User:Saxum/Prokurative

The Prokurative, officially known as the Trg Republike (Republic Square), is a Neo-Renaissance square in Split, Croatia.

Background
Following the medieval westward expansion of the city, the area of the present-day Prokurative was an open space dividing the Varoš, a suburban neighborhood inhabited by farmers and the fishermen, and the center of city. Between 1665 and 1668, a curtain wall conecting the bastions of San Antonio and Santa Marina was constructed in the area. The wall and bastions were part of a system of medieval foritications, constructed by the Venetians to defend the city from Ottoman incursions. In the early 19th century, Split came under control of Napoleon's France. By then, the danger posed by the Ottoman empire had disappeared and the fortifications lost their strategic purpose. Fearing the fortifications might fall in the hands of British and Russian fleets in the Adriatic, and acting under the pretext of beautifying Split, the military governor of Dalmatia, Auguste de Marmont, ordered parts of them demolished. As Marmont was he initiated several construction works in Split, with the goal of improving the quality of life in the city and making it more beautiful. In 1806, he ordererd the construction of Split's first public park in the area of the present-day Prokurative.

Construction