The Adriatic Sea, from Istria (in modern Croatia) in the north to Albania and Greece in the south, commonly called the Dalmatian coast, is familiar to modernday tourists. The coastline - mainly a narrow belt of land dominated by the Dinaric Alps - helped create a Balkan hinterland utterly different from the more urbanised and prosperous coast, which still shows its Venetian heritage.
Seventy-nine islands run almost parallel to the coast. Because of their position on the coastal shipping lanes that connected the Western and Eastern world, the Adriatic islands have often played an important historical role.