Mošćenice is a village in the municipality of Mošćenička Draga

Mošcenicka Draga

Mošćenička Draga is municipality in Primorje-Gorski Kotar County. It has 1,641 inhabitants, 91.5% which are Croats. It is situated southwest of Opatija under the Mt. Učka. Center of municipality is former fishing village of Mošćenička Draga which is today an attractive tourist resort with two...

 in Primorje-Gorski Kotar County

Primorje-Gorski Kotar County

Primorje-Gorski kotar County is a county in western Croatia that includes the Bay of Kvarner and the surrounding Northern Croatian seacoast, and the mountainous region of Gorski kotar...

 on the Istria

Istria

Istria , formerly Histria , is the largest peninsula in the Adriatic Sea. The peninsula is located at the head of the Adriatic between the Gulf of Trieste and the Bay of Kvarner...

n peninsula, close to Opatija

Opatija

Opatija is a town in western Croatia, just southwest of Rijeka on the Adriatic coast. , the town proper had a population of 7,850, with the municipality having a total 12,719 inhabitants.-Geography:...

, Croatia

Croatia

Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...

.

It is a typical hilltop village with stone houses and narrow streets situated 173 meters above Mošćenička Draga. From Mošćenice one has a nice view across the Kvarner Gulf

Kvarner Gulf

The Kvarner Gulf ); sometimes also Kvarner Bay, in Italian Quarnaro or Carnaro) is a bay in the northern Adriatic Sea, located between the Istrian peninsula and the northern Croatian seacoast....

 to Rijeka

Rijeka

Rijeka is the principal seaport and the third largest city in Croatia . It is located on Kvarner Bay, an inlet of the Adriatic Sea and has a population of 128,735 inhabitants...

 and the islands of Krk

Krk

Krk is a Croatian island in the northern Adriatic Sea, located near Rijeka in the Bay of Kvarner and part of the Primorje-Gorski Kotar county....

 and Cres

Cres

Cres is an Adriatic island in Croatia. It is one of the northern island in the Kvarner Gulf and can be reached via ferry from the island Krk or from the Istrian peninsula ....

. The village is connected to the Mošćenička Draga by road and 750 steps which lead from Sv. Ivan beach to the center of the village. Besides the old St. Andrew church, places of interest are the local ethnographic museum and an old olive extraction mill.

The town is typically built as a concentrically conceived settlement with outer walls consisting of houses whose outside walls function as walls of the fortress. In such an enclosed environment, space is precious and all houses are built close to one another, separated by narrow streets and sometimes linked by covered passages. Much of the medieval structure is still visible now.

History

Its history dates back to the prehistory when Liburnians

Liburnians

The Liburnians were an ancient Illyrian tribe inhabiting the district called Liburnia, a coastal region of the northeastern Adriatic between the rivers Arsia and Titius in what is now Croatia....

 settled here. They were cattle breeders and seamen, known for their fast rowing boats. Istria was conquered by the Romans after two military campaigns in 177 BC, calling the region Liburnia

Liburnia

Liburnia in ancient geography was the land of the Liburnians, a region along the northeastern Adriatic coast in Europe, in modern Croatia, whose borders shifted according to the extent of Liburnian dominance at a given time between 11th and 1st century BC...

, part of the province of Dalmatia

Dalmatia

Dalmatia is a historical region on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea. It stretches from the island of Rab in the northwest to the Bay of Kotor in the southeast. The hinterland, the Dalmatian Zagora, ranges from fifty kilometers in width in the north to just a few kilometers in the south....

. With the end of the 6th century, Croats

Croats

Croats are a South Slavic ethnic group mostly living in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and nearby countries. There are around 4 million Croats living inside Croatia and up to 4.5 million throughout the rest of the world. Responding to political, social and economic pressure, many Croats have...

 arrived and built their first permanent settlement in Liburnia around the year 620. Istria was annexed by the Franks during the reign of Pepin the Short in 789, But Liburnia became part of the State of Croatia. When this state fell, Liburnia and thus also Mošćenice became part of the German Empire.

The village was for the first time mentioned as an independent community with its own statute in 1374.in the testament of Count Ugona of Duina, written in German. Mošćenice was mentioned again, this time in Glagolitic-script, in document delineating boundaries between Moscenice and Kosljak.

Mošćenice was ruled by Polish bishops, the Counts of Duina and then the Counts of Walse. Mošćenice came under the German emperor Frederick III

Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor

Frederick the Peaceful KG was Duke of Austria as Frederick V from 1424, the successor of Albert II as German King as Frederick IV from 1440, and Holy Roman Emperor as Frederick III from 1452...

 when the Counts of Walse transferred their estate to him.

In 1637 Mošćenice was awarded its own City Statute. In the same year the city was transferred into the possession of the Jesuits of Rijeka

Rijeka

Rijeka is the principal seaport and the third largest city in Croatia . It is located on Kvarner Bay, an inlet of the Adriatic Sea and has a population of 128,735 inhabitants...

. This ended in 1773.

During a short period 1801 -1813, by the Treaty of Schönbrunn

Treaty of Schönbrunn

The Treaty of Schönbrunn , sometimes known as the Treaty of Vienna, was signed between France and Austria at the Schönbrunn Palace of Vienna on 14 October 1809. This treaty ended the Fifth Coalition during the Napoleonic Wars...

, Mošćenice was part of the Napoleonic

Napoleon I

Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader during the latter stages of the French Revolution.As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1815...

 Illyrian Provinces

Illyrian provinces

The Illyrian Provinces was an autonomous province of the Napoleonic French Empire on the north and east coasts of the Adriatic Sea between 1809 and 1816. Its capital was established at Laybach...

 and therefore nominally part of the French Empire. When the French troops were chased away by the Austrian troops in 1813, Mošćenice became part of the Austrian Empire until the end of the first World War.

St. Andrew's church

There was already a small church in the eight century, during the period of the Croatian Christianization. A new church was built between 1200-1300. The only remaining parts are the Romanesque-Longobardic church tower and, inside the church, the wall under the choir with four columns. The parish was founded at the beginning of the 14th century.
All ritual books ware written in Glagolitic. Only in the second half of the 19th century, the liturgy was written in Croatian.

The church consists of a central nave, heightened in 1640, and two lateral aisles with lower ceilings, added between 1785 and 1795. The central altar dates from the 18th century. Its five marble statues were sculpted by the Paduan artist Jacopo Contieri. They represent (on the left) Saint Ignatius of Loyola

Ignatius of Loyola

Ignatius of Loyola was a Spanish knight from a Basque noble family, hermit, priest since 1537, and theologian, who founded the Society of Jesus and was its first Superior General. Ignatius emerged as a religious leader during the Counter-Reformation...

, founder of the Jesuit order, (on the right) the Bohemia

Bohemia

Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...

n saint John of Nepomuk

John of Nepomuk

John of Nepomuk is a national saint of the Czech Republic, who was drowned in the Vltava river at the behest of Wenceslaus, King of the Romans and King of Bohemia. Later accounts state that he was the confessor of the queen of Bohemia and refused to divulge the secrets of the confessional...

 and (on top) two angels and the risen Christ. The painting behind the altar represents the apostle Saint Andrew

Saint Andrew

Saint Andrew , called in the Orthodox tradition Prōtoklētos, or the First-called, is a Christian Apostle and the brother of Saint Peter. The name "Andrew" , like other Greek names, appears to have been common among the Jews from the 3rd or 2nd century BC. No Hebrew or Aramaic name is recorded for him...

 on the X-shaped cross. The walnut

Walnut

Juglans is a plant genus of the family Juglandaceae, the seeds of which are known as walnuts. They are deciduous trees, 10–40 meters tall , with pinnate leaves 200–900 millimetres long , with 5–25 leaflets; the shoots have chambered pith, a character shared with the wingnuts , but not the hickories...

 canonical choirs were added between 1620 and 1705. The frescoes above the choir were added by the Italian soldier Carmine Visintini in 1942 (during World War II).

The two side altars are dedicated to Our Lady of the Rosary

Our Lady of the Rosary

Our Lady of the Rosary is a title of the Blessed Virgin Mary in relation to the rosary....

 (with statues of Saint Dominic

Saint Dominic

Saint Dominic , also known as Dominic of Osma, often called Dominic de Guzmán and Domingo Félix de Guzmán was the founder of the Friars Preachers, popularly called the Dominicans or Order of Preachers , a Catholic religious order...

 and St. Catherine of Siena

Catherine of Siena

Saint Catherine of Siena, T.O.S.D, was a tertiary of the Dominican Order, and a Scholastic philosopher and theologian. She also worked to bring the papacy of Gregory XI back to Rome from its displacement in France, and to establish peace among the Italian city-states. She was proclaimed a Doctor...

) and to St. Francis. The pulpit dates from 1791 and the Baroque baptismal font was added in the early 18th century. Below the choir is an old statue of St. Peter, dating from the 17th century. it was transferred to the church from a private house. The present organ dates from 1847, replacing an older organ from 1658, and was restored between 1997 and 1998.