Prethodno priopćenje
https://doi.org/10.17018/portal.2016.8
Fortresses in the Šibenik ''campo di sotto'' – the remains of Fort Vrpolje and Parisotto Tower
Ivo Glavaš
orcid.org/0000-0001-9576-6495
; Ministarstvo kulture, Uprava za zaštitu kulturne baštine, Konzervatorski odjel u Šibeniku, Hrvatska
Ivo Šprljan
; Ministarstvo kulture, Uprava za zaštitu kulturne baštine, Konzervatorski odjel u Šibeniku, Hrvatska
Sažetak
Fort Vrpolje and the Parisotto Tower originated as a reaction against constant raids by the Ottoman army that began in the second half of the 15th century in Donje Polje (campo di sotto), an area that was of vital importance for the sustenance the Šibenik Commune. Such a defense system was fully compatible with the efforts of other Dalmatian Venice-governed communes that were also in danger from Ottoman incursions. Other than to protect the populations of the settlements in Donje Polje, both fortresses also served as outposts that defended Šibenik against the enemy attacking its defensive walls. Fort Vrpolje was situated in the easternmost portion of Donje Polje, while the Parisotto Tower stood in its midst. The latter initially originated as a nobleman’s residence which, according to archival records, was erected in 1503 by Ivan Parisotto, a member of the Šibenik noble family of Šimunić. The first mention of the fortresses in official Venetian reports dates to 1520, and immediately after that the Parisotto Tower became a communal fortress. As early as the War of Cyprus (1570 – 1573), the two fortresses became outworks of the Šibenik defense system. With the outbreak of the Cretan War (1645 – 1669), the Šibenik population appealed to the Venetian authorities to fortify the town surroundings, principally having in mind two sites: St. John’s Hill directly above the town and Fort Vrpolje. Fort Vrpolje and the Parisotto Tower – about which there is considerably less historical record – had in the period between the War of Cyprus and the Cretan War been demolished and renovated on several occasions. It seems, however, that after they had been brought down in the early days of the Cretan War, they were never re-erected, as confirmed by their meager present-day remains. The Military Frontier was from the beginning of the Morean War (1684 – 1699) moved deep into the territory previously held by the Ottomans, rendering the renovation of fortresses in Donje Polje strategically redundant. After the Ottoman raids ceased, a part of the stone material from Fort Vrpolje ended up in houses of the eponymous local village. It is not possible to fully reconstruct the perimeter of Fort Vrpolje, owing to the scanty remains of former defensive walls. There is a particular problem concerning the prehistorical dry stone defensive wall that encircles the fort, as well as its function during the Venetian-Ottoman wars. This dry stone wall was possibly a kind of sub-wall of the fort, where the local population could also take shelter. Within Fort Vrpolje there is also preserved the original cistern and the church of St. John that was most probably fully reconstructed following the period of the Venetian-Ottoman wars. The defensive perimeter of the Parisotto Tower was large enough to house a garrison and protect the population of the surrounding settlements. The basic unit of defense was the defensive tower, and next to it there was a kind of bastion that may have been used to protect the original entrance to the tower. Two stone reliefs with coats of arms of the Venetian nobility – one built into St. John’s Church in Fort Vrpolje as spolia and the other found in the Parisotto Tower during an archaeological excavation – are impossible to attribute or date. The left coat of arms built into the front of St. John’s Church in Fort Vrpolje may be representing a nobleman from the Venetian family of Foscarini; there are two candidates who served as Šibenik Prince and captain in the period between the War of Cyprus and the Cretan War. If the coat of arms carved on the remains of the stone water well found in the Parisotto Tower did belong to one of Šibenik Princes (a not to the fortress castellan), this could have been Francesco Querini, Prince and captain of Šibenik from 1632 to 1634.
Ključne riječi
Donje Polje; Šibenik district; Fort Vrpolje; Parisotto Tower; War of Cyprus; Cretan War; Morean War
Hrčak ID:
171695
URI
Datum izdavanja:
28.12.2016.
Posjeta: 2.281 *