Abstract
This essay discusses the architectural significance of the palace/villa of the Emperor Diocletian, who abdicated from power in 305 and lived for eight years in a villa on the Dalmatian coast. The writer describes the villa and how it was an amazing self-contained community. The paper explains that, after the emperor's death, it was eventually taken over by locals who needed a secure hiding place from barbarians, and it eventually became the City of Split.

From the Paper
"The Emperor Diocletian rose through the orders by virtue of military skill, brilliance, and flexible scruples. Though he had little formal education, he proved an able soldier and a skilled statesman in power. Coming to the throne after a period of anarchy, he reorganized the empire, carried out a number of necessary reforms, and gave the empire a peace and security it had not know for years. (Durant, 639-400; Wilkes, 1-3) A complex figure, Dalmatian, and reflecting its part Roman/part Byzantine character, he was by temperament Oriental and despotic. At the same time, he was a military precisian, an untiring worker, logical and thorough..."

Tags:diocletian, split, palace

From the Paper
"A comparison of the narrative methods of the novel The Hundred and One Dalmatians, by Dodie Smith, and the film 101 Dalmatians, directed by Stephen Herek, produces a fascinating demonstration of how cinematic narratological code differs from the code of a written text. The key to the demonstration is that both works involve the presence of dogs that understand human speech and can interpret each other's barks in a 'linguistic' fashion. Both works were created for a primary audience of children. The novel could be read to smaller children but its level of difficulty is high enough that children would have to read at least at a third-grade level in order to enjoy it by themselves. It was clearly intended, however, to be read to younger children as well and Smith displays a fairly high level of anxiety in assuring that the terms of her fictional world of..."

Abstract
This paper relates that the Emperor Diocletian rose through the orders by virtue of military skill, brilliance, and flexible scruples and how in preparation for his retirement, Diocletian had built a huge structure on the Dalmatian coast, a few miles from Salona. It also looks at how what began as a villa eventually became a a permanent settlement as the city of Split developed.

From the Paper
"While there will probably never be definitive evidence of when the inhabitation which became Split took place, it is unlikely that the palace was ever entirely derelict. It was simply to fine a resource to pass up, and while it may have been many decades before there was any substantial permanent settlement here, it seems highly doubtful that the palace was ever truly deserted. (Wilkes, 88) While the precise nature of the inhabitation at Split during the early years remains questionable, the city always seems to have been regarded as autonomous, and by the time Constantine Porphyrogenitus chronicled it, it was essentially independent and remained so until the Venetians gained control in the fifteenth century. (Plommer, 256) "

Tags:rome, Constantine, Dalmatian, fortress