Small wars and the construction of the Venetian defence system from the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries

Abstract

ABSTRACT In the early modern period, there were some parts of Europe that tensions never ended. As part of the great Ottoman expansion, skirmishes, robbery, and taking slaves occurred almost on a daily basis in Dalmatia from the 15th to 18th centuries. At the beginning, the Venetian defence of the Dalmatian coastal communities was based on small mercenaries’ troops and locally recruited men. The establishment of a complex defence system of Military Border i.e. Krajina based on new human power provided by Morlach immigrants was possible only after few great wars in the 18th century.