Monasteries in Croatia

Franciscan Monastery

The large complex of the Franciscan monastery is situated at the very beginning of Placa, to the left of the inner Pile Gate, next to the Holy Savior Church. The Franciscan order arrived in Dubrovnik around 1234. The first Franciscan monastery was built in the 13th century in the Pile area on the spot what is today Hotel Hilton Imperial. However as the City was threatened with war, in 1317, decision was made to demolis ...
Founded: 1317 | Location: Dubrovnik, Croatia

Dominican Monastery

Dominican monastery is located at the eastern part of The City, close to the inner Ploce gate where it merges with the City walls. Dominican monastery is one of the most important architectural parts of Dubrovnik and major treasury of cultural and art heritage in Dubrovnik as the museum of the monastery exhibits many paintings, artifacts, jewellery and other items from the rich history of Dubrovnik. The Dominicans establ ...
Founded: 14th century | Location: Dubrovnik, Croatia

Monastery of St. Francis Assisi

The Monastery of St. Francis Assisi in Zadar, along with a church of the same name, was built around 1221. It was consecrated on October 12, 1282 by bishop Lovro Periandar. Throughout the centuries of its history the monastery was the focal point of religious life in the city of Zadar. It was also home to the Franciscan school, precursor to today"s University of Zadar. It had rich picture gallery as well as a coll ...
Founded: 1221 | Location: Zadar, Croatia

St. Francis Monastery

On the slope of the hill between the Forum Square and the upper circular street, lies the monastic complex dedicated to St. Francis of Assisi, built in the 14th century at the site of a previous cultic edifice. The Franciscan community was first recorded in Pula in the 13th century. The church was built in 1314 in the late Romanesque style with Gothic ornaments, as a firm and simple building of the preaching Franciscan or ...
Founded: 1314 | Location: Pula, Croatia

Lokrum Monastery

The Benedictine Monastery is perhaps the most predominant of all points of interest on Lokrum island. The monastery is first historically referenced in 1023 and existed until some point in the 15th century at which point the Benedictine monks were forced to leave the island. Popular legend states that, upon their eviction from the island, the monks of Lokrum passed a curse on any who possessed the island. A portion of the ...
Founded: 11th century | Location: Dubrovnik, Croatia

Franciscan monastery

On the cape to the south of the Hvar lies the Franciscan Monastery with a church of Our Lady of Mercy, built in the late 15th century. Hanibal Lucić's grave is under the main altar in the church. The cloister, with its monumental rounded arches with a well in the middle, dominates the whole of the Renaissance monastery. The bell tower, in Renaissance style, is the work of an artist from Korčula. Within the peace and qu ...
Founded: 15th century | Location: Hvar, Croatia

Kosljun Monastery

Košljun is a tiny island in Puntarska Draga bay off the coast of Krk, facing Punat. It is approximately 300 meters in diameter and covers an area of 6.5 hectares, but is rich in vegetation. The only inhabitants are a group of Franciscan friars living in St. Mary's Monastery. The earliest known settlement on Košljun was a Roman villa rustica belonging to a landowner of the Roman settlement on Krk. The next solid evidenc ...
Founded: 1480 | Location: Punat, Croatia

Visovac Monastery

The Visovac Monastery was established in the 14th century by Augustinian monks, who erected a small monastery and church on the island dedicated to the Apostle Paul. In 1445, it was enlarged and adapted by Franciscans, who settled on the island having withdrawn from parts of Bosnia when invading Turks had taken over. A new monastery was constructed in the 18th century. The oldest preserved part of the current complex dat ...
Founded: 14th century | Location: Drniš, Croatia

Dominican Monastery

In at the place in Bol where once was a bishop"s palace today is the Dominican Monastery. It was built in 1475 and very close to it is a small church of Our Lady of Mercy. The most precious heritage of both monastery and church is the renaissance painting of Madonna and Child with Saints.
Founded: 1475 | Location: Bol, Croatia

Capuchin Monastery

Construction of the Capuchin Church began in 1701, completed in 1705 and dedicated to the Blessed Trinity. The Capuchin Church and Monastery were built in a stern and simple style, typical for Capuchin Monasteries. A small wooden turret has also been preserved. The Franciscans, interestingly enough, who lived on alms that were collected during the harvest, found the arrival of the Capuchins troubling, because they were af ...
Founded: 1701 | Location: Varaždin, Croatia

Monastery of the Holy Trinity

The Franciscan monastery in star dates from the 18th century, and is also Baroque in style, with exceptional architecture, especially of the church yard, and monastery church interior, with its beautiful altar and paintings. In 1720, a faculty of philosophy was opened here.
Founded: 18th century | Location: Slavonski Brod, Croatia

Orebic Monastery

Our Lady of the Angel (Gospa od Anđela) is a monastery that is located near Orebić. The monastery was built at the end of the 16th century under the Republic of Ragusa (Dubrovnik), to which the town of Orebić belonged to between 1333 and 1806. It was built by the Franciscans and is of a Gothic-Renaissance style. The monastery is surrounded by dense pine wood forests and is located on a craggy stone crest 152 metres a ...
Founded: 16th century | Location: Orebić, Croatia

Franciscan Monastery & Church of St. John the Baptist

Church of St. John the Baptist in Kloštar Ivanić is a late Gothic (stone) structure built in 1508 and it belongs to the largest of the Gothic churches in northern Croatia. The single nave church hall, with its extended sanctuary ends in a polygonal apse, with ornaments of fauna. The massive bell tower rises at the southern end of the sanctuary and is the junction between the church and the monastery. The tower is constr ...
Founded: 1508 | Location: Kloštar Ivanić, Croatia

Gomirje Monastery

Gomirje is the westernmost Serb Orthodox monastery in Croatia. It was built in the period of the first larger Serb settling in the villages of Gomirje, Vrbovsko and Moravice at the end of 16th and the beginning of the 17th century. The monastery is thought to have been founded in 1600. The monastery includes the church of Roždenije saint John the Baptist, built in 1719. In 1789, the monastery was devastated by fires and ...
Founded: c. 1600 | Location: Vrbovsko, Croatia

Krupa Monastery

Krupa monastery is the oldest Orthodox monastery in Croatia. It is located on the southern slopes of the Velebit mountain, halfway between the towns of Obrovac and Knin. The monastery was built in 1317 by monks from Bosnia, with the financial support from the Serbian king Milutin. During their reigns, King Stefan Dečanski and Emperor Dušan renovated the monastery. In the 15th and 16th centuries, the monastery was endow ...
Founded: 1317 | Location: Obrovac, Croatia

Krka monastery

Krka Monastery is the best known monastery of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Croatia and it is officially protected as part of the Krka National Park. The oldest extant mention of the monastery was in 1345, when it is listed as an endowment of princess Jelena Nemanjić Šubić, half-sister of the Serbian emperor Dušan and wife of Mladen III Šubić Bribirski, Croatian duke of Skradin and Bribir. The Catholic monastery w ...
Founded: 14th century | Location: Kistanje, Croatia

Kutjevo Abbey

The Cistercian Kutjevo monastery was founded in 1232 as a daughter-house of Zirc Abbey in Hungary, of the filiation of Clairvaux. The Cistercians planted the vineyards, which are still cultivated today. After the Turkish attack of 1521 (or 1529) the monastery was dissolved and subsequently destroyed. In 1689 the monastery estate was granted by Emperor Leopold I to Ivan Babić, a canon of Zagreb, who was named titula ...
Founded: 1232 | Location: Kutjevo, Croatia

Orahovica Monastery

The Orahovica Monastery is a Serbian Orthodox monastery mentioned in 1583 when it was a seat of the Požega metropolitanate. It is thought to have been built before the end of the 15th century.
Founded: 15th century | Location: Orahovica, Croatia

Lepavina Monastery

Lepavina Monastery is a Serbian Orthodox monastery dedicated to the Presentation of Mary. According to an old local chronicle, the Lepavina monastery was founded around 1550, very soon after the emergence of the first Serbian settlements in this region. A monk from the Hilandar Monastery (on the Athos peninsula, Greece), Jefrem (Ephraim) Vukodabović, together with two monks from Bosnia, built a wooden church here. Howeve ...
Founded: 1550 | Location: Sokolovac, Croatia

Jastrebarsko Monastery

The original monastery in Jastrebarsko was Dominican in the 16th century., but by 1575, the last Dominican had left Jastrebarsko. In 1602, the Franciscans take over the Dominican Monastery. In 1704, the construction of the monastery begins. The entire structure was built in the form of early Baroque architecture, building the old Dominican structure into the new church and monastery, and the original Gothic structures are ...
Founded: 1704 | Location: Jastrebarsko, Croatia

Featured Historic Landmarks, Sites & Buildings

Historic Site of the week

Monte d'Accoddi

Monte d"Accoddi is a Neolithic archaeological site in northern Sardinia, located in the territory of Sassari. The site consists of a massive raised stone platform thought to have been an altar. It was constructed by the Ozieri culture or earlier, with the oldest parts dated to around 4,000–3,650 BC.

The site was discovered in 1954 in a field owned by the Segni family. No chambers or entrances to the mound have been found, leading to the presumption it was an altar, a temple or a step pyramid. It may have also served an observational function, as its square plan is coordinated with the cardinal points of the compass.

The initial Ozieri structure was abandoned or destroyed around 3000 BC, with traces of fire found in the archeological evidence. Around 2800 BC the remains of the original structure were completely covered with a layered mixture of earth and stone, and large blocks of limestone were then applied to establish a second platform, truncated by a step pyramid (36 m × 29 m, about 10 m in height), accessible by means of a second ramp, 42 m long, built over the older one. This second temple resembles contemporary Mesopotamian ziggurats, and is attributed to the Abealzu-Filigosa culture.

Archeological excavations from the chalcolithic Abealzu-Filigosa layers indicate the Monte d"Accoddi was used for animal sacrifice, with the remains of sheep, cattle, and swine recovered in near equal proportions. It is among the earliest known sacrificial sites in Western Europe.

The site appears to have been abandoned again around 1800 BC, at the onset of the Nuragic age.

The monument was partially reconstructed during the 1980s. It is open to the public and accessible by the old route of SS131 highway, near the hamlet of Ottava. It is 14,9 km from Sassari and 45 km from Alghero. There is no public transportation to the site. The opening times vary throughout the year.