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AND WHEN RENAISSANCE DOESN’T LOOK LIKE RENAISSANCE…?

When it comes to urban planning and architectural history of Kvarner’s more significant towns during the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance period, we can usually narrow it down to Venetian dominance. However, it becomes necessary to mention the activity of smaller regional cultural and episcopal centers from Zadar to Rab, Krk, Osor, and even Cres (which formally was not an episcopal town). Such influence can also be attributed to medieval Senj, situated in Velebit’s littoral. In comparison to all of these towns, the case of Rijeka stands out to some extent due to the fact that it obtained the status of an archdeaconry, and as such belonged to the diocese of Pula. Rijeka owes its development during the high Renaissance period to the twilight of urbanistic culture that occurred in the beginning of the 16th century when Senj was already completely militarized. Rijeka’s role in that period has been strikingly revealed in the letters of the Habsburg diplomats from the year 1553. The content of these letters reveals that during their diplomatic mission in Constantinople, Antun Vrančić and Franjo Zay, with mediation of Rijeka’s town council, conveyed the news about the murder of Suleiman’s eldest son, prince Mustafa, in detail. All of the aforementioned mediation was possible due to the fact that Rijeka was a secure Habsburg port. Statute of Rijeka created in the year 1530 as well as some other sources from the 1500s provide an elaborate picture of Rijeka as a vivacious town, which was renewed and entrenched after its destruction by Venetians in 1509 Nevertheless, the question of Rijeka’s appearance prior to all of that arises. The town’s later destiny certainly does not aid any attempts of such analysis. In 1719, Rijeka was proclaimed a free port. In the beginning of the other half of the 18th century, the town was smitten by a series of severe earthquakes. This occurrence, of course, was followed by a substantial renewal. A sudden urbanistic development that ensued in the late 19th and early 20th century came to its abrupt end during the urbanistic casualties of World War II. Rijeka also represents an example of an often very cruel post-war “restoration and construction”. The remains of the 15th century material heritage have been preserved in a relatively humble manner. Only in comparative analysis with written sources, primarily notarial documents are we enabled to reconstruct a pretty dynamic picture of the town which persevered in the Habsburg Monarchy’s zone of interest as well as under its administration later on. Rijeka was a port town squeezed under the hills with no significant agricultural production of its own. The town laid the basis of its revival on trade mediation with the common Adriatic merchandise such as oil and wine as well as the usually continental trademarks, such as metal, which arrived across the percutaneous passes and through the gates of Postojna. Notarial documents reveal the presence of merchants from Dubrovnik, Republic of Venice and Pesaro, located opposite to Rijeka. They also reveal the presence of one stonemason who arrived in Rijeka from Brioni islands, stonecutters from Kras situated in Rijeka’s hinterland as well as the widely known architect from Zadar. It was without a doubt that during the 15th century the first real urbanistic bloom of the medieval town was conducted. The medieval Rijeka emerged from the remarkable ruins of its ancient predecessor, which was militarized during the Late Antiquity, and from which Rijeka did not even inherit its name. The influence of the typical Dalmatian late Gothic period on the municipal investment in the sanctuary of the collegiate church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary is considered a distinctive example. Furthermore, when it comes to the area of Kvarner (Quarnero) during the late Middle Ages, a longer construction sequence of some parts of the Augustan Monastery during the 15th century is considered exceptional. At the time, this was still a monastery, which was developing as the foundation of the town’s feudal managers, precisely the elite that controlled the town from the court located inside the fortified residence in the northern brim of the town. Representativeness of this court can only be foreseen by reading the notarial documents. However, the remaining elements of 15th century’s architecture reside 28th InternatIonal IrClaMa ColloquIuM 43 inside the monastery’s circuit. The Church of Saint Jerome, which was built in accordance with the style of the 1400s, was radically adapted in the style of the Baroque period, but what remained of the late Gothic sanctuary has its template preserved in Styrian Fürstenfeld. Little of what remained from the masonry of the oldest phase of the stonewalled cloister allows us to recognize the formation similar to the one from the former Carthusian monastery Bistra beside Vrhnika. The design of families Raunacher and Rauber’s covenants allows us to recognize the influence of workshops that expanded from Kranjska towards the area of Kras as well as the Habsburg estates on Istrian grounds. Due to the implementation of the elements of Renaissance ornamental repertoire into extremely late Gothic, more precisely, the continental late Gothic architectural system, the case of the Rauber fam

City of Rijeka, Late Middle Ages, material heritage, written sources

Sažetak referata na međunarodnom znanstvenom skupu