The lecture by Vladimir Peter Goss will present three early medieval Slavic courts in Southeastern Europe, the court of Croatian Kings at Villa Regalis at Biskupija near Knin (9th ct.), Blatnograd of the Dukes of Pannonia Inferior (second half of the 9th ct.), and of Dukes of Hum and Kings of Duklja-Doclea at Ston in Southern Dalmatia (10th and 11th ct.). Each of them stands as an exquisite individual centre of arts and culture capable of strikingly innovative and precocious works such as St. Cecilia in Biskupija, St. Hadrian at Blatnograd and St. Michael at Ston. The analysis is underlined by the methodologies the author has developed in his recent book Space: Sense and Substance, University of Rijeka, 2016, and is fully applying in the book he is currently writing on Croatia’s cultural landscape. Art is not a system of celestial forms which seep down to the artist but an outcome of an artist’s response to his natural and cultural surroundings. That this is highly individual goes without saying. Stylistic categories and the like are useful for classification and teaching purposes, but must not become a prejudice in our study of art. To quote Paolo Verzone, if we approach a work of art with love and care it will gladly yield all its secrets.