Church of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, Brela

At the Soline site in Brela, in Split-Dalmatia County, stands the church of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. Visitors find here a votive church connected with an important event from the Ottoman era.

It was built in 1715 by the bishop of Makarska, Nikola Bijanković, as a vow to Our Lady of Victory after the Turkish siege of Sinj. The nave is vaulted and ends in a horseshoe-shaped apse, and vaulted chapels are arranged as a transept. Above the eastern chapel rises a bell tower with a loggia. On the south, main façade is a door with a profiled lintel, and in its axis an oculus window. On the gable is a new stone cross, because the former bell gable collapsed and lies in front of the church. Inside are two wooden altars with paintings of the Mother of God, one on a board from the 16th century and one on canvas from the 18th century.

The church is a protected cultural good, entered in the Register of Cultural Goods of the Republic of Croatia under the code Z-4939.

Photo: Jozef Kotulič, CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons.
Data: Register of Cultural Goods of the Republic of Croatia (Ministry of Culture and Media), Open Licence; coordinates: DGU (centre of the settlement).