Sv. Križ, a small town in the Vipavsko region, was founded on the basis of the
provincial princely privileges from 1532. Kostel, Vinica and Pobrežje are three
walled boroughs built adjacent to castles, along the boundary of the Kolpa
river. Among the towns and borroughs of Slovenia, these four settlements have
a rather unique position. Their common characteristics are the fact that originally
they had been built as a special type of a walled fortification settlement
(shelter) against the Turks, and also that despite their title the life-style in them
had never been the same as in other medieval towns or borroughs.