Premantura is 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. 

In the 19th and 20th centuries, a strategic Austro-Hungarian fortification system was constructed here. Notable personalities born in Premantura include Tone Peruško, a Croatian writer and teacher and founder of the Teacher Training Academy in Pula, and Antun Bogetić, the Poreč-Pula bishop.