Original scientific paper
HOW THE TOWN OF VRBOVEC BECAME THE REGION’S CENTER
Franjo Pajur
; Doktorski studij, Sveučilište u Mannheimu, Njemačka
Abstract
From the earliest times Vrbovec's history was closely linked with the history of the nearby Rakovec (variant names: Rakonog, Rokonok, etc.), once the central town in the region. Rakovec owes its relative significance in history to the Križevci-Zagreb road stretch that crossed its territory and along which came the Hungarian and Croatian kings' armies in the 13th and 14th centuries, as well as those of the Croatian dukes and bans. This was the reason why it was called the army road, and sometimes Koloman's road or simply – the grand road.
This route was protected on both sides by a system of fortifications situated on the nearby hills (for instance on Kalnik, Moravče and Blaguša) or on the very road (as for instance Križevci and Rakovec). The town-fort Rakovec was therefore based at an adequate distance from Kiževci, as one of the points of protection for this important route, whereas the choice of the very settlement’s location it seems, had been made because of there being a drinking water source – a strategic article in the Middle Ages. Rakovec, the future king's property (or the property of the dukes and bans), links the nearby properties, among which is also the Vrbovec one.
In the same way, and this is based on the central point theory, – besides being a defense center (town fort), the Rakovec settlement also becomes the region's leading administrative center (center of a vast feudal possession), a religious center (the parish Saint George Church) and the economic center (trade point in the part of town under the fortified place, fair, toll-house). During the reign of ban Mikec (around the year 1340), the castle and the Rakovec property (together with Lukovec in Turopolje) became to a certain degree the area belonging to Medvedgrad. Due to the fact that the Medvedgrad property had never been very big: in times of peace it had hardly some 60 bondsmen (whereas the Lukavec castle had 10 homesteads), the Rakovec income was used for maintaining Medvedgrad, and a significant part of this item came from the earnings from the Vrbovec property.
After being separated from Medvedgrad and divided between the Erdödy brothers at the end of the 16th century, Vrbovec gradually gains its independence; the castle is erected and the market is developed. After the stagnation in the Rakovec region's development and the Vrbovec market's development; after the fair events are transferred from Rakovec to Vrbovec (during the Patačić reign), as well as the reducing of the Rakovec and increase of the Lonjičko markets, there is evident decrease in the Rakovec route’s importance and transferring of the trade route that had been leading from Hungary to the coast and passing along the Vrbovec stretch.
Namely, following the Sisak battle in 1593, the Ottoman raids towards the Vrbovec region ceased, and after there is no more direct danger from the Turks (especially after the Žitva peace treaty in 1606), the Križevci-Lovrečina-Vrbovec-Lonjica-Zagreb stretch as the shortest plain road gradually gains primacy over the Rakovec road which is also the naturally protected one and hilly one, but therefore the more difficult one, and thereby Vrbovec gradually became the central town in the area, remaining as such to date.
Keywords
Vrbovec; Rakovec; the central point theory; castle; the grand road
Hrčak ID:
70004
URI
Publication date:
7.1.2010.
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