Detached powerful fortress in the suburb of Pile, rising on the thirty-seven meters high rock, has been named after St. Lawrence whose church used to stand there. The chapel is still incorporated into the body of this fortification. The origins of Lovrjenac reach back to the years 1018 and 1038, while the first preserved mention of the fortress dates from 1301 when one in the string of its commanders was being appointed. It seems that the original fortification was of an asymmetrical triangular shape, that it was accessed via a drawbridge, that it was about seven meters high, and that it had a battlement with merlons and the ring corridors which rested on small arches. In addition to the buildings for the garrison also contained within the fortress were the Church of St. Lawrence and the House of pious women of the Third Order who tended the church.
In the centuries that followed the fortress was continually strengthened and updated. To the north of it, a moat was dug which was lengthened in 1418, and a drawbridge was built over it. The height of the walls was increased and the entrance gate moved. In 1464 the western and northern walls were greatly strengthened, their thickness was doubled and in places, it reached twelve meters.
Frequent references to the works on the fortress can be found in the archive material from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries when its appearance became as we see it today. The fortress was badly damaged in the great earthquake of 1667, and the repairs of the damage lasted until the end of the seventeenth century.
The concept of the Fortress evolves from the central atrium on the ground floor around which are rooms for the accommodation of the garrison and its commander, storage of cannons and other armaments, and the communication with other levels. There are three levels above the ground floor, mostly with open platforms with battlements. At its north-western corner is a niche with the statue of St. Blasius, work by the French sculptor Jacob de Spinis from Orléans and Vicko Lujov of Korčula from 1559. Today Lovrjenac is particularly famous for the inscription carved into the gate lintel: Non bene pro toto libertas venditur auro – Not for all the gold is freedom sold.
Over the inner gate, which was demolished in the nineteenth century so that cannons could be brought out, there used to be another inscription, today sadly preserved only in records: “If a new divine force should come upon us, may these walls have the Typhon.” In the event of attack or siege of Lovrjenac, and therefore of the City, Typhon was called to assist, a terrible Giant from the Greek antiquity who had a hundred snakeheads, spewed fire, shook the earth and destroyed everything in its path.
After the fall of the Republic in the nineteenth century, Austria turned Lovrjenac into a barracks. Cannon embrasures were converted into large windows, the drawbridge in front of the entrance was paved with concrete, and on the second platform, a pigeon coop was built for homing pigeons. In 1907 the army left the fortress which was then leased to some hotel chain to adapt it into a hotel. This decision provoked huge discontent on the part of the citizens of Dubrovnik, and in 1908 the Fortress was handed over to the Society for the promotion of interests of Dubrovnik. The Fortress was repaired and some of the structures added to it were cleared away before the world congress of P.E.N. in 1933 when some of the conferences were held at Lovrjenac. At the foot of the fortress, pine trees were planted and a new eastern staircase was opened leading from the port in Pile. During WW2 the Fortress was turned into a prison, and it’s interior divided into cells. Immediately after the war, all those monstrosities were cleared away and the most essential repairs carried out. Today Lovrjenac is used during the Summer Festival in Dubrovnik as a stage, particularly for the classic drama, in particular Shakespeare’s Hamlet.
