Fort Lovrijenac (St. Lawrence Fortress)
The fort Dubrovnik built in three months — just to stop Venice from ever owning the city.
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Perched 37 metres above the Adriatic on the western edge of the old city, Lovrijenac commands both the sea and land entrances to Dubrovnik. Its outer walls run 12 metres thick, yet the walls facing the city are a mere 60 centimetres — a striking contrast that makes the asymmetry one of the fort's most memorable features.
What to look for
- The Latin inscription carved above the gate: Non Bene Pro Toto Libertas Venditur Auro — Liberty Cannot Be Sold for All The Gold in the World
- The wall thickness contrast: 12-metre ramparts facing the sea versus 60-centimetre walls on the city side
- The triangular layout with three terraces, which doubles as a stage — Hamlet performed here is the centrepiece of the Dubrovnik Summer Festival
The fort hosts live theatre each summer, including Shakespeare's Hamlet as the signature event of the Dubrovnik Summer Festival — check the festival calendar before your visit.
Fort Lovrijenac (St. Lawrence Fortress) is one of 12 sights worth the detour in Dubrovnik, all bundled offline in Voyage GO — download the Dubrovnik pack and it sits on your map with no signal, filling your travel passport the moment you walk past.
More to see in Dubrovnik
- Walls of DubrovnikWalk an unbroken 1,940-metre circuit of medieval stone — up to 25 metres above the old city — that held Ragusa independent for centuries.
- Rector's PalaceFour disasters over two centuries — fire, a gunpowder explosion, and two earthquakes — rebuilt this palace each time in a different style and left the evidence in plain sight.
- Dubrovnik CathedralA Baroque church rebuilt from the rubble of Dubrovnik's 1667 earthquake — its foundations partly funded by Richard the Lionheart, who owed a votive for surviving a shipwreck off Lokrum on his way home from the Third Crusade.
- StradunEvery building on this 300-metre limestone street was rebuilt to a government blueprint after the 1667 earthquake — and it shows.
- Sponza PalaceA stone arch inside warns every merchant: "When I measure goods, God measures with me."
- Franciscan Church & MonasteryThe 1667 earthquake flattened the church. One portal from 1498 made it through — and carved into it is a miniature of everything that didn't.