Today I decided that was high time that I visited the Rector's Palace which also housed the Cultural-Historical museum. As the name suggests the Rector's Palace was home to the Rector, some would argue that, well actually everyone would argue that because I believe it is true, that the Rector, appointed monthly was the head chairman of the major council that ruled the Dubrovnik Republic.
The Republic flourished during the 15th and 16th century and Dubrovnik's trade by sea went from to strength to strength yet by the 17th century things weren't looking so good for the poor D.R. who were losing out thanks to the Venetian Republic.
Worse still in 1667 there was a disastrous earthquake that brought the city of Dubrovnik quite literally to its knees. The whole city was destroyed .(apart from one church- see previous post) by the eighteenth century the city seemed to be recovering from the shock and was building itself back up but then Napoleon came along.
Dubrovnik surrendered to him afraid of a Russian invasion but at the Congress of Vienna in 1816 was passed to the hands of the Hapsburg's and has ever since been toing and froing never knowing which way it'll go next. That's probably a gross exaggeration on my part but hey ho. The independent republic of Croatia was finally formed in 1990 and by 1991 they are being bombed by Serbia.
The downstairs galleries of the museum were dedicated to the famous faces of some of Croatia's genii and I must admit that I had not heard of any of them, not even Stjepan Gradic who had most of the upstairs gallery all to himself.
The special exhibition about Stjepan Gradic 'the father of the homeland' marks four centuries since his birth. Gradic was a great scholar and highly regarded diplomat both in his homeland but also in Rome where he spent a lot of his time. It was there where he heard the news of 'the great quake' of 1667 and like any great hero Gradic dropped everything and rushed to his people's aid. He is known to have helped facilitate the cities recovery seeking out help and funds from places like the Vatican amongst others.
Indeed it was Gradic who the rebuilding of the Cathedral can be attributed to, so quite naturally this was my next destination.
Well I hope you enjoyed your history lesson. Bok Bok (which apparently means bye bye but the first time I heard this was from a grown women who sounded like she was imitating a chicken.)
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