The largest reconstruction of the Belgrade Fortress took place between 1723 and 1736 under the administration of Austria and under the supervision of the builder de Boff, followed by Nicolas Doxat de Démoret. The reconstruction of the fortress began at that time, but also parts of the city outside the fortress.
Belgrade was divided into a fortress, as a military center, a Serbian settlement around the old Cathedral and a German settlement that started from Vasina Street towards Dorcol. Today’s Savamala, the so-called “Lower Serbian town” with a predominantly Serbian population and the German settlement of Karlsstal (today’s Palilula), remained outside the fortified Belgrade.
In the area of today’s Kalemegdan, the earlier medieval walls were demolished, except for the Jakšić Tower and the Nebojsa Tower in the Lower Town. The Upper Town was entered by well-defended gates: the outer Stambol Gate led to the inner Stambol Gate above which a clock tower was built, today known as the Clock Tower.
The southeast gate was Leopold’s gate, the western approach was covered by Karadjordje’s gate, and Deferdar’s gate remained at the northern entrance to the Upper Town. In the Lower Town, on the east side, the Vidin Gate was built, and on the west side, the Gate of Charles VI. A canal ran along the middle wall of the Lower Town, which was later buried. During the Austrian reconstruction of the fortress, the so-called “Roman well” was completed in 1731.
The Lower and Upper Towns were occupied by military facilities, and civilians had to move to the suburbs.
During the first decade of Austrian rule, about 80 private and public buildings were erected outside the fortress walls. Belgrade was built with a donation from Pope Benedict XIII, who donated 10 million guilders, and the works were partly financed by population taxes throughout the Habsburg monarchy.
In the Lower Serbian town was the Church of St. John the Baptist, which was destroyed in the war of 1738/39. but the icons from this church are still kept today in the Matica Srpska in Novi Sad.
Alexander Württemberg’s barracks were a complex of military buildings in the wider area of today’s Republic Square. The large complex first housed 12 infantry battalions, and from 1726 they were adapted for the governor of the Kingdom of Serbia.
Only two civic houses have been preserved from the period of Austrian rule: one in Gračanica Street 10, the other in Dušanova Street 10.
Gračanica Street 10
The barracks of the engineers, which are mentioned in later Turkish documents as the Delija konak, were built in 1727 and destroyed in the 1930s.
The population structure of Austrian Belgrade has also changed significantly.
From 1717, the Turks emigrated, and poor immigrants from Central Europe, mostly of German origin, settled there. The wave of construction was started in 1724 on the Danube side with the construction of one-storey houses on the so-called Long Bazaar, today’s Cara Dušana Street (Langen Gassen).
Dušanova Street 10.
Dušanova Street 10.A rectangular space for a market was formed on the site of the Roman baths on today’s Student Square, which later became a Turkish cemetery. In the last wave of construction, another 85 new houses were built, along with the existing 1,375.
New Roman Catholic churches were built in Baroque Belgrade: the Franciscan Church in 1726 and the Jesuit Church in 1732. The Franciscan Church was built on the foundations of an earlier mosque. During the later wars, ten buildings were damaged, and by the end of the 18th century they were turned into civilian buildings and inns.
The defeat of Austria in the war with Turkey in 1739 caused great panic and fear among the population. Most of the inhabitants of Belgrade fled across the Sava, and wealthy Serbs and Armenians settled in Novi Sad. The Turks found only a small number of Serbs and Jews in Belgrade. By the middle of 1741, about two thousand Turks were settled, mosques were renovated, and a new one was built.
The Serbian population was slowly returning, so according to the census until 1777, their number was 1,200.
