Podhumlje

As one might expect Vis - the island farthest from the Croatian mainland and only 60 kms from Italy - was inhabited in Neolithic times.
The Greek tyrant of Syracuse, Dionysius the Elder, founded the colony Issa on the island in 4 BCE in order to control shipping in the Adriatic. "Issa" is thought to have meant "spas" in Illyrian. As it prospered it became an independent polis, founding its own colonies, notably Aspálathos (modern Split), Epidauros (Stobreč), and Tragurion (Trogir). until eventually it became an "oppidum civium Romanorum" in 47 BCE.
Until 1797, the island was under the rule of the Republic of Venice, remnants of this are traceable in the dialect of Komiža, (the second town on Vis situated on the West side,) as well as various buildings. In fact Italian was the official language and the island was called Lissa, until it came under the rule of the Austro-Hungarian empire in 1814, returning to Italy after WWI before being traded to the kingdom of Yugoslavia as part of the 1920 Treaty of Rapallo.
During most of these times, the unconsulted islanders cultivated every square inch of the land for grapes, especially its own, vugava, a white varietal that makes a jolly nice sundowner. Stone terraces, abandoned since WWII, can be seen on every slope and large piles of surplus rocks are found at the end of every wall.
Italians had control and built extensive bunkers all over the place at the start of WWII until Josip Broz Tito and his partisan broz took it over. One of the few tourist sites on the island is "Tito's cave", though it is more of a small cavern than a cave and nobody here thinks Tito ever visited it. Evelyn Waugh was an early tourist in July 1944, popping in with one Randolph Churchill as part of the British military mission to Yugoslavia and airbnbing with Joe. They crash landed on their return to Bari, but Boeing deny all culpability.
Of course, Yugoslavia got it back in the end as nobody else wanted it and most of the islanders hopped it - to America mainly. They had a military base cut off from foreign visitors from the 1950s right up until 1989. As far as we could discover wandering through the hulks it was mainly a training and R&R camp - nothing particularly secret exept for the fact that Communists were enjoying themselves in the same way as Westerners.
The benfit from all this is that the island has been spared the overdevelopment of its shoreline and the growing number of visitrs come precisely because of that. Unfortunately, the Croatian government gave permission for "Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again" to be filmed here a year ago which has drawn too many of the Wrong Sort to come over in skinfulls of alcohol and the mistaken impression that they can sing like Abba. The ferry ride can be excruciating.Read more