The Retirement "home" of Diocletius

Split, Croatia – June 11, 2014

We departed Hvar on the 8 am ferry to Split. Split is the largest city in Dalmatia (coastal Croatia) and the second largest city in Croatia after the capitol Zagreb. The Greeks settled Split at least 2,400 years ago, but it is most famous for the Emperor Diocletius who was the first Roman emperor to voluntarily retire in 305 CE. He had a huge retirement palace built in what is now the central part of Split. It covers almost 10 acres and has held up to 10,000 inhabitants

 

Split from a distance; The palace is above the left bay area

 

Diocletius' Palace behind the row of palms on the bay

 

After the Greeks, Romans, and Ostrogoths held this area, the control of Split changed 17 times in the first 400 years of the 2^nd millenium, mostly between Hungarians, Venetians, and the Byzantines. I should have paid more attention in my Park High School history classes – but they held large lectures in the auditorium and it was too conducive to sleeping. Now I have to read Wikipedia articles over and over again – following links to figure out who the Byzantines and Ostrogoths were. Memorizing the periodic table or the Uranium decay series would be easier for me.

We scheduled a tour of the palace, and it turned out to be a private tour for just the two of us. In general, tours are good value if you want to learn more about the place you are visiting than you can get from your guidebook. Often the guides have grown up in the places we are learning about and they tell stories that give us a deeper sense of this place as a home. We need more of this in our fragmented world. Every place we go we hope to understand it better as someone's home.

 

Every palace needs a market

 

Older and newer sit side-by-side

 

Mosaic that the guide helped interpret!