Zavojane

History

Zavojane was first mentioned in documents of the Kreševskoj era in 1434. When Vrgorac capitulated to the Ottoman Empire, Zavojane probably fell with the rest of the area. The spread of Islam into the region that came with the arrival of the Ottoman army concerned the occupants of the monastery in Makarska, who began to worry about the residents in Zavojane and the surrounding region, fearing that many would convert to Islam. After the liberation of inner Dalmatia from the Ottoman Empire, most of Kozica and the surrounding villages had been deserted because of the exodus of the populace to the northern regions of Croatia. The Venetian Republic repopulated the area with Herzegovinian people from the east. The withdrawal of the Ottomans saw the region come under the jurisdiction of the Venetian Republic, then under the rule of Napoleon. A short and prosperous period followed, which included the construction of the "napoleonska cesta" (Napoleon's road), encouraging travel to the area. With the failure of Napoleon's campaign in Dalmatia, Zavojane fell under the rule of Austria-Hungary, and remained so until the end of the First World War. The parish was first mentioned in the Kreševo Charter in 1434, and was founded in 1696, when the Franciscans from Živogošće brought the people from Broćno, below Mostar, to that region, which had been relaxed during the Cretan War. The villages of * Dragljane, * Dubrava, * Duga Njiva, * Vlaka and * Zavojane belong to the parish. The Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Zavojane was built at the beginning of the 18th century in the Baroque style. The church is a monumental, single-nave building with a rectangular apse, oriented east–west. It was built from uneven stones arranged in rows, measuring 25 meters in length…