Cultural and Historical Urban Ensemble of Kastav

Kastav is a medieval little town northwest of Rijeka, in Primorje-Gorski Kotar County, beside the former road from Tarsatica towards Tergeste. It is interesting to a visitor for its walled core, but also as a spiritual centre of Glagolitic culture.

The old settlement developed on the site of a Iapodian hillfort, and the necropolis in the nearby Mišinci cove also bears witness to life in ancient times. In the Middle Ages it was the seat of a lordship to which Veprinac, Mošćenice and the port of Volosko belonged, and it thus acquired town characteristics. At the beginning of the 15th century it had a statute written in the Glagolitic script in the Croatian language, and Glagolitic priests and notaries made it the cultural centre of the wider region until the 19th and 20th centuries. In the 17th and 18th centuries it was governed by the Jesuits of Rijeka, who built in the Baroque style. The core is surrounded by a rampart and towers.

A protected cultural property, entered in the Register of Cultural Goods of the Republic of Croatia under the code Z-2687. The first traces of the settlement date from the 11th century.

Data: Register of Cultural Goods of the Republic of Croatia (Ministry of Culture and Media), Open Licence.