During the 14th century, the expansion of the Republic of Ragusa to the west proceeded on two occasions. First, in 1333, Ston and Pelješac Peninsula were redeemed, and then in 1399 the area of Primorje, in contemporary Dubrovnik documents known as Terre Nuove, was redeemed from the Bosnian king Stjepan Ostoja. Slano becomes a headquarters of the Primorje Countship, which in the following centuries will develop into a significant commercial port of international importance with two shipyards, salt warehouses, and markets of salt, livestock, and grain.
At the head of each Countship was appointed a Count who was elected from the nobility, first three to ten and then to six months. Since 1635, the mandate of the count was one year. The first count of the new countship was Lovro de Bodacia, who started filling a post on 29 May 1399. The powers of the count were related to governing of the countship, judicial affairs in civil and criminal proceedings, collection of administrative fees, and taxes.
The land for the construction of the Palace and the garden of the Count of Primorje was determined already in 1399, during the division of the Primorje Countship into the territorial units, kaznačine. Then the land for the garden and the house of the Count of Slano was set aside, and by all indications, it was a provisional wooden building. It is built on the most prominent strategic site above the shore of the stream, with the best defence capabilities.
The first palace in the Gothic-Renaissance style was completed in 1447, which is witnessed by the inscription above the door on the upper floor, where next to the monogram of Christ is the name of the Count Drago Rafael di Gozze, who was the first to fill the post and reside in a newly built palace.
The Rector’s Palace in Slano was not one of the representative palaces, since the function was conditioned by fortifying and administrative purposes. The reason for this was the frequent invasions of pirates and brigands, especially in the 16th and 17th centuries, and the supervision of the salt trade.
Originally, the south wall with the main entrance in the Gothic style had an internal defensive corridor and guard’s wall walk with arrow slits. In front of the palace there was a stone platform and in the Palace’s courtyard, in front of the dungeon premises a pillory, which is now restored to their original positions.
On the upper floor of the Palace to which conducted an outdoor staircase, is located a representative Count’s room, but there were also chancellor’s premises where the archives of the Primorje Countship were kept.
The Rector’s Palace in Slano shared the stormy political history of the Republic, followed by reconstructions, mostly conditioned by earthquakes, especially by the great earthquake in 1667 that destroyed Dubrovnik and its surroundings, and in 1806 when it was burned during the Montenegrin aggression.
Aiming at transforming the ruinous building into an apartment of the pretorial administrator. In 1831, district engineer Lorenzo Vitelleschi worked out detailed Palace’s designs with a clear purpose: pretorial administrator’s apartment, his offices, and prison.
At the end of the 19th and early 20th centuries, the sale of the state-building to the merchant Jelić resulted in the reconstruction of an administrative-fortifying building into a residential one.
During the Serbian aggression on the Republic of Croatia in 1991, the Palace was burned, as most of the buildings in Slano.
In May 2017, the Society of Friends of Dubrovnik Antiques completed the reconstruction of the Rector’s Palace in Slano. Conservation guidelines were respected in the reconstruction of the Palace aiming at restoring the administrative-defensive function of the building found on the occasion of the abolishment of the Republic in 1808 and its original architecture from the 15th to 18th centuries.
