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Plague and Trade Control. Form and Function of the Dubrovnik Lazaretto

Lazaretto in the Dubrovnik suburb of Ploče is one of the few buildings constructed in the early modern period for the purpose of control of the spread of plague, that was preserved almost in its integral form. This Lazaretto was the last in a series of structures built by the Republic of Dubrovnik to quarantine merchants and travellers who came from pestiferous regions. Deliberately located next to the city gate, at the end of the caravan road that connected Dubrovnik with the Ottoman Empire, close to the docking facility in the port and the customs office in the city, the Lazaretto was part of the complex of buildings intended to stimulate and control trade, such as the han and čardak that accommodated Ottoman merchants after they were released from quarantine, and the bazaar where goods from the Dubrovnik hinterland were sold. Due to intense trade, the suburb of Ploče, together with the Lazaretto, became the meeting point of two cultures, the Western European and Ottoman. The Lazaretto was constructed in two phases between 1627 and 1647, based on a carefully conceived project that allocated almost more space in the Lazaretto to warehouses for disinfection of goods and courtyards in between, than spaces for quarantine of merchants and travellers. The form of the Lazaretto and its position confirm its primary trade-sanitary role that, with the general tendency towards the development of the lazaretto function in the second half of the 16th century, was still the result of the specific geopolitical situation of Dubrovnik and the intensification of overland trade in the first few decades of the 17th century. With its primary trade-sanitary role, the Lazaretto at Ploče still remained in the service of the local community, as one of the quarantine structures for the local population and the disinfection of their goods during plague outbreaks in the city of Dubrovnik.

plague, lazaretto, Dubrovnik, architecture, form

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