Pula
The city, port and the largest settlement on the peninsula (62,378 inhabitants). It is situated in a well protected bay and surrounded by "the seven hills": Kaštel, Zero, Arena, St. Martin, St. Michael's Abbey, Mondibola and St. Ivan. It has good road and railroad connections with the rest of the country and there is the international airport near the city. During the Austro-Hungarian Empire it was a military port. Today, it is the administrative, educational and industrial center. The natural beauties of its surroundings also enabled quick tourist development: beside the facilities in the city there are many tourist objects, camps and marinas in the surrounding area. On the hill Kaštel, even in the 5th century BC, there was an Illyrian hillfort. The Roman settlement (Colonia Julia Pollentia Herculanea) was founded between 44 and 31 BC. The structure of the prehistoric settlement was kept in the later Roman, medieval, and even present urban structure of the old part of the town. The Roman amphitheater (Arena) from the 1st - 2nd century AD, lies on the dominant position above the port.
It has elliptical shape, and the hight is 32.45 meters. It had capacity of 23,000 spectators.
According to the tale, it was built by the emperor Vespasian to please his friend Cenida who was born in Pola. Today, Arena is used for opera performances, film festivals and other happenings of that sort.
The Roman Pula had the water supply and sewer system, forum, capitolium with temples, two theaters a huge city graveyard (mentioned by Dante in the 9th part of 'The Hell') and houses richly adorned with mosaics and marble. The city was surrounded by walls and had about 10 gates. Some of these gates are still preserved like the Double Gate (Porta Gemina) from the 2nd century AD, through which you come into the Archaeological Museum. A part of the wall with the gate of Hercules from the middle of the 1st century BC still stands. On the top of it there is a bearded head of Hercules with an inscription on the left. Left from the Hercules' Gates you can still see on original part of the city walls. Across the square you can see the triumphal arch of the Sergius family that was built between 29 and 27 BC. The Roman houses were richly furnished with sculptures and mosaics: in one of them you can still see the multicolor mosaic know as "the Dirka's Punishent Mosaic", probably from the 3rd century AD. The most important churches are: the cathedral of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary with three naves, built over the older building from the 4th - 5th century, and restored in the 15th century; the church of St. Toma , an example of the double church complex, built in the 5th century; the Benedictine Abbey of St. Mary Formosa, built in the 6th century and deserted in the 16th century. Its pillars and marble paneling were taken and some of them were built in the church of St. Mark in Venice. Only one of the two chapels of the abbey remained. The church of St. Nikola from the 6th century is another monument of the Byzantine architecture in Pula. The Franciscan church and the monastery of St. Francis of Assisi were built in the 14th century and have valuable art works and archaeological collection.
Beside the Romanesque portal, one of the most valuable works of wooden Gothic sculpture in Istria, polyptich of Jacob from Istria from the 15th century, is kept in that church. Another precious cultural and historical monument is the temple of Augusts from the 1st century AD built on the position of the former Roman forum (today it is the square). Beside this temple there is the city hall built in the 13th century on the location of the Roman temple. Kaštel on the top of the hill is on the probable location of the Illyrian hillfort, the Roman capitol and the medieval fort from the 13th century. It has four bastions built by Venetians. At the time of Napoleon, citadel was rebuilt, and in 1830 restored. Today it is the building of the Historical Museum of Istria.
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