Page 47 - revitas_urbanaPOVsredista_ITL-ENG

It is not easy to find an attractive introduction for oprtalj , yet another fortifed town on the hilltop. No matter how attractive it was at the time of its prosperity, it is presently inexplainably neglected which is why it is usually not included in tourist itineraries of medieval towns. However, its development is not much diferent from other towns of the same group.

Here again, fragments of prehistoric pottery reveal that the settlement was formed on a hill plateau, on the northern side of the Mirna Valley. Life continued in Antiq-uity, while in its later phase, at the threshold of the Middle Ages, the population presumably grouped in the fortifed refuge on a defensible, elevated position, after which the settlement gradually developed into a castle of the High Middle Ages. In written sources from 1102 it was frst mentioned as Castrum Portulense when it was formally governed by the Patriarch of Aquileia. Te preserved buildings from that period consist only of remains of the defensive walls and part of the old Parish Church of St. George, visible in the lower zone of the northern wall.

Oprtalj was besieged by Venice in 1421 when it became part of the defensive sys-tem of the Venetian possessions in Istria. Te most impressive proof of reinforce-ment and extension of the walls is certainly the tower of the town gate, but equally important is the square tower below the parish ofce, later turned into a housing area. Te area within the walls saw new changes: the loggia was built not far from the entrance to the town, the grain storehouse was built in the central square, the earlier parish church was replaced by a new three-aisled church with ribbed and stellar vaulting with a deep polygonal sanctuary, whose elements are decorated by signatures of the masons of Carniola. Te peculiarity of their reliefs is not limited to the representations of saints. We are able to notice more secular fgures: the knight, the forest man and black man. Te church was consecrated in 1526, at the time when other towns had already gained Renaissance buildings. Tat is why it is unusual that Oprtalj insisted on the elements of the elapsed Gothic style. Less than a decade later, yet another church was in construction - that of St. Roch, decorated

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HISToRIC URBAn CoReS