Lovrenc na Dravskem Polju (; ) is a

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

in the

Municipality of Kidričevo The Municipality of Kidričevo (; ) is a municipality near Ptuj in northeastern Slovenia. The seat of the municipality is the town of Kidričevo. The area is part of the traditional region of Styria. The municipality is now included in the Drava S ...

in northeastern

Slovenia Slovenia, officially the Republic of Slovenia, is a country in Central Europe. It borders Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the south and southeast, and a short (46.6 km) coastline within the Adriati ...

. Traditionally the entire area was part of the

Styria Styria ( ; ; ; ) is an Austrian Federal states of Austria, state in the southeast of the country. With an area of approximately , Styria is Austria's second largest state, after Lower Austria. It is bordered to the south by Slovenia, and cloc ...

region. It is now included with the rest of the municipality in the

Drava Statistical Region The Drava Statistical Region () is a statistical region in Slovenia. The largest city in the region is Maribor. The region's name comes from the Drava River and includes land on both banks along its course through Slovenia as well as the Pohorj ...

Name

The name of the settlement was changed from ''Sveti Lovrenc na Dravskem polju'' (literally, 'Saint Lawrence on the Drava Plain') to ''Lovrenc na Dravskem polju'' (literally, 'Lawrence on the Drava Plain') in 1952. The name was changed on the basis of the 1948 Law on Names of Settlements and Designations of Squares, Streets, and Buildings as part of efforts by Slovenia's postwar communist government to remove religious elements from toponyms.

Church

The local

parish church A parish church (or parochial church) in Christianity is the Church (building), church which acts as the religious centre of a parish. In many parts of the world, especially in rural areas, the parish church may play a significant role in com ...

, from which the settlement gets its name, is dedicated to

Saint Lawrence Saint Lawrence or Laurence (; 31 December 225 – 10 August 258) was one of the seven deacons of the city of Rome under Pope Sixtus II who were martyred in the Persecution of Christians, persecution of the Christians that the Roman Empire, Rom ...

and belongs to the

Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Maribor The Archdiocese of Maribor (, ) is a Latin Church ecclesiastical jurisdiction or archdiocese of the Catholic Church in Slovenia. Its episcopal see is Maribor. History * 1859 : Maribor (then Marburg) became the see of the Diocese of Lavant * ...

. It was built in 1414 on the site of an earlier church, first mentioned in written documents dating to 1323. Part of a late 12th-century structure is incorporated into the

sanctuary A sanctuary, in its original meaning, is a sacred space, sacred place, such as a shrine, protected by ecclesiastical immunity. By the use of such places as a haven, by extension the term has come to be used for any place of safety. This seconda ...

.Slovenian Ministry of Culture register of national heritage
reference number ešd 3117

References

External links

*
Lovrenc na Dravskem Polju on Geopedia
Populated places in the Municipality of Kidričevo {{Kidričevo-geo-stub