St. James's Bridge (Slovenian: Šentjakobski most) in Ljubljana is a bridge that crosses the Ljubljanica River on the southern end of downtown Ljubljana, next to Zois Manor. It links Zois Street (Slovenian: Zoisova cesta) and Karlovac Street (Slovenian: Karlovška cesta). The most important city traffic artery across the Ljubljanica runs across it.[1]
A wooden bridge was constructed at this place in 1824, later than other bridges of the period, and for a long time it was therefore called the New Bridge (German: Neue Brücke). In 1915, it was replaced by a reinforced concrete corbel bridge by the engineer Alois Král and the architect Alfred Keller. It was described by the art historian Damjan Prelovšek as a "monumental neo-Biedermeier architectural language of late-Secession Vienna."[2]
Since 1954, there has been a plaque with an inscription on the bridge about a 15th-century town watermill, which caused damage to farmers and was destroyed in the 1515 peasant revolt.[3] Four bronze relief plaques depicting scenes from The Water Man, a Ljubljana-related Romantic ballad by the poet France Prešeren, were intended to be put on the fence of the bridge.[4] However, this has been never realised.[5]