Premantura is situated on a rise farther from the sea. A community of traditional houses spread around the main square and church, and in the modern era it has grown into a tourism hub.
The area of Premantura has been settled since prehistory, and all through Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when during the era of Venetian rule it was permanently settled by families from the Zadar hinterland and southern Dalmatia, so that in 1638 the village had a population of 270. The parish Church of St. Lawrence was dedicated in 1664. In the 19th/20th centuries, an Austro-Hungarian strategic fortification system was constructed in the Premantura area.
Church of St. Lawrence with steeple constructed in the 19th century