Karlobag's Plans

By comparing this plan with the 1660 renovation plans by Martin Stier, it is evident that the buildings in question are the Chapel of St. John (St. Ioannes) and the Church of St. Mary (St. Maria), as confirmed by the inscriptions on the floor plan itself.

Karlobag as it Never Existed

Comparing De Latto’s plan of Karlobag from 1729 with later military drafts (such as the one from 1757), we come across an incredible discovery. While the 1757 map depicts the real Karlobag at the foot of the rugged Velebit mountain, De Latto offers a vision of the town that more closely resembles a Dutch or Italian lowland fortress.

* Fantastic Walls: Karlobag is drawn with massive, regular star-shaped ramparts that it never actually possessed.

* Geographical Absurdities: Instead of realistic toponyms, the map's index is full of inexplicable names like Soro, Zano, or Itobo, which likely stem from incorrect transcription or phonetic "improvisation."

The "Funny Maps" Syndrome: Rijeka, Zadar, Dubrovnik...

Karlobag was not an exception. By analyzing De Latto’s atlas and comparing it with maps of other cities like Rijeka, Zadar, Dubrovnik, or historical Salona, the same pattern emerges. These maps do not show actual topographical positions. Publishers of that era, like De Latto, often worked in their offices in Vienna or Venice, never having set foot on the eastern coast of the Adriatic. To fill their luxury atlases, they used:

1. Outdated templates: Sketches 50 or more years old that were completely irrelevant by the 18th century.

2. Ideal plans: Drawings of what cities were supposed to become according to investors' wishes, rather than what they truly were.

3. Decorative filler: If they did not know what the hinterland looked like, cartographers would simply draw generic hills and fortresses to make the map look richer.

From "Cabinet Imagination" to Science

The true value of De Latto’s 1729 atlas lies not in its accuracy, but in how it shows us how visual information was manipulated for the public of that time. It was only in the mid-18th century, with the arrival of Theresian reforms and precise military engineers, that cartography became the science we know today.

Today, De Latto’s atlas serves as a reminder of a time when a map was more than a navigation tool – it was a prestigious "picture book" that promised order and power where, in reality, there were only stone, sea, and unexplored mountains.

“Morlakichir” or “Canale della Morlacca” – Historical name for the Velebit Channel. “Morlakichir” or “Canale della Morlacca” appears on Austro-Hungarian and early 19th-century Italian maps. The name comes from the Morlaks (Morlaci), an ethnic group that lived in the hinterland of Velebit and the wider Dalmatian region.

This note from an 1846 map shows the highest point of the then-new road connecting Karlobag with the interior. Today's road to Gospić follows this historic route all the way to "Stara Vrata," where there is a tunnel and the famous “Kubus” – a stone monument with an inscription in German: “…bei Stara Vrata…” which testifies to the geodetic and historical significance of this site. Here, modern and historical elements connect the Adriatic and the mountain, preserving traces of the work and planning from the time of Emperor Ferdinand I., and allowing travel through a space rich in natural beauty and historical narrative.

The summit of the new Karlobag road on the southern ridge of the Velebit Mountains near Stara Vrata rises approximately 869 meters above the Adriatic Sea. This value corresponds to the historical unit of measurement, the "Viennese foot," which was used in the Habsburg Monarchy before the introduction of the metric system (1 Viennese foot ≈ 0.3161 m).

This leveling plan precedes the note from the 1846 Karlobag plan, in which Emperor Ferdinand I refers to the completed road between Karlobag and Vela Vrata. The 1810 plan represents one of the earliest technical documents testifying to the construction of an important traffic route between Oštarije and Karlobag in the early 19th century. It was created during a period of intensive development of transport infrastructure within the Habsburg Monarchy.

The document shows the precise leveling and layout of the road connecting the continental area with the Adriatic, which was of exceptional economic and strategic importance. The plan was drawn by hand, with great attention to detail and technical accuracy, and served as a basis for construction and supervision of works along this demanding mountain route.

The note written in the lower part of the plan provides insight into the language, style, and administrative hierarchy of the time, as well as the high level of technical culture accompanying road construction in the early 19th century.

Today, this plan represents a valuable historical document — a testament to the creation of one of the key road links between the inland and the sea.