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Te town at “the top of Istria” preserved the names of rulers in its his-toric names. Its name in prehistory, when this was the site of the Illyrian sanctuary, is unknown to us while the Greek name Egida (Aegida), bound by legend to the myth about the Argonauts, is mentioned in the 1st c. BC. It developed in Roman times as Capris (Goat Island) or Insula Capraria owing to its favorable position along the Via Flavia and the fertile land in the hinterland. At the dusk of Antiquity, it became the shelter to the refugees from Pannonia, Noricum, Tergesta. Te im-portant Byzantine fortifcation was renamed to Justinopolis.

At the end of the 8th c., it belonged to the Frankish and afterwards German rul-ers. In battles of German Emperor Conrad II with Venice, it took the side of the emperor, and in 1035 was granted town rights, independence from the Margrave of Istria and large estates as far as the Dragonja River.

Trade between Koper and Venice was recorded as early as the 10th c. Although formally owned by the Patriarch of Aquileia since 1208, the town developed its au-tonomy, and became an important economic and political power of the northern Adriatic, thus a threat to Venice. Te Patriarch changed its name to Caput Ystriae,

that later yielded the Venetian variant Cao d’Istria (It. Capodistria). Apart from trade, its prosperity rested on the production and sale of salt that it monopolized in Istria since 1182. Its inhabitants ardently defended its independence during Vene-tian eforts to establish its administration, and Koper along with Pula led frequent rebellions during the 13th and 14th cc. that ceased only after the town was con-quered and plundered in 1380.

Urged by the rebellion in 1278, after which Koper was forced to swear loyalty to Venice, the Senate ordered the construction of the fortifcation Castel Leone. Te historic core is condensed, with a grid of narrow streets radially directed to-wards the central square with the cathedral. Perimetrally, along the walls and the town gate, eight squares were formed with churches. Several times reconstructed and pulled down during the Middle Ages, the Venetian walls from the 15th c. em-braced the entire island. Of the twelve medieval gates, only the Porta della Muda or del Ponte towards the mainland was preserved. It was the site where taxes were charged for goods entering the town. Most of the gates had a mandrač (tiny port) in front of them. Te organization of the town, conceived in today’s form at the

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