SITE ARCHÉOLOGIQUE DE GABELA

This site (Arheološko Nalazište Gabela) is located between a meander of the Neretva and the present border village of Gabela (about 2,300 inhabitants, 96% of them Bosnian-Croats). It preserves the remains of a Venetian fort that served as a "customs post"(gabella in Italian). It was erected in 1415, then reinforced by the Ottomans in the 17th century. One can still see the statue of a lion of St. Mark, symbol of Venice, an enclosure with a well-preserved wall rising to 7 m high and the bases of a mosque. Before the Venetians settled here, the site, known as Drijeva, was long disputed between the Serbian princes and the Republic of Ragusa (Dubrovnik). It occupies a strategic passage, on the right bank of the Neretva, which is navigable here. The river was used to transport goods by boat between the Adriatic and Herzegovina. Gabela still occupies an important place in the trade with Croatia, since there is the large border post of Gabela Polje, along the Croatian town of Metković (about 13,000 inhabitants). As for the archaeological site, it has received a strange publicity since the publication of a book in 1985. In Homer's Blind Audience, the Mexican writer Roberto Salinas Price (1938-2012) claims that Gabela is the site of the ancient city of Troy. This far-fetched theory still finds a certain echo among a part of the local population.