Hungary contested the
possession of Dalmatia, victory inclining to Venice, who, by policing
the Adriatic, made her protection valuable to the coast cities. The
pirate raids from which the coasts suffered were of varied
nationality--Saracen and Turk, Uscoc and bands of native pirates. Of
these latter the Narentans were the most powerful. They remained pagan
till near the end of the ninth century, and beat off an attack by Doge
Pietro Candiano in 887, killing him. He was buried in the atrium at
Grado. For one hundred and sixty-eight years they carried on the contest
with Venice, being most powerful during the tenth century, when Otho I.
sought their alliance. They had then become Christian, and assisted in
driving the Saracens from Monte Gargano. In 992 the confederate
Dalmatian cities asked for the protection of Venice, in response to
which the expedition under Orseolo II. was fitted out, and broke their
power. The population of the Narenta valley is now but 12,000, in spite
of the facts that Metkovic, near the mouth, is the terminus of the
railway from Serajevo and Mostar, and that the government has spent much
money in dredging and embankment works at the mouth of the river. The
boundary of Herzegovina is but a mile from Metkovic, for which it serves
as port. Vid, a few miles away, is the ancient Narona. A good many
inscriptions and antique fragments have been found there, and are now
encrusted in the wall of a house. For many years Vid was a bulwark of
Christianity against the Turks, and the minarets of a little Turkish
village, Liubuski, in which half the population, male and female, wear
Turkish costume may be seen not far away.

By the middle of the fourteenth century Lewis of Hungary had acquired
the whole of Dalmatia from Zara to Cattaro. In 1409-1420 Venice bought
the territory from Hungary, with the exception of Ragusa, which for some
fifty years remained under Hungarian protection, but after 1467 was
protected by Turkey. In the sixteenth century the Cross and the Crescent
were bitterly opposed; Austria became the Christian champion in place of
Venice towards the end of the seventeenth century, and at the fall of
the Republic Istria and Dalmatia were given to her in 1797 by the treaty
of Passerino. From 1806 till 1814 they were French; but the peace of
Vienna settled their destiny as forming part of the Austrian dominions,
in which they have remained till the present day.

XVII

ARBE

It was very