Old Port of Dubrovnik

This guide to the Old Port of Dubrovnik traces how the Republic of Ragusa turned this harbor basin into a locked vault, with an iron chain drawn across the water each night between Fort Saint John and the breakwater called the Kaše. It follows engineer Paskoje Miličević's work fortifying the harbor mouth from thirteen forty-six onward, and the row of sealed archways at the old Arsenal, the state shipyard where Ragusan galleys were built and repaired. Stand here at dusk, where fishing boats still slide in through the same gap the chain once closed.