Split Diocletian Palace

Diocletian’s Palace in Split is one of the world’s best-preserved Roman imperial monuments — and it is still lived in. Built by the emperor Diocletian around the year 300 AD as his retirement residence, the palace was never abandoned. After the Roman empire receded, locals moved into the walls, built houses on top of the imperial apartments, opened shops in the old gateways, and turned the fortress into a town. The result is the old town of Split: a working neighbourhood of cafés, flats, churches and markets sitting inside a 1,700-year-old Roman rectangle, listed by UNESCO since 1979.

The layout of the palace

The palace was built as a rectangle roughly 215 by 180 metres, with walls about 26 metres high and a pair of streets crossing at right angles — the cardo (north-south) and the decumanus (east-west) — that still divide the town today. It had four gates:

• The Golden Gate (Porta Aurea, north).
• The Silver Gate (Porta Argentea, east).
• The Iron Gate (Porta Ferrea, west).
• The Bronze Gate (Porta Aenea, south, opening to the sea and the cellars).

The southern half, on the sea side, was the imperial apartment: Diocletian’s private quarters, temples and reception halls. The northern half was for garrison, servants and logistics. This split is still visible: the southern end is denser and more monumental, the northern end more ordinary.

What to see

• The Peristyle — the palace’s main square, an open colonnaded court that was the entrance to the imperial apartments. The Egyptian sphinx brought from Luxor in the 3rd or 4th century still sits there, granite and worn, a real, original piece of Roman display.
• The cellars (Podrumi) — the most photographed part of the palace. The cellars are the basement of the imperial apartments, and because they were bricked up and used for storage for centuries, they preserve the original floor plan of the rooms above. They are a paid entry today.
• The Cathedral of Saint Domnius (Sveti Duje) — built as Diocletian’s mausoleum and converted to a church in the 7th century, making it one of the oldest Catholic cathedrals in the world still in its original structure. The bell tower, added in the 13th century, is the landmark you see on every Split postcard, and you can climb it.
• The Temple of Jupiter — a small Roman temple near the Peristyle, later baptised as the baptistery of Saint John. The black granite sphinx at the entrance is another original Egyptian import.
• The Bronze Gate and the Riva — exiting the palace on the south side puts you on the Riva, Split’s famous harbour promenade.
• The four gates themselves — the Silver and Iron Gates retain their Roman form, with later medieval and Baroque layers visible around them.

History in brief

Diocletian was the only Roman emperor to voluntarily retire. He ruled from 284 to 305 AD and stepped down to his palace in Split, the modern name of which is a contraction of the Greek and Latin word for the local spiny broom plant (brnistra, Aspalathus). He famously answered, when asked to return to power during a later crisis, that growing cabbages in his palace garden was more appealing than ruling again. The palace became a town after the Roman administration collapsed, and by the 7th century refugees from the destroyed Roman city of Salona (Solin) had moved into the walls and brought Split’s Catholic hierarchy with them.

Practical info

• Entry: the palace is a public space: the streets, the Peristyle, the gates and most of the open courtyards are free to walk at any hour, no ticket required. Paid entries are the cellars, the cathedral and bell tower, the Jupiter temple and the City Museum. Combined tickets exist.
• How to get there: Split is the main transport hub of the Dalmatian coast. The airport (SPU) is 30 minutes out, ferries run to all the nearby islands, and the bus and train stations sit a few hundred metres east of the palace.
• Tours: guided walking tours run constantly from the Riva and from the Peristyle. For the cellars and the cathedral a self-guided visit is plenty.
• Crowds: the Peristyle and the main streets are busy from mid-morning to late afternoon, especially when cruise ships are in. Walk the same streets at 7 am or after 9 pm and you have the place almost to yourself.
• Footwear: the stones are real Roman paving, polished by two millennia of feet. They are slippery, especially in the rain. Wear shoes with grip.

Best time to visit

April, May, September and October are the sweet spot: warm, walkable and quieter than high summer. Midsummer is hot, the streets are packed with day-trippers, and accommodation prices peak. Winter is mild, cheap and surprisingly atmospheric — the lights, the empty Peristyle and the cafés with stoves are a different city from the cruise-ship version.

For photographers

The classic Split shots are the Peristyle at golden hour (the columns catch the late sun), the long view up the cardo from the Silver Gate, the cellar arches (long exposures with a tripod if you have one), and the Riva from above, ideally from the cathedral bell tower if you can climb the 60 metres. Inside the palace alleys, the light is narrow and direct; a fast prime lens is more useful than a zoom. The black granite sphinx at the Jupiter temple is best photographed in soft, even light, when the carved detail is visible without deep shadow.

Every spot here is mapped and verified by Photograph by John. Share this guide if it helped plan your trip.