The Urban Layout of Osor after 1450

Abstract

The urban transformation of Osor during the second half of the fifteenth century has so far been interpreted as a consequence of the town’s contraction due to wars, loss of importance and population decrease. The article presents a detailed analysis of the main town square and demonstrates that the careful remodelling of the town centre took place in the fifteenth century, prior to the reduction of the urban area caused by the building of the new fortifications in the sixteenth century. The article offers an assessment of the main square and the Episcopal Palace while also introducing into the debate an analysis of the spatial organisation of the town’s residential buildings. It considers several individual features which were typical of Osor during the second half of the fifteenth and in the sixteenth century, that is, the period following the establishment of a bimunicipal county when the local nobility was more intermingled and the town became dominated by aristocratic residences resembling country houses.