Sibenik (Italian Sebenico) is a historic town in Croatia, population 51,553 (2001). It is located in central Dalmatia where the river Krka flows into the Adriatic Sea. Sibenik was mentioned for the first time under its present name in 1066 in a Charter of the Croatian King Petar Kresimir IV. For a period of time, it was a seat of the Croatian King. Sibenik is the oldest native Croatian town on the eastern shores of the Adriatic. Sibenik was given the status of a town and its own diocese in 1298. Excavations of the castle of Saint Michael have since proven that the place was inhabited long before the actual arrival of the Croats. The city, like the rest of Dalmatia, resisted the Venetians up to 1412. The Ottoman Empire started to threaten Sibenik at the end of the 15th century, but they never succeeded in conquering it. In the 16th century, the fortress of St. Nicholas was built and, by the 17th century, its fortifications were improved again by the fortresses of St. John (Tanaja) and Subićevac (Barone). The central church in Sibenik, the Cathedral of St. James, is on the UNESCO World Heritage list. Several successive architects built it completely in stone in the 15th and 16th centuries, both in Gothic and in Renaissance style. A couple of kilometers north of the city is the beautiful Krka National Park similar to the more famous Plitvice Lakes National Park. The park is full of breathtaking scenery of waterfalls, flora, fauna as well as historical and archaeological remains. Town street of Sibenik. The annual Sibenik International Children's Festival takes place every summer.