Dominican Monastery and Church of St. Dominic

In front of you, along the western shore of the old town core, rises the Dominican Monastery and Church of St. Dominic – a silent but powerful testimony to faith, knowledge and art that has lasted in Trogir for more than seven centuries. Founded in 1265, at a time when the Dominican order permeated Dalmatian towns, the monastery and its church soon became a center of preaching, teaching and care for the written word. The Church of St. Dominic, completed in the 14th century, is simple and austere, as befits a mendicant order – without luxury, but with the quiet nobility of the Gothic style. On the facade, however, stands out an exceptional relief of the Virgin Mary, the work of the sculptor Nikola Denta from 1372, like a gentle point of light on the stone facade. The interior holds true artistic treasures: the Renaissance tomb of the Sobota family, a work by Nikola Firentinac, and “The Circumcision of Jesus”, an oil painting by Palma the Younger from 1607. The monastery cloister, added in the 15th century, was the heart of the community – everyday life gathered around it: prayer, learning, copying, collecting city and church histories. During the Allied bombing in 1944, the north wing was destroyed and never rebuilt. However, the restoration of the remaining parts, which began in the 1970s, saved its core from oblivion. Today, although without a monastic community, the monastery and church remain open to the public.