Nowadays the villaee of Tučepi is recognized as a popular tourist destination in the guidebooks of modern Croatian and European travellers. However, thanks to its favourable geographical position, Tučepi has been a settlement for four thousand vears. To the west its boundaries touch the town of Makarska, the only urban centre of the area called the Makarsko primorje in Croatian i.e. the Makarska Coastland. or popularly the Makarska Riviera. The imposine mountain of Biokovo represents the northern border of the village. The hamlets of Tučepi: Podpeć. Čovići, Srida sela, Šimići and Podstup, built in traditional Mediterranean style, are spread over a large area of coastal limestone slopes. Rich in natural water springs, the area abounds with terraced eardens, vineyards and olive-groves. The modern village of Tučepi, situated in the south of the area. along the four kilometres of mild, cultivated pebbly shore, seeks its prosperity in tourism. The very name of the place witnesses its long history tracing back to the Prehistoric period (Illyrians, 2000 BC - 1st cent. AD). One of the hypotheses concernine the Illyrian origin and the meaning of the toponym is based on the preserved Old Illyrian elements in the Albanian language which would mean "a village at the source". Both, the toponyms and the archaeological finds point to the conclusion that the village was inhabited in Illyrian times: the hillforts in dry-wall construction with the typical tumuli (ancient burial mounds) on their tops. All the names the inhabitants gave to these hillforts would mean the same: a site where a buildine stood. So vou will find Gradine (on the slopes of the hill Sutvid), Gomile (on the localities of Sutvid and Ravnice). Gradac (not far from the sea shore), and Grad (above the road leading from Srida sela to Podpeći.

The oldest find witnessing the existence of a settlement is a necropolis on the soutb slopes of the hill Sutvid, which dates from the period of Classical Antiquity (Romans, 1st cent.AD-6th c.AD). At the beginning of the twentieth century several stelae (upright stone slabs, used as monuments) engraved with inscriptions, human skeleton graves, various grave offerings and several specimens of Roman coins (2nd cent. AD-4th cent. AD) were found on the same site.To the east of the hill Sutvid, near the road that links the coastal area with the inlands, there is the site of Okrumbica. Numerous archaeological traces like remains of mortar walls, tegulae (tiles), fragments ot various ceramics and an iron spear, provide evidence proving that a Late Antiquity settlement might have existed on the locality. The site of Javorak covers the broader area round the crossroads which connect the local ways between Čovići and Podpeć. Its position, and the accidental discovery of coins, walls and a necropolis made the famous Venetian traveller and author of the travelogue "Viaggio in Dalmazia" (Venice, 1774) Alberto Fortis ( 1141-1803) come to the conclusion that the locality could have been the site of the Late Antiquity Laurentum described by, Procopius, a Byzantine historian (500? - 565? AD).

St.George's church was built in 1311 and it has been preserved as a one-nave Romanesque-Gothic building with a semicircular apse. In the interior of the church everal consecration crosses, decorated in paint, have been preserved as well. Having been thoroughly explored by archaeologists and restorers, the church aas completely restored in the years 1992 and 1993. The site shows different periods of development: an Early Roman villa rustica ( 1st - 2nd cent. AD), a Late Antiquity oratory, a Middle Ages church with a necropolis and a seventeenth century coenobium, an annex attached later to the south part of the building.

On the very top of the hill Sutvid there is a Prehistoric site with the foundations of St.Vid's church. It is supposed that the Croats, at the time of settling this area in the seventh century, used to worship their pagan God Svevid on the locality mentioned. After having been christened they turned the pagan temple into the Christian church. The Church of Our Lady's Birth was built in 1703 as a one nave building having all the features of the Dalmatian provincial Baroque style. In the earthquake of 1962 the church was badly damaged, so it was disassembled and restored to the original condition. By disassembling this baroque church, several decorative architectonic elements of the Early Christian church dated between the fifth and the sixth century were found in the foundations.In front of the west facade there are four medieval tablets engraved with the characterictic plastic decoration of the period: a representation of a sword and a shield with a rose or a half moon and a noss over the whole tablet.

On the site there is also a stele ( 1st cent. AD) which represents the oldest sepulchral monument in the area of the Makarska Riviera. Earlier, it was supposed that the stele might have been the grave stone of the Venetian doge Pietro Candiano I, who was killed in the naval battle with the Neretvanians on September 18, 887, not far from the locality. A great number of Roman tegulae, marked with manufacturer's seals, antique, late antique, medieval and late medieval ceramics and glass finds, coins, earrings, and other metal artefacts dating from the tenth to the seventeenth century are the proofs of the long and turbulent past of Tučepi. At the same time. life was going on not only on the coast, but also in the hamlets on the slopes of the mountain Biokovo. The fact is witnessed bv the remains of the foundations of St. Martin's church with a necropolis on the site of Grebišće, to the northwest of the hill Sutvid. As the foundations show, the building has an east-west orientation; it is paved with stone tiles made bv local stone-cutters. The apse is rectangular from outside and semi-circular from inside, which corresponds with the style of many eleventh and twelfth century churches in Dalmatia.

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