Punat

Punat, located on the east coast of the more than 3 km long and 2 km wide Punat valley, is considered one of Krk’s more recent villages. However, this belief is connected to the fact that studies and more detailed reports regarding this area only began around a hundred years ago. Earlier it was part of the city of Krk, and the area of Vrbnik almost reached the village of Punat. However the inhabitants have been settled here continuously since prehistoric times. Traces of settlement date back in prehistory through the Iliric tribes, the Greeks and the Romans. According to legend, during the Roman period a bridge passed through the narrow entrance to the Punat valley heading to the city of Krk. Supposedly, according to a variety of records, inhabitants from the Punat area were more precisely settled by the Krk noblemen, in order to protect the approach to the bridge and to the Punat valley. During the historical events on this area, Punat has shared the other villages’ destiny, and besides farming and cattle breeding, the inhabitants were, occupied with fishing and ship building, and the Austro-Croatian steamship society was founded here in 1906 whose first steam ship, the Frankopan, maintained the route from the village to the mainland.