St. Stephen Church (Stari Grad, Hvar)
The St. Stephen Church ( Crkva sv. Stjepana ) the Roman Catholic parish church in Stari Grad on the Dalmatian island of Hvar in Croatia . It is the Pope and St. Stephen I ordained . It stands on the east side of a small square, the Trg sv. Stjepana (St. Stephen's Square), in the historic old town of Stari Grad.
history
The church stands on the site of an earlier one, in the 9th / 10th centuries. The church, built in the 16th century and also consecrated to St. Stephen , served as the cathedral of the diocese of Hvar until 1278, when the seat of the Hvar bishop was moved from Stari Grad to Hvar . Like the entire city, this church was largely destroyed in 1571 by the corsair and Ottoman admiral Uludsch Ali in the run-up to the sea battle of Lepanto during his attack on the island of Hvar. Only when the city had recovered from this affliction after years, the ruins of the church and the neighboring bishop's residence were removed and from 1605 a new church was built in their place. The free-standing bell tower was not completed until 1753.
architecture
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The church is a large, three-aisled basilica in the style of the Dalmatian Baroque , with a rectangular apse . It was built from stones from the neighboring island of Korčula , which over time have turned a red-brown color through redox reactions .
The church is the work of local builders. The main portal and probably the entire west facade were designed by Ivan Pomenić from Korčula , who was also involved in the construction of the cathedral in Hvar, which was also consecrated to Stephen I. The two aisles were built by Mark Foretić from Korčula and the master of the Skarpa family from Stari Grad.
The baroque facade has a semicircular gable , a large main portal in the middle and two smaller portals in the respective side aisles on the right and left, all in the style of the late Renaissance or early Baroque. There is a rose window in the gable above the central portal .
Interior
The vault of the central nave is made of stucco so that it emulates the vault ribs of the late Gothic . The wood-paneled choir in its lower area contains a number of valuable works by well-known artists. The stone baptismal font from 1592 is the work of the architect and sculptor Tryfun Bokanić (1575–1609) from Pučišća on the island of Brač . The main altar comes from the Venetian workshop of Alessandro Tremignon from 1702. In the north aisle there is a wooden crucifix from the 17th century and the black marble altar of the Holy Cross, a work by the architect and sculptor Andrea Bruttapelle (1728– 1782) from 1773. In the south aisle are the altar of Anthony of Padua from the first half of the 18th century and an altar from the 19th century with depictions of the martyrs Cosmas and Damian and St. Lucia of Syracuse . Next to it is probably the most valuable art object in the interior, a triptych by the Venetian Francesco di Gerolamo de Santacroce (1516–1584) depicting the mother of Jesus , John the Baptist and St. Jerome .
Bell tower
The bell tower stands free next to the church. The inscription above its door says that it was completed in 1753. Another inscription, in Latin , says that the large stone blocks on its first floor come from the city walls of the ancient Greek city of Pharos , from which the present-day city emerged, and that the city gate was once located here. In the wall of the first floor there is a relief of a Roman trading ship from the 2nd century a . Z.
Coordinates: 43 ° 11 ′ 0 ″ N , 16 ° 35 ′ 55 ″ E
