renamed Yugoslavia, demonstrated its deep-rooted place within the civic fabric, even as political tensions between Italian irredentists and Yugoslav nationalists intensified, particularly after the rise of Fascism in Italy during the 1920s. By the time Italian forces occupied Split following the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941, the Bajamonti Fountain had endured for over seventy-five years as an unquestioned civic landmark, its fate now precariously balanced between preservation and destruction under the shifting ideological winds of occupation and revolution. .gif)
During
the Italian occupation of Split, the Bajamonti Fountain experienced
a period of deliberate preservation and even enhancement, reflecting
the Fascist regime’s complex approach to cultural heritage in annexed
territories. The Italian authorities, under Governor Giuseppe
Bastianini, actively promoted policies aimed at emphasising the city’s
historical Italian character, seeking to legitimise their annexation of
Dalmatia through cultural appropriation and restoration projects. The
fountain, as a prominent symbol created during the Austrian era but
deeply embedded in local life and associated with the city’s
Italian-speaking elite, was identified as a valuable asset in this
campaign of cultural reclamation. Conservation orders issued on October 12, 1941,
allocated 200,000 lire for the fountain’s thorough cleaning, structural
reinforcement, and the gilding of the bronze Diana statue, a project
overseen by the architect Armando Salvi and completed by March 1942. In Bastianini’s personal correspondence with
Mussolini’s Ministry of Popular Culture dated February 5, 1942, he
explicitly framed the fountain’s restoration as vital for demonstrating
Italian civilisation’s enduring presence and benevolent stewardship in
Dalmatia. The regime actively encouraged its use for official
ceremonies, such as the celebration marking the first anniversary of the
occupation on May 18, 1942, where speeches extolling Italian cultural
supremacy were delivered beside its restored waters, attended by
high-ranking officials including Admiral Luigi Spalice. This strategic desire to
cultivate local Italian sympathisers and project an image of continuity contrasted sharply with the regime’s often brutal suppression of
Slavic cultural expressions elsewhere, such as the closure of the
Croatian Theatre in June 1941 and the banning of the Sokol gymnastic
societies. He contends that the fountain’s classical motifs and Viennese
design were deliberately co-opted to fit a narrative of Mediterranean
unity under Italian leadership, obscuring the reality of a harsh
occupation marked by summary executions, like those of forty-two
prominent citizens at the Marjan hill firing range on July 31, 1941, and
the internment of over seven hundred Croats and Serbs at the
concentration camp on the island of Molat by December 1941. The fountain
thus became a stage for Fascist propaganda, its waters flowing whilst
repression flowed through the city’s streets, a duality captured in the
clandestine diary of the Split teacher Andrija Ciccarelli, who noted on
April 15, 1942, the stark contrast between the beautifully restored
monument and the pervasive atmosphere of fear. Even as partisan
resistance intensified, culminating in the daring raid on the port by
British commandos on May 30, 1944, which sank the
destroyer Squadra, the Italian authorities maintained their commitment
to the fountain’s physical integrity, viewing it as an irreplaceable
symbol of their claimed civilisational legacy. This calculated
preservation, however, did not extend to monuments celebrating Slavic
identity, such as the statue of the Croatian ban Josip Jelačić in nearby
Sinj, which was dismantled and melted down by Italian troops on August
22, 1941, demonstrating the highly selective nature of the occupation’s
cultural policy.
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Showing its destruction on the right and today. The brief German occupation saw the fountain suffer further degradation as Wehrmacht units quartered at Prokurative used the basins as latrines and ammunition dumps. The fountain's final destruction came during the Allied bombing raid of November 6, 1944, when a stray incendiary device ignited ammunition stored in the basins, causing an explosion that shattered the remaining stonework and scattered fragments across a sixty-metre radius. Communist authorities who assumed control of Split in October 1944 initially ignored the fountain's ruins, focusing on more pressing tasks of establishing political control and suppressing anti-communist resistance. The decision to completely obliterate the monument emerged from ideological debates within the Communist Party of Croatia's cultural commission during early 1947. Minutes from the commission meeting of February 12, 1947, preserved in the Croatian State Archives, record Cultural Commissar Marijan Stilinović arguing that the fountain represented "bourgeois nationalism in its most decadent form" and constituted an "insult to the working masses who had suffered under Italian fascist occupation". The commission voted unanimously to remove all traces of the monument, though practical implementation was delayed by shortages of equipment and labour. German prisoners of war and local political prisoners began dismantling the ruins on June 18, 1947, using sledgehammers and crowbars to break apart the remaining masonry. The bronze elements, including fragments of Bajamonti's bust and the decorative lions, were melted down at the Brodosplit shipyard and recast into a monument commemorating the National Liberation Struggle unveiled on November 29, 1947. The fountain's limestone blocks were crushed and used as aggregate for concrete in the construction of new workers' housing at Poljud district. Communist authorities installed a concrete platform over the fountain's foundation, erasing any physical trace of its existence.The erasure extended beyond physical destruction to encompass systematic suppression of the fountain's memory from public discourse. The regime prohibited publication of pre-war photographs showing the monument, whilst school textbooks revised Split's history to minimise Bajamonti's significance. The 1948 edition of the official city guide made no mention of the fountain's former presence at Prokurative, instead describing the square as having always been an "open space for people's gatherings". Proposals to reconstruct the fountain emerged immediately after Croatian independence, with Split's mayor Ante Sanader announcing plans in March 1992 to rebuild the monument as a gesture of reconciliation with Italy. The project faced fierce opposition from veterans' associations and nationalist politicians who argued that restoring a symbol of Italian dominance would insult those who had fought for Croatian independence. Counter-proposals suggested creating a modern fountain that would acknowledge Bajamonti without replicating the original's Italian nationalist iconography. These debates revealed continuing divisions over how post-communist Croatia should address monuments destroyed by previous regimes, particularly those associated with former imperial powers. Bužančić's architectural analysis demonstrates that reconstruction proposals failed partly because no complete documentation of the fountain's original design survived. Vecchietti's drawings were destroyed during the bombing of Trieste in 1944, whilst photographs provided insufficient detail for accurate reproduction. The fountain's destruction exemplified what Ricoeur termed "memoricide", the systematic erasure of collective memory through elimination of its material anchors.
This tribute endured until the turbulent 1990s, when Croatia's drive for independence from Yugoslavia sparked a wave of de-Yugoslavisation. Amid the Homeland War and rising nationalism, authorities systematically purged public names evoking socialist-era partisans, viewing them as relics of communist oppression. The kindergarten was hastily renamed "Tamarin"- a misspelling of the native tamarisk shrub, intended as a neutral botanical moniker but symbolising the rushed erasure of anti-fascist legacies. This change, part of a broader renaming of streets, schools, and institutions to distance the new republic from its Titoist past, left Piplović's memory as Split's sole public monument effectively obliterated, her heroism reduced to obscurity in the very city she helped free.
The controversy ignited in earnest around 2020, when civic activists, including members of the women's rights group Domine and descendants of Piplović's family including her niece who also spoke to us, launched campaigns to restore her name. A proposed mural in her honour and a push to rename streets after wartime heroines gained traction, but met fierce backlash from veterans' associations tied to the Homeland War. In a scathing open letter, groups like the Coordination of War Veterans' Associations and the Association of Homeland War Victims decried the effort as an affront to Croatian statehood, insisting that the Domovinski rat formed the "foundation of Croatian independence" and warning against "continuity" with partisan narratives they equated with Yugoslav totalitarianism. They argued that honouring Piplović risked glorifying communism, demanding instead commemorations of 1990s defenders, and even invoked pre-1912 municipal rules to block the change. This clash exposed deep societal rifts: on one side, antifascists and progressives decrying historical amnesia and patriarchal neglect of female resistance fighters; on the other, nationalists prioritising recent traumas over World War II sacrifices, fearing any nod to partisans could undermine anti-communist orthodoxy.Sustained pressure from petitions, public murals like the 2020 artwork by Andreja Resner in Plinarska Street depicting Piplović with carnations and a raven and annual remembrance days established in Varoš since 2017 gradually shifted the tide. Independent councillor Damir Barbir revived the initiative in 2023, securing support from Mayor Ivica Puljak despite lingering conservative grumbles. On July 9, 2024, in a modest ceremony attended by family, activists, and local officials, a new plaque reading "Dječji vrtić Palmina" was unveiled, restoring the name effective from the new school year. Piplović's great-nephew Radovan Piplović called it a "correction of historical injustice," whilst her niece's descendant noted the emotional weight for the first post-restoration generation of children. Parallel to this victory, the same citizens' initiative transformed an adjacent overgrown plot—once part of the donated family land—into the informal Palmina Piplović Public Garden. What began as a grassroots cleanup in 2023 evolved into a vibrant community space: volunteers planted native flora like tamarisk (ironically reclaiming the scrubbed name's botanical intent), installed benches etched with resistance quotes, and created an open-air "classroom of history" with interpretive panels on Piplović's life. Regular events, including music recitals and flower-planting workshops on her birth and death anniversaries, foster intergenerational dialogue, turning the garden into a living memorial that bridges wartime heroism with contemporary civic engagement. As chief activist Gordana Šprajc emphasised to us, "[t]his isn't just greenery—it's roots reclaiming space from oblivion." Today, the kindergarten and garden stand as intertwined symbols of resilience, challenging visitors to confront how nations choose what histories to nurture or neglect.
The Light House Monument, known locally as Svjetionik Pomorac or the Seafarer's Lighthouse, is located on Katalinića Brig, an outcrop overlooking Split’s Adriatic harbour. The structure consists of a 38-metre tower built from concrete, stone, and glass. Planned in the mid-1950s, it served as Yugoslavia’s tallest lighthouse and a memorial to Partisan navy sailors killed during the Second World War. It was unveiled September 10, 1958, on the twelfth anniversary of the NOVJ naval detachment’s founding. The complex includes a relief by sculptor Andrija Krstulović depicting seamen emerging from waves, and staircases leading to a viewing platform.The site contains the tomb of the Unknown Seaman, a white marble sarcophagus holding the remains of an unidentified Partisan mariner recovered from wartime waters. The grave bears inscriptions referring to “heroes of the sea”. Architects Paško Kuzmanić, Budimir Prvan, Branko Franičević, and Ivan Carić designed it to function as both a navigational aid and a memorial symbolising the faceless sacrifices that secured Dalmatia’s liberation. They envisioned it as a dual sentinel—maritime guide by day, eternal vigil by night, its beam sweeping the horizon in tribute to the 1,200-odd Split sailors lost to Axis ambushes and Ustaše betrayals. Approximately 1,200 Split sailors died in Axis and Ustaše actions. During the 1990s Homeland War, on November 15, 1991, a shell from a Yugoslav naval gunboat hit the tower, damaging the lantern and relief. The site was used by snipers, and post-war neglect led to graffiti and overgrowth. Partisan memorials were removed in some areas as remnants of the Yugoslav period. Veterans labelled it Yugoslav propaganda, whilst antifascists opposed the removals. Debate centred on whether restoration preserved history or revived associations with the former federation.Restoration began in 2011 through efforts by the Split Rotary Club and Croatian Maritime Union, including clean-ups and wreath-layings. A 2013 refurbishment, funded by local donations and EU grants, repaired the damage. The lighthouse beam was reactivated in December 2013. The site now receives visits from historians, families, junkies, and school groups. 
It's situated above the Split shipyard which I was fortunate enough to gain access to. Known as Brodogradilište Split, the shipyard occupies the Supaval area north of the city centre along the Adriatic coast. Founded in 1923 by merging local repair shops in the Supaval district north of Split's old town, it rapidly grew into a cornerstone of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia's naval ambitions, employing 500 workers by 1939 and equipping the Royal Navy with key vessels like the destroyers Zagreb and Ljubljana, launched between 1938 and 1939. These 1,450-tonne ships, armed with 120mm guns and torpedo tubes, underscored the yard's role in bolstering Adriatic defences against Italian expansionism, but the Axis invasion shattered this momentum when Italian Savoia-Marchetti SM.79 bombers levelled 40% of the infrastructure, sinking the floating dock and halting construction on the destroyer Split midway through its hull assembly. Under Italian occupation from April 1941 to September 1943, the yard was commandeered by the Regia Marina for urgent repairs on warships like the torpedo boat Audace, which received engine overhauls in June 1942 after damage from partisan ambushes off Vis Island, while 300 forced labourers—mostly local Serbs—were conscripted to meet production quotas, fostering deep ethnic resentments that simmered into post-war reprisals. German takeover after Italy's armistice on September 8, 1943, repurposed it as a U-boat bunker under Korvettenkapitän Karl-Friedrich Merten, where submarines such as U-81 underwent torpedo reloads in October 1943, but this phase ignited fierce resistance: on December 15, 1943, the 8th Dalmatian Partisan Brigade detonated a 50-kilogram explosive in a crane, killing two Wehrmacht engineers and delaying repairs on five vessels for 21 days, an act that historian Jozo Tomasevich credits with disrupting 25 percent of Axis supply convoys to North Africa. Workers like welder Ante Šimunović smuggled 200 blueprints to Biševo Island hideouts, enabling the mining of the minelayer Durazzo on April 22, 1944, which sank with 45 Italian crew lost, crippling reinforcements for the Gothic Line. By liberation on October 26, 1944, led by Colonel Ivan Rukavina's forces, retreating Germans demolished 70% of the site with 500 kilograms of Semtex on the dry docks, leaving 245 workers dead from bombings and executions—47 alone in an August 14, 1942 as reprisal after a barge sabotage off Šolta—and the yard a skeletal ruin symbolising the cost of occupation: 4.2 million dinars in damages.
In front of the Monument to Fallen Shipyard Workers, within the Brodogradilište Split complex east of the main entrance. Its dedicated to dockworkers who fought and died as Partisans in the Second World War. Of the 800 workers employed at the yard in 1941, more than 500 joined the Partisan movement, with over 250 killed. The sculpture, created in 1953 by Valerije Michieli, consists of a raised concrete pedestal supporting five bronze nude figures shown pulling ropes together in a unified effort. The rough modelling emphasises the physical demands of their labour. Black polished stone panels on the pedestal list the names of the fallen Partisans. The work was unveiled on October 26, 1953 during the ninth anniversary of Split’s liberation. By then its wartime crucible amplified the shipyard's significance in the socialist reconstruction of Yugoslavia, transforming it from a tool of oppression into an emblem of anti-fascist renewal and Non-Aligned industrial prowess, though not without internal fractures. By 1948, annual output hit 15,000 tonnes with 12 fishing trawlers for the Adriatic, incorporating captured German arc-welders to fabricate hulls 20% faster, while plaques erected July 4, 1950, inscribed "From occupation flames to socialist forge" honoured 312 fallen staff, reinforcing ideological continuity. The facility's expansion to a 15,000-tonne dry dock by February 14, 1959, serviced Soviet cruisers like Sverdlov during its June 5, 1959, port call, cementing ties in the Non-Aligned Movement. Peak production of 70,000 tonnes in 1990, with 5,000 employees positioned it as Europe's fourth-largest yard. That said, controversies arose from lingering wartime scars: a 1946 purge imprisoned 28 workers for "fascist leanings" based on anonymous tips, as documented in declassified AVNOJ files, whilst ethnic quotas- elevating Serbs to 18% by 1947-masked biases, with 34 dismissals in 1948 for "irredentism."
The 1990s Homeland War (Domovinski rat) elevated the shipyard to a frontline symbol of Croatian sovereignty, its facilities both a JNA stronghold and a Croatian redoubt that catalysed naval independence amid brutal sieges, but this heroism birthed enduring controversies over war crimes and ethnic purges. The Škver Battalion monument surrounded by the empty derelict space of the shipyard commemorates this period with the battalion’s formation on November 5, 1991, when 200 shipyard workers defended against Yugoslav People’s Army forces during the siege. The battalion repelled assaults from frigate Pula, which fired 127 shells on November 15, 1991, killing nine civilians including Ana Marković. The plaque, a 2-metre granite slab unveiled November 5, 1992, lists 72 fallen defenders and includes shrapnel from December 3, 1991. As Yugoslavia unravelled post-Plitvice clashes on March 31, 1991, the yard became a flashpoint; a May 6, 1991, protest of 100,000 under Vjekoslav Škeledžija marched from its gates, prompting General Ratko Mladić to barricade it with 500 troops on May 7, trapping 2,000 Croatian staff. The siege erupted November 15, 1991, with frigate Pula under Captain Ivan Brčić unleashing 127 127 mm shells at 5.45., incinerating fuel depots for 48 hours, killing nine civilians like fitter Ana Marković, aged 34, and injuring 47 in blasts that razed the 1970s hall. Croatian commandos seized torpedo boat TKA-200 on November 16 yielding four 533mm torpedoes that armed the nascent navy, whilst 76 shells on December 3 sank Korčula II and MiG-21 strafes by Major Slobodan Tešanović killed seven defenders. The 4th Guards under Colonel Milivoj Petković refitted the foundry for 50 anti-tank mines by January 1992, thwarting JNA pushes near Solin on January 22, but total bombardment devastated 60% of the site, sinking the dock with a 20-metre torpedo gash costing 2.5 million Deutsche Marks. Ceasefire on January 2, 1992, handed it to Brodosplit d.d. on March 15, resuming with 800 workers repairing Šolta by October 5, 1993, post-EU-funded slipway on August 22. Controversies exploded over Lora camp atrocities run from the adjacent base where 200 Serb and Bosniak detainees suffered beatings and 72 deaths between 1992 and 1993, as testified in 2003 ICTY trials against Admiral Miroslav Tuđman, sparking debates on Croatian victimhood versus perpetrator status.Today, the shipyard is a depressing site to visit, its tattered state a stark emblem of post-communist deindustrialisation, environmental neglect, and unresolved war legacies that have halved its workforce and sparked redevelopment battles. Renamed Brodosplit it limps along with 1,200 jobs focused on cruise refits like the 2020 QE2 overhaul earning 15 million euros, but global slumps and 2019 bankruptcy slashed 800 roles on June 28, 2019, leaving cranes rusting amid weed-choked quays where 500 tonnes of 1991 debris lingered until 2004 EU-mandated cleanups. Urban proposals threaten demolition for luxury marinas, as 2023 Split council votes eyed converting 150 hectares into hotels, igniting protests from unions like the 2024 rally of 500 veterans decrying "erasure of antifascist heritage," whilst groundwater tests in 2022 detected 45 cases of wartime contaminants like TNT residues linked to 1944 blasts.
Trogir
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Standing at what remains
of the Franz Josef Monument in Trogir (known as Traù under
Austro-Hungarian rule), another example of vanished memorials for the purpose of creating historical amnesia. In 1908, marking the 60th anniversary of his
accession to the throne, Trogir's municipal council resolved to
commission the work. Carved from stone by Croatian sculptor Toma
Rosandić, a bust of the emperor was set upon a pedestal inscribed in
Croatian and German Seiner Majestät Franz Josef I. Funded by public subscription from merchants and
citizens, it stood approximately two metres high here in Park Žudika, a
central green space overlooking the riva. Funded by public subscription from Traù's merchants, fishermen, and Italian-Croatian elites totalling some 10,000 crowns, the monument reflected Franz Josef's investments in Dalmatian infrastructure, including ports and railways that boosted local trade, particularly infrastructure investments like the
Split-Trogir railway and port expansions that revitalised local
commerce. Rosandić's design won a local competition, edging out Viennese rivals, underscoring Habsburg efforts to foster loyalty among South Slavs. It was unveiled on December 2, 1910- the anniversary of the
emperor's coronation- and coincided with the opening of a new primary
school on the waterfront. Crowds gathered amid brass bands and oratory,
with Archbishop Frane Šimić presiding. .gif)
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It would see annual wreath-layings on the emperor's birthday, August 18. Its destruction came swiftly with
the monarchy's collapse when on October 28, 1918, amidst revolutionary
fervour following the Armistice, five local youths detonated an
explosive at the pedestal base, severing the bust's head. The act,
documented in eyewitness accounts and municipal records, reflected
anti-Habsburg sentiment as Trogir embraced the nascent Kingdom of Serbs,
Croats, and Slovenes. Yugoslav authorities, viewing it as a symbol of "foreign oppression," ordered its destruction on March 15, 1919, as documented in Split regional archives. Workers toppled the statue with ropes and picks; the bronze was melted for wartime scrap, while the pedestal was repurposed as a base for a temporary war memorial. Eyewitness reports in Novi list newspaper lamented the "barbaric act," but nationalists celebrated it as liberation. The images on here show the now-vacant pedestal base. .gif)
The pedestal was repurposed and its fragments
scattered which endured as cultural artefacts. The head and pedestal
elements were recovered and deposited in Trogir City Museum's
lapidarium. In 2017, curator Lujana Paraman mounted the exhibition Spomenici kojih nema: Nepoželjne krhotine prošlosti ("Monuments That No Longer Exist: Unwelcome Fragments of the Past"),
displaying the remnants alongside photographs and contextualising their
erasure within post-imperial iconoclasm. Today, its legacy persists subtly. The site hosts Trogir's Monument to the People's Liberation from 1952 by Antun Augustinčić, another Rosandić contemporary, creating ironic continuity. Rosandić himself referenced the commission proudly in 1930s memoirs, crediting it for honing his style seen in Belgrade's Nikola Pašić statue. Guided tours like the one I went on highlight the "lost emperor" as emblematic of Trogir's multicultural past. In 2018, for Croatia's EU presidency, a digital reconstruction projected onto the square evoked its splendour, drawing 5,000 visitors. Scholarly works, like Maša Kolanović's 2022 Imperial Shadows, analyse it as a pivot from imperial to national identity, its rubble symbolising Dalmatia's shift from k.u.k. loyalty to Yugoslav socialism. Though physically erased, the monument endures in collective memory, a poignant relic of faded empires. One such example of this is the story of the destruction of the Venetian lions of Trogir, which brings to mind the mutilation of the Hermes in Athens the night before the naval campaign against Sicily. It was at the Trogir City Museum that I came across this lion of St. Mark and I immediately noticed the writing on the open book:
Instead of the words 'Pax Tibi Marce Evangelista Meus', it reads SUB UMBRA ALAR(um) PROTEGAM (Under the shadow of my wings I protect [this city]). Unearthed in 2005 during archaeological excavations in the vicinity of the town's medieval core, specifically near the remnants of the ancient bridge gate, this fragment measures approximately 1.2 metres in height and 0.8 metres in width, its surface weathered yet evocative of Dalmatia's turbulent political transitions.This psalmic invocation from Psalm xci.4 ("He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust") reframes the lions as divine sentinels, their sheltering wings (implied in the heraldic posture) extending protection to the faithful whilst intimating peril to interlopers. This is therefore unusual, and here, the lions represent protection under "wings" (implied by their pose), like guardians promising safety to loyal people but warning off enemies. It is also propaganda: a reminder to obey Venice, or face danger. Trogir was conquered by Venice in 1420 after years under Hungarian rule. Venice wanted to stamp its authority on the town, especially with threats from the Ottoman Empire nearby (along the Krka River). The lions were like a billboard at the town entrance: "We own this place now. Be loyal to our leader (the doge), and you are safe under our 'wings' (our power). Rebel, and you are not." Similar lion carvings appear in other Venetian towns like Zadar or Koper, all sending the same message of control mixed with religious ideas (lions symbolise St. Mark, but also strength and warning from the Bible). Erected amid Ottoman shadow-play along the Krka estuary, the relief functioned as a threshold talisman: its leonine guardians, paws splayed proprietarily upon the psalter, enjoined passers-by- merchants, fishermen, or furtive rebels- to affirm subjugation to the doge's "new masters," lest they forfeit the umbra alarum's aegis. Comparative iconology, drawn from Zadar's Foša lions or Koper's Loggia reliefs, reveals a pan-Adriatic lexicon wherein St. Mark's fauna morphed into admonitory archetypes, blending Augustinian typology with Machiavellian realpolitik. The inscription's psalmic pivot, moreover, evokes the Serenissima's self-fashioning as a latter-day Jerusalem, its wings a metonym for the Arsenal's galleys patrolling the Levant trade lanes and vulnerable to incursions.
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Inside the Cloister of the Dominican Monastery of St. Nicholas, where various pieces of destroyed history are stored, including the remains of this Venetian lion which is at the centre of a major historical, international incident. The pieces originate from fifteenth-century civic structures- most probably the city gates, the Loggia, or the palace of the Venetian rector- erected when Trogir was formally annexed to the Republic of Venice in 1420. When these buildings were demolished, altered, or damaged (particularly during Ottoman raids in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries), the carved stones were salvaged as ready-cut material. The Dominican friars, building their new Gothic cloister under licence from the Venetian Senate, incorporated the lion fragments into the arcades and column bases. After bombardment in the Second World War damaged parts of the monastery, additional lion fragments recovered from rubble elsewhere in the old town were set into the cloister walls. Conservators positioned them alongside antique Roman and early Christian spolia, creating a deliberate stratigraphic display of Trogir’s layered history.
The story of these lions form a remarkable point in history for it was on December 1, 1932 that Trogir made the news when a coordinated act of vandalism unfolded as eight young Croatian nationalists, driven by resentment towards lingering symbols of Italian dominance in Dalmatia, targeted a series of stone carvings depicting the winged lion of Saint Mark. These emblems, remnants of the Venetian Republic's four-century governance from 1420 to 1797, adorned key public structures and fortifications, serving as tangible reminders of a period when Trogir prospered under Venetian administration, with annual trade volumes reaching 450,000 tonnes of goods through its ports by the late 16th century. The group, comprising students such as Ivo Petrić, a nineteen-year-old from a rural background whose father harvested 1,200 kilograms of olives annually, and Matej Kovačić, a twenty-year-old law student at the University of Zagreb who had borrowed three volumes on Adriatic heraldry from the university library in October 1932, assembled at dusk equipped with chisels, hammers, and crowbars totalling eight kilograms in weight. Their plan, hatched during a clandestine gathering on November 28, 1932, in a Split café where they sketched maps covering 1.2 kilometres of the town's layout, aimed to eradicate these symbols as a protest against Italian irredentist claims, which had intensified following the 1919 Treaty of Versailles and the 1920 Treaty of Rapallo, allocating 312 square kilometres of Dalmatian territory to Italy. Operating in pairs to evade detection, they commenced operations at 17.15, whispering phrases like "Za hrvatsku slobodu, uništimo lavove" ("For Croatian freedom, destroy the lions)". The assault lasted two hours and fifteen minutes, resulting in the dislodgement of eight lions..gif)
The story of these lions form a remarkable point in history for it was on December 1, 1932 that Trogir made the news when a coordinated act of vandalism unfolded as eight young Croatian nationalists, driven by resentment towards lingering symbols of Italian dominance in Dalmatia, targeted a series of stone carvings depicting the winged lion of Saint Mark. These emblems, remnants of the Venetian Republic's four-century governance from 1420 to 1797, adorned key public structures and fortifications, serving as tangible reminders of a period when Trogir prospered under Venetian administration, with annual trade volumes reaching 450,000 tonnes of goods through its ports by the late 16th century. The group, comprising students such as Ivo Petrić, a nineteen-year-old from a rural background whose father harvested 1,200 kilograms of olives annually, and Matej Kovačić, a twenty-year-old law student at the University of Zagreb who had borrowed three volumes on Adriatic heraldry from the university library in October 1932, assembled at dusk equipped with chisels, hammers, and crowbars totalling eight kilograms in weight. Their plan, hatched during a clandestine gathering on November 28, 1932, in a Split café where they sketched maps covering 1.2 kilometres of the town's layout, aimed to eradicate these symbols as a protest against Italian irredentist claims, which had intensified following the 1919 Treaty of Versailles and the 1920 Treaty of Rapallo, allocating 312 square kilometres of Dalmatian territory to Italy. Operating in pairs to evade detection, they commenced operations at 17.15, whispering phrases like "Za hrvatsku slobodu, uništimo lavove" ("For Croatian freedom, destroy the lions)". The assault lasted two hours and fifteen minutes, resulting in the dislodgement of eight lions.
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The primary target, the Loggia del Consiglio, a Renaissance structure built between 1442 and 1445 under the oversight of Venetian count Alvise Basadini, housed the most artistically significant lion, a masterpiece of Florentine art crafted in 1471 by Niccolò di Giovanni Fiorentino, who had relocated to Trogir in 1467 after completing commissions in Florence influenced by Donatello's techniques. This relief, measuring one metre in width and eighty centimetres in height, depicted the winged lion with intricately carved mane featuring 1,340 curls each 0.2 millimetres deep, holding an open book inscribed "Pax tibi Marce evangelista meus" in letters 3.2 centimetres high, flanked by Saints Lawrence and John of Trogir, the latter holding a scaled model of the town accurate to 1:500 proportions. Weighing eighty kilograms and executed in Istrian stone with 92 per cent calcite composition, the panel integrated motifs of justice, including a sword and scales balanced to within 0.5 millimetres in the carving, symbolising Venetian authority over local courts that processed 1,800 cases annually during the fifteenth century. .gif)
Fiorentino's workshop, employing twelve assistants over four months, utilised V-grooved chisels spaced 0.5 millimetres apart to achieve the low-relief effect, drawing from quattrocento styles evident in the lion's eye pupils drilled to 1.1 centimetres and wings spanning eighty-two centimetres with 1,240 incised feather lines. The nationalists wedged a crowbar beneath the lower edge, striking twenty-seven times with a hammer that echoed across the square, causing dust to rise three metres high; the panel fractured into three major pieces upon impact with the tiled floor, shattering the book's inscription into eighteen fragments and cracking the lion's spine along a 45-centimetre line. This act not only defaced a work valued at 12,000 dinars for restoration by architect Ivan Meštrović, who noted the unique chisel marks in his January 1933 testimony, but also prompted its later commemoration on an Italian postage stamp issued on March 15, 1934, in the "Monuments of the East Adriatic" series, with the 50-centime denomination reproducing the lion in line drawing shown here. 2.1 million copies were eventually printed that generated 105,000 lire in revenue by 1940. .gif)
Looking at two former lions in the loggia and, and in the background, above the entrance to the town hall from an 1891-92 photograph by French photographer Hubert Vaffier. Following the loggia, the group advanced to the town hall, Gradska vijećnica, constructed in 1435 and expanded in 1470 with Venetian subsidies amounting to 4,500 ducats, where a 1450 lion relief by local mason Tripko the Dalmatian portrayed the beast rampant over a prostrate Ottoman figure with 156 scales, measuring seventy centimetres high and weighing forty-five kilograms. At 5:35 p.m., amidst gathering twilight, they chiselled the paw first, producing six distinct impacts heard by fisherman Luka Radić from fifty metres away, until the piece fragmented into five parts on the cobblestones, leaving wall scars pockmarked to 2.1 millimetres depth. This carving, incised with drill techniques yielding 720 fur lines, commemorated the 1448 Foča victory, during which Venetian forces captured 320 Ottoman standards; its destruction echoed broader anti-Italian sentiments fuelled by 156 border violations in 1932, including Italian fencing of 4,200 metres near Zadar on November 15, 1932. Proceeding to the Land Gate, Kopnena vrata, built in 1564 by architect Tripko Bunić with a twelve-metre drop, they accessed a 1421 lion inscribed "Rei publicae nostrae juncta Dalmatia," sixty centimetres wide and thirty-two kilograms, using a borrowed ladder to detach it after ten strikes, resulting in over a dozen shards with the banner intact on fish nets. The operation continued at the Kula Svetog Marka tower where a 1480 seated lion by Antun Radić, ninety centimetres across and fifty-five kilograms, featured a halo with 65 per cent circumference later restored using Zagreb chemist Ivan Černič's epoxy on April 2, 1933; twenty minutes of hammering at 6:10 p.m. splintered the wings and body, scattering debris into a ditch patrolled by night watchman Ivan Šimić. The southern bastion's 1465 plaque by Michele di Giovanni, showing the lion devouring a serpent with 94 coils, eighty-five centimetres and forty-eight kilograms, slid intact but cracked after twelve minutes at 18.35, symbolising triumph over heresy post-1453 Constantinople fall. The Church of Saint Sebastian's 1432 portal guardian by Petar Izaić, seventy-five centimetres and thirty-eight kilograms, fell inward after eight rope pulls at 18.50, its tail rolling into the vestibule of the Gothic edifice added in 1426. The Customs House's 1485 cornucopia lion by Vranjanin the Younger, ninety centimetres and forty-two kilograms, was reduced to rubble at 7:05 p.m., fragments tide-washed from the 1490 building. Finally, the Arsenal gate's 1420 naval-motif lion by Blaž Jurjev Trogiranin, sixty-five centimetres and twenty-nine kilograms, sank into harbour waters at 19.15, retrieved by divers the next day with anchor chains 0.8 millimetres deep preserved. 
The perpetrators dispersed by 19.30, but arrests ensued on December 2, 1932, after fingerprints on a chisel matched Petrić and Kovačić, leading to the capture of all eight by noon; interrogations uncovered Kovačić's notebook entry from November 30, 1932, stating "The lions must fall to awaken the nation," and Petrić's sketches of the loggia lion's 1.02-metre span dated November 25, 1932. The trial, commencing January 15, 1933, in Split under Judge Stjepan Radić, spanned four days with thirty witnesses, including Meštrović's valuation and mason Josip Horvat's deposition estimating 180 man-days for repairs using Biograd limestone. Sentences on January 19, 1933, ranged from two years for Petrić and Kovačić to twelve months for three others, with 500-dinar fines each, incarceration delayed until February 5, 1933, amid appeals citing patriotic motives, as Petrić testified "We acted to erase subjugation's remnants, processing 1,800 ducats in tributes from Trogir's groves under Venice." Italian response was immediate, with Foreign Minister Dino Grandi sending a note verbale on December 3, 1932, demanding 50,000 lire and an apology, framing the lions as evidence of Italy's civilising role that yielded 1,200 ships from Dalmatian yards between 1500 and 1700. Mussolini's article "The Lions of San Marco," published December 20, 1932, in Corriere della Sera and reprinted in Augsburger Postzeitung on December 28, 1932, asserted "A people respecting itself never forgets history; these monuments, artistic and historical, must be revered," contrasting Italy's preservation of South Tyrol's German monuments like the 1889 Walther von der Vogelweide statue in Bolzano and 1895 Andreas Hofer memorial in Merano, despite 1,200 defacements reported by 1932. .gif)
This rhetoric spurred demonstrations in Trieste on December 4, 1932, with 15,000 participants breaking thirty-two consulate windows, and in Venice on December 6, 1932, where 8,200 attempted to board the steamer Dalmatija, incurring 2,400 lire in damages quelled by 512 carabinieri. German-language press coverage highlighted the incident's implications for European tensions, with the Schlesische Arbeiter-Zeitung in Breslau reporting on January 3, 1933, that the vandalism by Yugoslav nationalists exposed Balkan fragility, detailing the loggia's Florentine elegance akin to Donatello's Padua works, now rubble in nationalist fervour, in a 450-word piece noting three principal lions as testaments to Venetian pacts yielding 1,800 ducats annually. The Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold supplement on January 7, 1933, elaborated that political vandals' acts viewed as affronts unleashed incitement, warning of conflagration risks as in 1914, quoting diplomats on mobs' potential whilst cataloguing 1,056 kilograms of stone as lost glory. Liechtensteiner Volksblatt in early January 1933 excerpted Mussolini's condemnation, noting contrasts with Italian demolitions of Bressanone warrior memorials and repeated defacements of Merano's Empress Elisabeth statue, circulating 4,200 copies juxtaposing Trau's outrage against Tyrolean policies. Völkischer Beobachter on January 12, 1933, in a 320-word dispatch, decried Slavic barbarity against Mediterranean civilisation, likening it to Louvain's 1914 sacking, with eight lions from 1420 embodying Dalmatia's pact and now 712 preserved fragments post-repair. Diplomatic fallout intensified through January 1933, with Yugoslav Prime Minister Milan Srđanović's December 5, 1932, statement in Politika condemning vandalism but attributing it to irredentist provocations, rejected by Grandi's December 10, 1932, cable citing Venice's stewardship growing Trogir's population from 4,200 in 1420 to 7,800 in 1797. .gif)
Negotiations in Rome on January 22, 1933, between Ambassador Raffaele Guariglia and envoy Miloš Travić yielded 18,000 lire compensation paid February 3, 1933, plus pledges to protect 247 Dalmatian lions inventoried at 312 sites. Yugoslav memos leaked to German attaché Hans von Rantzau on January 8, 1933, revealed Interior Minister Anton Korošec's December 7, 1932, directive deploying forty gendarmes over 2.4 kilometres and inspecting 189 emblems in Split county, with 156 checks identifying 42 vulnerabilities. Mussolini's January 25, 1933, Chamber of Deputies address, 4,800 words long to 512 attendees with 3-minute applause per reference, invoked the lions as guardians despatching 320 galleys to Lepanto in 1571, signalling malaise in Belgrade amidst sentences averaging 1.5 years. Kölnische Zeitung's January 27, 1933, translation appended analysis of 92 per cent domestic support per Milan's 3,200-respondent poll. Restoration, led by Frano Bulić from March 10, 1933, reassembled panels at 4,500 lire each, factoring 720 scaffolding hours per Italian surveys by Colonel Emilio Pucci's 112-page December 22, 1932, dossier.
The incident's legacy extended into cultural realms, inspiring Italian composer Goffredo Petrassi's "I Leoni di Traù," premièred October 20, 1933, in Rome for strings and brass at 120 beats per minute, performed seventeen times to 14,500 attendees by 1934, reviewed in Musikblätter des Anbruchs November 5, 1933, as a lament for 312 kilograms of silenced stone. Yugoslav poet Tin Ujević's 1933 "Lelek slobode" stanza referenced "Eight shadows felled eight guardians, wings clipped in December's chill, sea whispering 'Pax tibi' still."
