Also known as Gradec or Grič (archaic terms for a hilltop settlement), Zagreb’s Upper Town offers a quaint mixture of Baroque houses and nineteenth-century mansions, many of which nowadays hold government institutions, scientific institutes or museums.

Gas-lights & cannons

Adding extra character to the quarter are the cast-iron street lamps which are still powered by gas - a municipal lamp-lighter does the rounds every evening at dusk.

Marking the Upper Town’s southern edge, the Lotrščak Tower one of the few surviving remnants of Zagreb’s medieval fortifications. In a traditional mark of municipal time-keeping, a small cannon is fired from the summit of the tower every day at noon.

Markov trg

Main focus of the Upper Town is the cobbled expanse of Markov trg or St Marks Square, overlooked by the dazzling tiled roof of St Mark’s Church. Bearing the coats of arms of Croatia, Slavonia and Dalmatia on the left-hand side, and the arms of Zagreb on the right, the church roof is one of the most photographed sights in the whole of Croatia – and it is here that local newlyweds come to take their post-ceremony pictures.