Fazana isn't far from my hometown. I had to drive only about twenty kilometers to get the material for this post. But the atmosphere there is considerably different than here where I live. In Medulin, my hometown, and all the surrounding villages, the old center isn't near the sea. The most interesting architecture can be seen a kilometer or two from the harbor and the beaches. In Fazana ...
... all the best stuff is displayed near the harbor and the seaside promenade.
I visited the place last year. I mean, a little less than a month ago. On the 8th of December 2022. The rare winter tourists were enjoying the nice view and the salty air ...
... and you could see the Eurasian jackdaws (Coloeus monedula) swarming around the church tower and above the rooftops in the center of Fazana.
At one point some of the birds landed on the roof tiles, so I was able to get this group portrait.
When it comes to the history of Fazana, like in the case of all settlements around the city of Pula, there was some activity in the ancient centuries dominated by the Roman Empire. Where is now the center of town, once was a large rural villa with a plant for processing olives and a big pottery kiln for the production of amphoras and other objects used for storing, preparing & serving food. The villa was surrounded by olive orchards, vineyards, and gardens with a mix of fruit trees and vegetables that prosper in this climate.
In the above photograph, you can take a look at one of the streets that lead from the harbor to the interesting little labyrinth behind the first line of buildings with front facades facing the sea. In the following shot ...
... you can take a better look at a detail from the building shown in the foreground of the previous picture.
Here I zoomed in a bit more. Can't tell you much about the artwork, but it looks like something pretty old surrounded by a relatively new coat of paint.
Upon arrival, I left the car on the edge of the old town. On the small parking lot with a view of some more contemporary apartment buildings across the large lawn. The building shown in this photograph is probably here since the late nineties or early two-thousands. I said probably because I could very well be wrong about that. After taking this shot ...
... I continued along the street bordered by slightly different architecture ...
... and the sea.
In this photograph, you can see the distant pier. The nearby pine trees provided a nice framing. I mean, the pier wasn't very far, only a hundred or two hundred meters from where I stood, but it looks fairly distant in this wide shot. This stretch of sea between the harbor and the nearby Briuni archipelago is called Fazanski kanal. Which means the channel of Fazana. Some minutes later, when I reached the pier ...
... I photographed a group of tourists there.
Briuni islands are a national park and, although the high season is in summer, you can encounter small groups of tourists there in winter too.
During the early middle ages the area belonged to the clergy of the church of Ravenna in Italy, and then, in the 11th century became the property of bishops of Pula, the nearby city.
In 1197 the small town known as Wasana is mentioned in written sources as a property, disputed between the archbishop of Ravenna and Engelbert the Third, Count of Gorizia.
Fazana was changing its feudal masters quite often in that period, but at the same time, it was getting progressively more attached to the nearby city of Pula. At the end of the 13th century, Pula and Fazana ended up governed by the Venetian Republic together.
In the following centuries, trading was prosperous in the Adriatic sea and the channel of Fazana became an important shelter for ships on the route from Venice, along the western coast of Istra, to the Dalmatian coast and the Levant.
In 1379, on the fifth day of May, a fairly large naval battle took place in the channel of Fazana, right in front of the coastal town. It was during the fourth war between Venice and Genoa. 21 ships of the Venetian Republic confronted 22 ships of the Genoese fleet. About 1700 people died in combat or ended up drowning in the sea. Genoa was the winner on that occasion but in 1380 the war ended in a status quo, having exhausted both maritime republics.
The Parish Church of St. Cosmas and Damian was built in the 15th century. Christmas wasn't far when the photograph was taken, so you can see the tall tree erected in the square in front of the church.
The jackdaws were circling high above my head as I entered one of the small streets that lead to the area behind the church ...
... and continued exploring the architecture.
Here you can take a look at the nice, slightly chaotic mix of various elements that include the street lamp and the small satellite dish.
Some minutes later I came across an old house that has been partially turned into a lovely little hotel.
The name of the place is Heritage Hotel Chersin ...
... and that whole, pretty large, 500 years old building is protected by UNESCO.
From 1615 to 1618, during the conflict known as the Uskok War or War of Gradisca, Fazana was a military port through which the Venetians supplied their army and a strategic point from which to suppress the raids from the sea. The conflict was named after Uskoks, soldiers from the Croatian coast that were in that period used by the Austrians to fight a guerrilla war against the Ottomans. Uskoks were Christian fugitives from the Balkan inland who, at the beginning of the 16th century, fled from the Ottoman invasion to the Adriatic coast. They were sometimes soldiers, sometimes pirates and highwaymen, quite often both of the two. At first, they operated from the Venetian territories, supported by the Republic of San Marco. When those areas were conquered by the Ottoman Empire, Uskoks moved northwards. There, in the region known as Kvarner, they became a paramilitary force working for the Austrians. And for themselves, of course. At that point, besides attacking Ottoman ships, they have begun to rob the Venetian merchants as well. The situation escalated, the diplomacy failed, and in 1615 the war between Venetians & allies and Austrian & allies was ready to start.
The war wasn't long but it was devastating for the region. In some areas on the peninsula, 30–50% of the population and 90–99% of the livestock were killed, 60–90% of the houses were destroyed or burned, and 90–98% of the land was abandoned. It was followed by epidemics that continued the destruction, and like many other places in Istra, Fazana didn't recover from that catastrophe.
The town was downsized to a small fishing village.
Nowadays, with the Briuni National Park nearby, just across the channel, with beaches and historic sites to offer, Fazana is very alive again, especially in summer.
Every time a visit a small town in Istra, I end up photographing at least one cat.
Here you can see that obligatory cat found in Fazana.
It was a very friendly cat. And it looked exactly like one of my cats.
Here you can see an interesting new door on one of the old houses near the harbor.
This detail was photographed on the facade of the building across the street.
You can see the street lamps on the waterfront in this photograph. At this point, I was walking back to the car ...
... and I was photographing the buildings along the way from time to time.
I like this red one a lot.
Before entering the car, I photographed the statue of a boxer in the nearby park.
Mate Parlov, born in Split in 1948, was a damn good boxer and a cool dude from Pula, who lived in Fazana after retirement. He had an amateur and professional boxing career.
Mate won tons of matches and got quite a few trophies and medals. The list of the stuff he won is damn long so I'll copy-paste the text from Wikipedia.
"In his amateur career, he participated in 310 matches and lost only 13. He was an eight-time champion of Yugoslavia in the light heavyweight category (1967–1974), five-time champion of the Balkans (1970–1974), a two-time champion of Europe (1971 in Madrid, and 1973 in Belgrade), and world champion at the inaugural 1974 World Championships in Havana, Cuba. He won the Golden Glove award twice, in 1967 and 1969. He participated in the Munich 1972 Summer Olympics, winning the gold medal in the light heavyweight division."
" In his professional career Parlov won twelve of his first thirteen fights as a professional boxer before successfully challenging for the European light-heavyweight title. In 1976, he faced the future world champion Matthew Saad Muhammad. In their first fight in Milan, scheduled for eight rounds, he was defeated following the referee's decision. In a rematch, he and Muhammad struggled to a ten-round draw. After successfully defending the European title three times, he met Miguel Angel Cuello in Milan for the WBC world light-heavyweight title in January 1978. The two men had been scheduled to meet in the quarter-finals at the Munich Olympics, but Cuello withdrew due to an injury. Parlov knocked out Cuello in the ninth round to become the first professional world champion from a communist country. Parlov lost the title on his second defense and would later challenge for the world cruiser-weight title without success."
He died in 2008.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mate_Parlov
AND THAT'S IT. AS ALWAYS IN THESE POSTS ON HIVE, THE PHOTOGRAPHS ARE MY WORK.
THE END