Review article
https://doi.org/10.21857/m3v76t615y
ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL RESEARCH OF THE VARAŽDIN FORTRESS
Lovorka Štimac-Dedić
; Gradski muzej Varaždin
Abstract
The town of Varaždin was surrounded by a fortification in the shape of an
irregular quadrilateral with bastions, semi-circular half towers and north and
south town gates which were entered across wooden bridges stretching over
a moat. According to historical sources, its construction was associated with
the impending threat to the wider area of the Kingdom of Croatia and Styria in
the second half of the 15th century, while the underlying mediaeval fortification
layer that preceded it has not been sufficiently researched yet. Although
the exact time of the beginning of its construction remains unknown, the existence
and construction of the walls is mentioned in the sources as early as 1516.
Some elements indicating the appearance of the fortification around the settlement
before it was modernised are known from historical sources, but its final
transformation occurred in the Renaissance during the restoration of the feudal
fortification into a Wasserburg, when these two elements were connected with
a shared fortification system. Apart from repairs, after this period there were
no significant interventions on the fortification until the second half of the 18th
century, when the east and west walls were breached for the purpose of urban
development and to facilitate transport. At the beginning of the 19th century
the fortification was systematically demolished, leaving only the foundations of
the walls beneath the street level and individual segments in the foundations of houses. In the course of archaeological supervision, the existence of the remains
of the north and east part of the town wall was confirmed, the west wall was
investigated in systematic archaeological research as part of the Bastion project,
while the recent conservation-restoration research of the granary revealed the
remains of the north town wall, which constitutes the south wall of the granary.
The south town wall is the only wall that has not yet been included in archaeological
supervision, but it is visible in the foundation of a building in Sloboda
Square. All remains of the town walls share the same construction features and
the fact that the segments of all four sides of the walls were detected will facilitate
any kind of future reconstruction for presentational purposes. Since the
percentage of researched segments is very small compared to the overall surface
occupied by the town walls, only future archaeological research in Varaždin
can provide new insights on the subject.
Keywords
town of Varaždin; urban archaeology; Varaždin fortress.
Hrčak ID:
231080
URI
Publication date:
24.12.2019.
Visits: 2.121 *