Trieste (Trst in Slovenian, Croatian and Serbian) is an Italian
town of 200 523 inhabitants, the capital of the Italian region with
special status Friuli-Venezia Giulia, overlooking the homonymous
gulf in the northernmost part of the Upper Adriatic, between the
peninsula Italy and Istria, a few kilometers from the border with
Slovenia in the historic region of Venezia Giulia.
For
centuries it has represented a bridge between western and
central-southern Europe, mixing Mediterranean, Central European and
Slavic characters and is the most populous and densely populated
municipality in the region, with the port of Trieste which in 2016
was the Italian port with the most freight traffic and one of the
most important in southern Europe.
The etymology of the name Tergeste is of
pre-Roman origin with a pre-Indo-European base: terg in ancient
Illyrian means "market", while the suffix -este is typical of the
Venetian language (not to be confused with the modern Venetian
language), a language spoken by the ancient Venetians ,
Indo-European population settled in north-eastern Italy. The
term terg is also found in the Old Church Slavonic language in the
form tьrgъ with the same meaning, or "market" (in Slovenian, Serbian
and Croatian "market" is translated instead trg or in tržnica, while
in Polish targ and in Old Scandinavian torg ).
An alternative
hypothesis that attempts to explain the origin of the name Tergeste,
which was reported for the first time by the Augustan geographer
Strabo, would have it that this toponym derives from the Latin
tergestum, later transliterated into Tergeste. The historical facts
that would justify the Latin etymology of Tergeste are linked to the
fact that the Roman legionaries would have had to fight three
battles to win over the indigenous populations living in the ancient
pre-Roman settlement. Tergestum would in fact be the contraction of
Ter-gestum bellum (from the Latin ter = three times and gerere
bellum = to make war, hence the past participle gestum bellum).
The modern names of Trieste, in the languages historically
spoken in the Julian city, are Trieste in Italian, Trst in Slovenian
and Croatian, Triest in German, Trieszt in Hungarian and Трст / Trst
in Serbian. As for the local languages, the names of the Julian city
are Trièst in the Tergestino dialect, Triest in the Friulian
language and Trieste in the Trieste dialect and in the Venetian
language.
From prehistoric times to Roman times
The territory where the city of Trieste currently stands and its
karst hinterland became the permanent seat of man during the
Neolithic period, the period of Prehistory which corresponds to the
last of the three that make up the Stone Age. Starting from the late
Bronze Age, around the second millennium BC, the culture of the
castellieri began to develop in the area, an ethnic group of
uncertain origin but probably pre-Indo-European and certainly coming
from the sea.
Perhaps the castellieri were of Illyrian
origin, an Indo-European population settled in antiquity in the
north-western Balkan peninsula (Illyria and Pannonia) and along a
part of the south-eastern coast of the Italian peninsula (Messapia).
After the 10th century BC the presence on the Karst of the first
nuclei of Indo-Europeans is documented, consisting of communities of
Istri, which however, in all probability, were not the first
inhabitants of the future Trieste. Between the 10th and 9th
centuries BC they came into contact with another Indo-European
ethnic group, the ancient Venetians, from which Trieste was then
considerably influenced culturally.
The foundation of the
first nucleus of modern Trieste in the area of the modern historic
center seems to be attributable to the people of the Venetians, as
evidenced by the Venetian roots of part of the name (in particular
the suffix -este, while the prefix terg- derives, as already
mentioned, from the ancient Illyrian) and above all from important
finds discovered within the perimeter of the historic center of the
city.
However Strabo, an important geographer of the Augustan
age, in his Geography, traced the foundation of Tergeste to the
Celtic tribe of the Carni, a people historically settled in the
eastern Alpine region, and defines it as phrourion, that is a
military outpost with defense and junction functions commercial.
Historians agree that later the Roman Tergeste became a castrum,
that is a camp in which troops of the Roman army permanently
resided: for this reason it also became an important military port.
With the military conquest of Illyria by the ancient Romans
(whose most salient episodes were the war against piracy of the
Istri, which took place in 221 BC, the foundation of Aquileia in 181
BC and the Istrian war of 178-177 BC) a process of Romanization and
assimilation of pre-existing populations began.
Tergeste was
colonized during the middle of the 1st century BC, towards the end
of the Republican age, then becoming part of the Regio X Venetia et
Histria, one of the regions in which Augustus divided Italy in 7 AD.
Tergeste overlooked the gulf of the same name in the northernmost
part of the Upper Adriatic. The city area was mainly occupied by a
hilly slope that became a mountain even in the areas adjacent to the
town, which was in fact at the foot of an imposing escarpment that
sloped abruptly from the Carso plateau towards the sea. It is likely
that the main fortress was located on the slopes of the San Giusto
hill.
Following the Roman conquest of Tergeste, which took
place around the 2nd century BC, the locality became mūnǐcǐpǐum
under Latin law with the name of Tergeste, developing and acquiring
a clear urban physiognomy already in the Augustan period. It
obtained the status of colony of the Pupinia tribus probably after
the battle of Philippi (42-41 BC).
Tergeste obtained, during
the principality of Vespasiano, the status of civitas, then reaching
its maximum expansion during the principality of Trajan reaching a
population, according to Pietro Kandler, of 12,000-12,500
inhabitants, a demographic consistency that Trieste will reach again
only in the years sixties of the eighteenth century. In the lower
part of the hill of San Giusto, towards the sea, it is still
possible today to observe the remains of the ancient Roman Tergeste,
despite the numerous modern buildings that partially cover the view.
During the winter of 53-52 BC, Julius Caesar stayed in Aquileia
together with legio XV, after the city had been attacked, together
with Tergeste, by the Iapids. During the following winter of 52-51
BC, legio XV was sent to winter together with legio VII and the
cavalry with Tito Labieno and his lieutenant, Marco Sempronio
Rutilo, among the Sequani in Vesontio. For these facts the
inhabitants of Tergeste are mentioned in Julius Caesar's De bello
Gallico:
"[...] Caesar called Tito Labieno, who sent the
fifteenth legion (which had wintered with him) in Cisalpine Gaul to
protect the colonies of Roman citizens to prevent them from
incurring, through barbarian incursions, any damage similar to in
the previous summer it was the turn of the Tergestini who,
unexpectedly, had suffered raids and robberies. [...] "
(De bello
Gallico, Julius Caesar, 8.24)
Tergeste developed and
prospered in the height of the imperial age. The residential
nucleus, in 33 BC, was surrounded by high walls (murum turresque
fecit, "walls and towers were erected": today the southern gate, the
so-called Arco di Riccardo, is still visible) by Octavian Augustus,
and enriched with important buildings such as the forum and the
theater.
With the fall of the Western
Roman Empire, Trieste experienced a period of strong decay, reducing
itself to a small fishing village. It passed under the control of
the Byzantine Empire until 788 (in this period the transliteration
of its name in Byzantine Greek, Τεργέστη was born), when it was
occupied by the Franks. The diocese of Trieste, founded in the sixth
century, also obtained full temporal power over its territory in
948. This period, the bishopric of Trieste, lasted until 1295.
Following the suppression of the patriarchate of Aquileia in 1751,
she became a suffragan of the archdiocese of Gorizia.
In 1098
Trieste was already an episcopal diocese with the Latin name of
Tergestum. In the 12th century the city became a Free Municipality,
and for the next three centuries the Republic of Venice, the County
of Gorizia and the Patriarchate of Aquileia alternated with the
control of the city.
In 1368 he entered into conflict with
Venice following a serious episode of violence perpetrated against a
galley of the Serenissima moored in the port of the city, and
because of this he had to first accept submission to Austria and
then be sold by the same to the Maritime Republic.
In 1380,
during the War of Chioggia, it was occupied by the homeland of
Friuli, and with the Treaty of Turin it was forced to give a deed of
dedication to Aquileia. With the death of the patriarch of Aquileia
Marquardo di Randeck in 1381, the Captain of the castle of Duino Ugo
VI called Ugone, in the service of the Duke of Austria, managed to
influence the City Council by convincing him to submit to the
dominion of Leopold III for the second time of Habsburg (second
dedication). The surrender of the city was signed in Graz in 1382:
municipal autonomy was maintained, however, no longer under an
elective podestà, but under a Captain appointed by the Duke of
Austria himself, a role that was held by Hugh himself.
The new political situation of the city, of relative tranquility,
allowed Trieste, in the first half of the fifteenth century, a good
commercial development, which however led it in 1463 to clash with
the Republic of Venice. The city requested the support of the
Habsburgs against the Serenissima, but the Emperor Frederick III of
Habsburg not only did not intervene, but had his Captain and the
garrison withdrawn, letting the Venetian army put the city to fire
and sword, salt and devastated the countryside.
The rebellion
against the House of Austria, which had not maintained the respect
of the pacts stipulated with the Free Municipality, was not long in
coming. The head of the imperial faction Giannantonio Bonomo and his
acolytes were banished from the city; the City Council elected
Cristoforo Cancellieri, a valiant soldier, in his place.
The
exiles gathered in the Duino castle planning the reaction, finding
support in Nikla Luogar of the Jama, Captain of Vipava and trusted
man of Frederick III. On New Year's Eve 1468 the fortified gates of
Trieste were opened by the traitor Nicolò Massaro, allowing them to
take the guards by surprise and to occupy the city without the
possibility of opposition. Cristoforo Cancellieri managed to escape,
but many were caught on the run or arrested in their beds.
The prisoners were locked up in the tower of the Duino castle and
their homes were ransacked. Nikla Luogar had the three Rector judges
imprisoned by imposing others of his choice, and began to completely
subvert the city systems. On 9 February 1468 he was appointed
imperial Captain by Frederick III.
Nikla Luogar of the Jama
subjected the City Council to his will, abolished all forms of the
ancient statute and personally applied punitive justice. On May 28,
1468, he made the Council vote for the total abolition of the
ancient citizens' rights. The new pact of submission was sent to
Graz to the Emperor, who happily accepted the new dedication.
Trieste was spared from the attacks of the Ottoman Empire, whose
most important military action was a direct incursion into Friuli in
1470, during which Prosecco, today a suburb of Trieste, which is 8
km from the city center, was burned down.
The presence of
numerous documents dedicated to viticulture in medieval Trieste
testifies to the importance that this activity had in the city
economy. In fact, until the development of the maritime merchant
activity that followed the proclamation of the free port of Trieste,
most of the inhabitants of the small fortified village dedicated
themselves to viticulture, which was practiced throughout the
municipal territory, in particular on the marly-arenaceous soil that
it is located close to the city, especially in the sunniest areas.
Trieste was therefore a fortified village surrounded by
vineyards, a feature reproduced in numerous period prints and
described by many foreign travelers. The absolutely central role
that wine had in the Trieste economy is proven by the presence, both
in the ecclesiastical and civil spheres, of tithes and other systems
based on the calculation of the profitability of the vineyards.
The most important product of the centuries-old Trieste
viticulture is Prosecco wine, which took its name from the castle of
Prosecco. On the oldest document that mentions it, Pucinum wine is
mentioned as castellum nobile. The production of this wine soon
spread beyond the municipal borders of Trieste, spreading in the
Gorizia area, in Friuli, in Dalmatia and above all in Veneto, where
it developed to become one of the most famous wines in the world.
At the same time its production stopped both in Trieste and in
the Trieste Karst, to resume starting from the beginning of the 21st
century thanks to the reorganization of the wine sector of the
Friuli-Venezia Giulia region.
In 1719 Charles
VI of Austria strengthened the then small village of Trieste by
establishing the free port, whose rights were extended during the
reign of Maria Theresa of Austria, his successor, first to the
Chamber District (1747) and then to the whole city territory
(1769).
Maria Theresa of Austria, who ascended the throne in
1740, thanks to a careful economic policy, traced the way that
allowed Trieste to become, over time, one of the main European ports
and the most important of the Austrian Empire. In the Teresian age
the Austrian government invested huge capital in the expansion and
strengthening of the airport.
Between 1758 and 1769, works
were prepared to defend the pier and a fort was erected. In the
immediate vicinity of the port, the Stock Exchange was built (inside
the Town Hall, around 1755), to which a square was later dedicated,
the Palazzo della Luogotenenza (1764), as well as a department store
and the first shipyard in Trieste, known as the squero di san
Nicolò.
In those years the Borgo Teresiano began to be built, which still
bears the name of the empress, to house a population that was
growing in the city and that at the end of the century would have
reached about 30,000 inhabitants, six times higher than the present
one. a hundred years ago. The remarkable demographic development of
the city was due, in large part, to the arrival of numerous
immigrants coming mostly from the Adriatic basin (Istrian, Venetian,
Dalmatian, Friulian, Slovenian) and - to a lesser extent - from
continental Europe (Austrians, Hungarians) and Balkan (Serbs,
Greeks, etc.).
In a report sent to the Empress Maria Theresa,
Count Nikolaus Graf von Hamilton, who held the office of President
of the Intendency of the city of Trieste from 1749 to 1768,
described the use of languages spoken by the inhabitants of
Trieste as follows:
"The inhabitants use three different
languages: Italian, Tergestino and Slovenian. The particular
language of Trieste, used by simple people, is not understood by
Italians; many inhabitants in the city and all those in the
surrounding area speak Slovenian."
Trieste was occupied three
times by Napoleon's troops: in 1797, 1805 and 1809. In these short
periods the city definitively lost its ancient autonomy, with the
consequent suspension of the status of a free port.
The first
French occupation was very short, as it began in March 1797 and
ended after two months, in the following May. Frightened by the
imminent arrival of Napoleonic troops, part of the population left
the city. Those who remained were ready to rise up against the
French soldiers. Having calmed the situation, Napoleon visited
Trieste on the following 29 April.
In May 1797, French troops
left the city under the treaty of Leoben. The second French
occupation began in December 1805 and ended in March 1806. Despite
the brevity of the first two occupations, the democratic ideas
brought by the Napoleonic troops also began to spread to Trieste,
where the awareness of an Italian national identity began to
develop.
The third French occupation began on May 17, 1809.
From October 15, Trieste was incorporated into the Illyrian
Provinces, a French governorate constituting an exclave of
metropolitan France, which also included Carinthia, Carniola,
Gorizia, Veneto Istria, Habsburg Istria, part of Croatia and
Dalmatia. The French occupation ended on November 8, 1813 following
the Battle of Leipzig.
Returning to the Habsburgs in 1813,
Trieste continued to develop, also thanks to the opening of the
railway with Vienna in 1857. In the 1860s Trieste was elevated to
the rank of capital of the Land of the Austrian Littoral region
(Oesterreichisches Küstenland). Subsequently the city became, in the
last decades of the nineteenth century, the fourth urban reality of
the Austro-Hungarian Empire, after Vienna, Budapest and Prague.
Thanks to its privileged status as the only commercial port of
Cisleitania, the unofficial name of the western half of the
Austro-Hungarian Empire, once part of the Holy Roman Empire, Trieste
became the first port of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The Julian
city became a strongly cosmopolitan, multilingual and
pluri-religious center, as shown by the official Austrian census of
December 31, 1910: 51.83% of the population of the municipality (and
59.46% of the historic center) was Italian-speaking, added Italian
immigrants from the Kingdom of Italy, who were considered foreigners
(12.9% of the inhabitants of the historic center), 24.79% of the
inhabitants were Slovenian-speaking (12.64% of the inhabitants of
the historic center) , 1.04% German-speaking (1.34% of the
inhabitants of the historic center), while there were many minor
communities: Serbs, Croats, Armenians, Jews, Greeks, Hungarians,
English and Swiss.
In the eighteenth century in the city the
Trieste dialect, a colonial Venetian dialect also spoken in a large
part of the modern province of Trieste and in the current province
of Gorizia), replaced the Tergestino dialect, an ancient local
Rhaeto-Romance dialect with a strong correlation with the Friulian
language.
Trieste was - together with Trento - one of the major centers of
Italian irredentism, a movement of opinion, an expression of the
Italian aspiration to territorially perfect its national unity,
freeing the lands subject to foreign domination, which was
particularly active in the last decades of the 19th century and the
beginning of the 20th century in all the territories included in the
Italian geographical region or populated by Italian speakers, or
connected to Italy by centuries-old historical, linguistic and
cultural ties.
As a consequence of the third Italian war of
independence (1866), which led to the annexation of Veneto to the
Kingdom of Italy, the Austrian imperial administration, for the
whole second half of the nineteenth century, increased the
interference on the political management of the territory to
attenuate the influence of the Italian ethnic group fearing the
aforementioned irredentist currents, even reaching clashes. In
particular, during the meeting of the Council of Ministers of
November 12, 1866, Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria outlined a
wide-ranging project aimed at the Germanization or Slavization of
the areas of the Empire with the aim of eradicating ethnicity.
Italian:
"His Majesty has expressed the precise order that
action be taken decisively against the influence of the Italian
elements still present in some regions of the Crown and,
appropriately occupying the posts of public, judicial, masters
employees as well as with the influence of the press , work in South
Tyrol, Dalmatia and on the coast for the Germanization and
Slavization of these territories according to the circumstances,
with energy and without any regard. His Majesty reminds the central
offices of the strong duty to proceed in this way with what has been
established. "
(Franz Joseph I of Austria, Council of the
Crown of 12 November 1866)
The prelude to this decision came
after the second Italian war of independence, which led to the
incorporation of Lombardy to the unborn Italian state (1859).
Following this event, the Austrian government favored the formation
of a Slovenian national conscience in order to counter Italian
irredentism. The awareness of Slovenian identity increased the
regression of the use of the Italian language, which nevertheless
retained considerable prestige throughout the Austrian period, which
ended at the end of the First World War with the annexation of
Trieste to Italy. after which Italian became the only official
language.
In the city, during the pro-Italian demonstrations
that followed a petition signed by 5,858 citizens to the City
Council asking for the right to teach the Italian language in state
schools, which took place between 10 and 12 July 1868, clashes broke
out and violence in the main city streets with local Slovenes
enlisted among Hapsburg soldiers, which resulted in the death of the
student Rodolfo Parisi, killed with 26 bayonet shots, and of two
workers, Francesco Sussa and Niccolò Zecchia.
On February 13,
1902, a general strike began in favor of the Lloyd stokers. The
Austrian government, in agreement with the governor of Trieste
Leopold von Goess, fearing a union between the Triestine socialist
party mainly of Italian ethnicity and irredentist elements,
proclaimed a state of siege and martial law on 14 February. During
the unfolding of the demonstration, the 55th infantry brigade under
the orders of General Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf intervened, who
proceeded to a violent repression by ordering his men to charge the
crowd with bayonets and ending the action with various rifle
discharges at height of man. Fourteen people were killed in the
action and over 200 injured.
In 1909 the Austrian governor
Konrad zu Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst prohibited the use of the
Italian language in all public buildings and with another decree of
1913 Austria officially expelled Italians from municipal
administrations and municipal companies. Trieste was also involved
in the Croatization process of Venezia Giulia, which took place
during the Austro-Hungarian domination. These interference, together
with other actions of aiding the Slavic ethnic group considered by
the Empire most loyal to the Crown, exasperated the situation by
feeding the most extremist and revolutionary currents.
According to the official Austrian census of 1910, out of a total
of 229,510 inhabitants of the municipality of Trieste (including
also the neighboring towns in the center and on the plateau) the
following breakdown was recorded on the basis of the mother tongue
of use:
118,959 (corresponding to 51.8% of the total population)
spoke Italian;
56,916 (24.8%) spoke Slovenian;
11,856 (5.2%)
spoke German;
2,403 (1.0%) spoke Serbo-Croatian;
779 (0.3%)
spoke other languages;
38,597 (16.8%) were foreign citizens who
were not asked for the language of use, including:
29,639 (12.9%)
were citizens of the Kingdom of Italy;
3,773 (1.6%) were citizens
of the Kingdom of Hungary.
At the beginning of the twentieth
century the Slovenian ethnic group of Trieste experienced a phase of
demographic, social and economic rise. This explains how irredentism
often took on markedly anti-Slavic characteristics in the Julian
city, which were perfectly embodied by the figure of Roger Timeus.
At the outbreak of the First World War, 128 Triestines refused to
fight under the Austro-Hungarian flags and - immediately after Italy
entered the war against the Central Powers - they enlisted in the
Italian Royal Army.
Among the volunteers who lost their lives
in the course of the conflict are the writers and intellectuals
Scipio Slataper, Ruggero Timeus and Carlo Stuparich, brother of the
more famous Giani Stuparich. The first exponent of this movement is
considered the Trieste Wilhelm Oberdank, then Italianized into
Guglielmo Oberdan who, for having hatched a plot to kill the
Austrian emperor Franz Joseph and found in possession of two Orsini
bombs, was tried and hanged in his city Christmas on December 20,
1882.
Particularly active on the front of ideas and
propaganda were the exiles from Trieste in Italy and France, where
they played a role of primary importance in the foundation, in Rome,
of a Central Propaganda Committee of the Upper Adriatic (1916) and,
in Paris, of the Italy irredenta association. All the members of the
executive bodies of the Committee were from Trieste, with the
exception of the Italian Dalmatian Alessandro Dudan.
World
War I and the first annexation to Italy
Between 1915 and 1917,
during the First World War, the Italian Regia Aeronautica bombed
Trieste on several occasions, causing numerous casualties among the
civilian population. On November 4, 1918, at the end of the
conflict, which saw Italy victorious, the Italian Royal Army entered
Trieste under the command of General Carlo Petitti di Roreto,
acclaimed by that part of the population that was of Italian
sentiment, who declared the state of occupation and curfew.
The sure and imminent annexation of the city and of the entire
Venezia Giulia to Italy, in vain opposed at the peace table by the
representatives of the newborn Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and
Slovenes, who instead demanded the annexation of the city and its
hinterland to the Slavic kingdom , was accompanied by a strong
tightening of relations between the Italian and Slovenian ethnic
groups, sometimes resulting in armed clashes.
After the First
World War, the Italian troops militarily occupied the part of
Dalmatia promised to Italy by the Pact of London, a secret agreement
signed on April 26, 1915, between the Italian government and the
representatives of the Triple Entente, with which Italy had
committed itself. to go to war against the central empires in
exchange for conspicuous territorial compensation which was not
fully recognized in the subsequent Treaty of Versailles (1919),
which was instead signed at the end of the conflict.
The
development of fascism in Trieste was early and rapid. In May 1920
the first voluntary city defense squads were formed in the city,
groups of fascist squads under the command of the marine officer
Ettore Benvenuti. In the following June, the headquarters of the
Trieste student avant-garde were opened, also clearly of fascist
inspiration. On 11 July 1920 the so-called "incidents" broke out in
Split, during which a Croatian citizen and two Italian soldiers were
killed.
Two days later the fascists of Trieste organized a
demonstration in the city, during which a young Italian named
Giovanni Nini was killed in unclear circumstances. The crowd,
incited by the squads led by Francesco Giunta, surrounded the
Narodni dom en masse, the greatest city cultural center of Slovenes
and other local Slavic nationalities. In the same event, Luigi
Casciana, an Italian officer on leave in Trieste, was also wounded
in unclear circumstances, who died in hospital a few days later.
On the same day some squads devastated the offices of "Jadranska
banka", the branch of "Ljubljanska kreditna banka", the printing
house of the weekly "Edinost", the Croatian Savings Bank, the
Serbian school and numerous other meeting places of the ethnic
communities present. in Trieste, in addition to those of the
Socialist Party, which had different political ideas from those of
the squadristi.
With the signing of the Treaty of Rapallo in
November 1920, Trieste definitively passed to Italy, incorporating
in its provincial territory areas of the former Princely County of
Gorizia and Gradisca, Istria and Carniola.
The period between the first and
second world war was marked by numerous difficulties for Trieste.
The city was in fact hit by a heavy economic crisis, caused by the
loss of importance of the port, once the largest of the
Austro-Hungarian Empire. Commercial activity suffered mainly, but
also the financial sector. Trieste lost its centuries-old municipal
autonomy, made very broad by the Austrian Crown, gradually changing
its linguistic and cultural division as well. Almost all of the
German-speaking community in fact left the city after the annexation
to Italy, with the Italian element gradually gaining importance.
With the advent of fascism in the national government, a policy
of "denationalization" of the so-called alien minorities was
inaugurated in Trieste and Venezia Giulia. Starting from the
mid-twenties, the Italianization of Slavic toponyms and surnames
began, while in 1929 teaching in Slovenian and German was
definitively banned from all public schools in the city of all
levels and - a little later - schools, cultural clubs and the press
of the Slovenian community were closed.
Despite the economic
problems and the tense political climate, the population of the city
grew in the 1920s, thanks mainly to immigration from other areas of
Italy. The first half of the thirties was instead a period of
demographic stagnation, with a slight decline in the population of
the order of about 1% on a five-year basis (in 1936 there were
almost two thousand fewer inhabitants than in 1931). In the same
period and, subsequently, until the outbreak of the Second World
War, some important urban works were carried out. Among the most
important buildings we should mention the University building and
the Victory Lighthouse.
The goal was to forcibly assimilate
minority ethnic groups. This policy, together with the anti-slave
actions of the fascist squads - sometimes punctuated by accidents
with deaths and injuries, had very serious repercussions on the
delicate inter-ethnic relations. Due to ethnic persecution, around
10% of Slovenes living in the city chose to emigrate to the
neighboring Kingdom of Yugoslavia. From the end of the 1920s, the
subversive activity of the Slovenian-Croatian anti-fascist and
irredentist organization TIGR developed, with some bomb attacks also
in the city center.
The Narodni dom, headquarters of the
organizations of the Slovenes of Trieste, was set on fire: the
Slovenian Hugo Roblek, housed there, died jumping out of the window
to escape the flames. The Slovenian independence and terrorist
organizations, including the TIGR and the Borba, reacted to the
murders perpetrated by the fascists with equal brutality: acts of
armed resistance multiplied and violent actions took place against
the members of the fascist regime and members of the police or - in
some cases - even against ordinary citizens.
In 1930, two
attacks were organized in Trieste by the TIGR: the one on the
Victory Lighthouse and, much more serious, the one on the editorial
staff of Il Popolo di Trieste, which caused the death of the
stenographer Guido Neri and the wounding of three people. The police
authorities carried out an extensive investigative action,
eradicating the resistance cells: the accused (all Slovenians) of
various crimes including - in addition to bomb attacks - also a
series of murders, attempted murders and fires, were tried by the
Special Court for the defense of the State, transferred for the
occasion from Rome to Trieste to carry out the first trial of this
type in the Julian city.
The trial ended with an exemplary
sentence: four defendants were given the death penalty (Ferdo
Bidovec, Fran Marušič, Zvonimir Miloš and Alojzij Valenčič), being
shot in Basovizza on 6 September 1930, while twelve others were
given various prison sentences between two years and six months and
thirty years. Two were acquitted instead.
In December 1941 - after the Second World War had already begun -
a second trial by the Special Tribunal for the Defense of the State
was held, again in Trieste, against nine members of the TIGR
(Slovenes and Croats) who were accused of terrorism and espionage.
Five of them (Pinko Tomažič, Viktor Bobek, Ivan Ivančič, Simon Kos
and Ivan Vadnal) were executed in Opicina, the others imprisoned.
With this second trial the anti-fascist terrorist organization was
annihilated.
The entry into the war of Italy alongside Nazi
Germany - in June 1940 - entailed for Trieste, as for the rest of
Italy, grief and hardship of all kinds, which worsened in the
following years, with the continuation of the conflict. The invasion
of Yugoslavia in the spring of 1941 rekindled the Slovenian and
Croatian resistance in Venezia Giulia, especially starting in 1942.
The war events and, in some cases, a deliberate terrorist policy
of the German and Italian occupation troops towards the Slovenian
and Croatian populations subject to their domination (villages
burned, decimations, indiscriminate killings of civilians), together
with the opening of camps of concentration for Slavs on the Italian
territory where thousands of innocent people lost their lives, they
further deepened the furrow of interethnic hatred that fascism had
contributed greatly to create. This hatred was not unrelated to the
tragedy that was to be experienced by the city of Trieste and by the
entire Venezia Giulia during and after the Second World War.
Since the summer of 1942 there was a resurgence of squadron violence
in the Julian city that lasted until the fall of fascism (25 July
1943). On 30 June 1942 a Center for the study of the Jewish problem
was established in Trieste - imitating the Roman one - and on the
following 18 July the synagogue of Trieste, already targeted a year
earlier, was attacked and seriously damaged.
In the months
that followed, the Fascists also devastated many Jewish and Slavic
shops, but never succeeded in involving the citizens of Trieste,
tired of the violence of the squads, in such actions of "political
hooliganism". In 1942 the Special Inspectorate of Public Security
for Venezia Giulia also began to function, based in a building in
Via Bellosguardo, which soon became a place of torture and death for
anti-fascists or supposedly so. Known as Villa Triste, it was the
forerunner of many other Italian Ville Triste that took their name
from it.
From the Badoglio
proclamation of 8 September 1943, which announced the entry into
force of the armistice of Cassibile with which the Kingdom of Italy
ceased hostilities towards the Allies, decreeing the de facto
beginning of the Italian Resistance against Nazi-fascism, Trieste
was at the center of a series of events that have profoundly marked
the history of the Julian capital and the surrounding region and
which still arouse heated debates.
In September 1943, Nazi
Germany occupied the city without any resistance, which formed,
together with all of Venezia Giulia, the Operationszone Adriatisches
Küstenland, a zone of war operations, directly dependent on by the
Gauleiter of Carinthia Friedrich Rainer.
Friedrich Rainer
tolerated in the city the reconstitution of a headquarters of the
Fascist Republican Party, directed by the federal Bruno Sambo, the
presence of a small force of Italian soldiers under the command of
the general of the Republican National Guard Giovanni Esposito and
the installation of a unit of the Guard of Republican Finance.
Rainer reserved for himself the appointment of the podestà of
Trieste, then chosen in the person of Cesare Pagnini, and of the
prefect of the province of Trieste, who became Bruno Coceani, both
welcome to the local fascists, to the authorities of the Italian
Social Republic and to Benito Mussolini himself, who knew Coceani
personally. During the Nazi occupation, the Risiera di San Sabba -
now a National Monument and museum - was used as a prison and
extermination camp for political prisoners, Jews, Italian and Slavic
partisans, with crematorium ovens that operated at full capacity.
Later - in the early 1950s - the Risiera di San Sabba was used as a
refugee camp for exiles from Julian, Rijeka and Dalmatia fleeing the
territories that had passed under Yugoslav sovereignty.
Despite the harsh repression carried out by the Nazi and Fascist
authorities, hundreds of inhabitants of the municipality of Trieste
joined the Slovenian partisan units operating in Venezia Giulia to
counter the troops of the German occupiers. Many of them died in
partisan guerrilla actions or in German concentration camps, as well
as in the Risiera. Their names are carved on the monuments erected
in their memory in almost all the hamlets of the city.
The German and Italian authorities committed numerous crimes
against the civilian population; most of these were made in Trieste
itself. On 3 April 1944 the Nazi-Fascists shot 71 people at the
Opicina shooting range, chosen at random from among the prisoners of
Trieste prisons in retaliation for the explosion of a time bomb
which the previous day, in a cinema in Opicina, had caused the death
of 7 German soldiers.
The cadavers of the Slovenes were used
to test the new crematorium built in Risiera di San Sabba which from
then, until the date of the liberation of Italy, was used to burn
the bodies of over 3,500 prisoners, directly suppressed by the
prison staff operating there.
The Risiera di San Sabba, in
addition to being used as a sorting camp for over 8,000 deportees
from the eastern war front who were then assigned to the other Nazi
concentration camps, was also used in part as a place of detention,
torture and elimination of prisoners suspected of subversive
activity against the Nazi regime.
The presence of the
crematorium in the Risiera di San Sabba testifies that it was not
only used as a place of sorting and detention of prisoners, but also
as a death camp. After the war, the Risiera, during the allied
occupation of Trieste, was used as a reception center for Italian
refugees from the Julian-Dalmatian exodus. With the D.P.R. n. 510 of
15 April 1965, the President Giuseppe Saragat declared the Risiera
di San Sabba a national monument as "the only example of a Nazi
concentration camp in Italy".
On 23 April 1944 the massacre
of via Ghega took place. In retaliation for a bomb attack on the
"Soldatenheim" club in which 4 German soldiers had died, 51
political prisoners were taken from the Trieste prison of Coroneo
who, after being taken to the site of the attack, were hanged in
every corner and window of the Palazzo Rittmeyer in via Ghega then
leaving the corpses exposed to public view for five days, before
burying them in a common grave.
The insurrection of the Italian and Yugoslav
anti-fascist partisans in Trieste was characterized by an anomalous
development. On 30 April 1945 the National Liberation Committee of
which Don Edoardo Marzari was president, made up of all the Italian
anti-fascist political forces with the exception of the Communists,
proclaimed a general insurrection. At the same time the brigades of
the Yugoslav partisans, with the support of the Italian Communist
Party, attacked from the karst plateau just outside the Julian city.
The clashes took place mainly in the areas of Opicina, which is
located on the plateau, of the Porto Vecchio, of the castle of San
Giusto and from inside the Palace of Justice, in the city center.
The remainder of the city was liberated.
The Nazi command
surrendered only on May 2 to the New Zealand avant-gardes, which
preceded the arrival of New Zealand general Bernard Freyberg by one
day. Tito's Yugoslav partisan brigades, however, had already arrived
in Trieste on 1 May. Their leaders quickly convened a city assembly
made up of Yugoslav citizens and two Italians. This occupation took
place following the so-called "race for Trieste", that is the
advance towards the Julian city made, for the purposes of post-war
policy and in a competitive manner, in the spring of 1945 by the
Yugoslav Fourth Army and the Eighth Army British and that was won by
the Yugoslavs, as evidenced by the arrival of the aforementioned
Yugoslav brigades of Tito, who anticipated the New Zealanders.
The city assembly composed of Yugoslav citizens and two Italians
previously mentioned, proclaimed the liberation of Trieste. In this
way, Tito's partisans were politically presented as the true
liberators of the Julian city in the eyes of the allies, pushing the
non-communist partisans of the Italian National Liberation Committee
to go underground. The Yugoslavs displayed on the buildings the Flag
of the Federal Socialist Republic of Yugoslavia, as well as the flag
of Italy with the red star in the center and the communist red flags
with hammer and sickle.
The Yugoslav brigades, which arrived in Trieste in forced marches
to precede the Anglo-Americans in the liberation of Venezia Giulia,
did not contain any Italian partisan units included in the Yugoslav
Army, instead sent to operate elsewhere, although many Trieste
(Italian and Slovenian) were there included. The allies
(specifically the New Zealand Second Division, which was the first
to arrive in the city), recognized that the liberation had been
accomplished by Tito's partisans and in return asked for and
obtained direct management of the port and of the communication
routes with the Austria. In fact, not yet aware of Hitler's suicide,
the Anglo-Americans were preparing the way for an invasion of
Austria and therefore of Germany.
The Yugoslav army took
advantage of the situation by assuming full powers. It then
appointed a Political Commissioner, Franc Štoka, a member of the
Yugoslav Communist Party. On May 4, orders 1, 2, 3 and 4 were issued
by the Yugoslav authority present in Trieste, called the City of
Trieste Command (Komanda Mesta Trst), which proclaimed a state of
war by imposing a curfew after the fighting was over and uniformed
the time zone Trieste to Yugoslav time.
These measures also
limited the circulation of vehicles and at the same time decreed the
removal from their homes of hundreds of citizens, suspected of
having little sympathy for the communist ideology that led the
Yugoslav brigades.
Among these there were not only fascists
or collaborationists, but also non-communist fighters of the Italian
Liberation War or even communists themselves who opposed the
annexation of Trieste to Yugoslavia, who were deported en masse to
various prison camps, such as the concentration of Borovnica or that
of Goli Otok from which they never returned. Many of them were
killed directly and thrown into the Trieste sinkholes.
In
Basovizza, a fraction of the municipality of Trieste, in May 1945 an
unspecified number of corpses of prisoners, soldiers and civilians
killed by the army and Yugoslav partisans were hidden inside the
well (Foiba di Basovizza) (President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro declared
the Foiba di Basovizza a national monument by decree of 11 September
1992). A U.S. memorandum of May 8 stated:
“In Trieste the
Yugoslavs are using all the familiar terror tactics. Every Italian
of any importance is arrested. The Yugoslavs have taken complete
control and are carrying out the conscription of Italians for forced
labor, taking over banks and other valuable properties and
commandeering grains and other supplies in large quantities. "
(The memorandum drawn up by the US State Department dated May 8,
1945)
On 8 May they proclaimed Trieste an autonomous city
within the Federative Republic of Yugoslavia. On public buildings
they waved the Yugoslav flag flanked by the Italian Tricolor with
the red star in the center.
The city experienced difficult
moments, of great fear, with people debated between profoundly
different ideas: the annexation to Yugoslavia or the return to
Italy. In this climate, confiscations, requisitions and summary
arrests took place. There were also cases of personal vendettas, in
a population exasperated by the war events and by the oppositions of
the fascist period. In vain did the Triestines solicit the
intervention of the Allies.
The Allied command and the
Yugoslav command finally reached a provisional agreement on the
occupation of Trieste. On 9 June 1945 in Belgrade, Josip Broz Tito,
having verified that Stalin was unwilling to support him, concluded
the agreement with General Alexander. A zone A was created,
entrusted to the allied administration, which included Trieste and
Gorizia and went up along the Isonzo in Tolmino and Caporetto up to
the Tarvisio border to go down to the enclave of Pola, and a zone B,
entrusted to the administration of the Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia, which included Istria, Rijeka and the Kvarner Islands.
On February 10, 1947, the Treaty of Paris was signed between Italy and the allied powers, which established the Free Territory of Trieste (FTT), consisting of the Trieste coast along the northwestern part of Istria, temporarily divided by a border passing through south of the town of Muggia and administered by the Allied Military Government (zone A) and the Yugoslav army (zone B), pending the creation of the constitutional bodies of the new state.
The situation was clarified only on 5 October 1954, when with the
London Memorandum the Zone A with the city of Trieste and its
international free port passed from the allied military
administration to the Italian civil administration, while Zone B
passed from the administration military to civilian Yugoslavia. The
following municipalities in zone A then passed to the Italian
administration: Duino-Aurisina, Sgonico, Monrupino, Trieste, Muggia
and San Dorligo della Valle. The transfer of power to Zone A
officially took place on 25 October 1954.
The agreements also
provided for some territorial adjustments in favor of Yugoslavia
(the so-called "Gardening operation"), which slightly changed the
boundaries of zone A with the sale of some areas belonging to the
municipality of Muggia; altogether the change of borders affected
about ten km². On 4 November 1954, during the celebrations of the
Day of National Unity and the Armed Forces, a national holiday
commemorating the Italian victory in the First World War, considered
the completion of the process of unification of the Risorgimento
thanks to the annexation of Trento and Trieste, the President of the
Republic Luigi Einaudi went to the Julian city on an official visit.
In the course of his short speech he stated:
«... You from
Trieste, in order to reach the goal, have discussed clause by
clause, word by word, for many months the agreement or signed. You
have defended, meter by meter, that territory which in your belief
should have remained united with Trieste. Let me congratulate you on
showing courage. By operating in this way, in silence, you are
deserving of the Italian homeland. "..."
In zone A there were
5,000 American soldiers of the TRUST (TRieste United States Troops)
and 5,000 British soldiers of the BETFOR (British Element Trieste
FORce). Italy took possession of zone A on 26 October 1954; the
allies withdrew between 25 and 27. With the constitutional law of
January 31, 1963, which came into force on February 16, the
Friuli-Venezia Giulia region was then formed, of which Trieste
became the capital.
It was necessary to wait for the Treaty
of Osimo of 10 November 1975 for a definitive settlement between
Italy and Yugoslavia, with the consequent end of the territorial
claims between the two countries, which de jure sanctioned the
territorial separation that had already been created de facto in
following the London Memorandum (1954), making definitive the
borders between Italy and the then Federal Socialist Republic of
Yugoslavia.
The Treaty of Osimo therefore concluded the
historical phase that began in 1947 with the peace treaty of Paris,
which decreed the cession to Yugoslavia of a large part of Venezia
Giulia and of the entire Quarnaro (i.e.Rijeka and the Kvarner
islands, the almost all of Istria and the karst plateaus to the east
and north-east of Gorizia) and the creation of the Free Territory of
Trieste including the current province of Trieste and the Istrian
coastal territories from Ankaran to Novigrad (today, respectively,
in Slovenia and in Croatia).
The failure to activate the
procedures for the establishment of the constitutional bodies of the
Free Territory of Trieste effectively prevented it from officially
constituting itself. The subsequent transfer of the civil
administration power of the Free Territory of Trieste to Italy (zone
A) and Yugoslavia (zone B) created the conditions for the subsequent
developments that eventually led to the Treaty of Osimo.
In 2004, together with other
European countries, Slovenia became part of the European Union, and
in 2007, it joined the Schengen Convention, thus eliminating the
figure of Trieste as a border city. In particular, the convention
regulates the opening of borders between the adhering countries;
since 2007, therefore, the Italian-Slovenian borders have ceased to
be an impediment to the free passage of goods and people.
Initially signed on 19 June 1990, in a first version, by the Benelux
countries, West Germany and France, other countries of the European
Union also joined the subsequent and homonymous convention,
including Italy (1990) and, indeed, Slovenia (2004).
Cathedral of San Giusto
The
Cathedral Basilica of San Giusto is the main Catholic religious
building in the city of Trieste. It is located on the top of the
homonymous hill overlooking the city. As reported by most Triestine
historians, the current appearance of the basilica derives from the
unification of the two pre-existing churches of Santa Maria and the
one dedicated to the martyr San Giusto, which were incorporated
under a single building by Bishop Rodolfo Pedrazzani da Robecco
between the years 1302 and 1320 to provide the city with an imposing
cathedral.
The first news about the cathedral dates back to 1337,
when the bell tower of the former church of Santa Maria was covered
with a thick wall to support the new building. The work on the bell
tower ended in 1343, but those on the church lasted until the end of
the 14th century. The bell tower was originally higher, but in 1422
it was struck by lightning and was reduced to its current height.
After the definitive dedication of the city to Austria (1382), the
then emperor Leopold III of Habsburg appointed the first German
bishop of Trieste, Enrico de Wildenstein, who on 27 November 1385
consecrated the main altar of the cathedral, putting an end to the
works. In November 1899 Pope Leo XIII raised the sacred building of
Trieste to the dignity of a minor basilica.
Serbian Orthodox
Church of the Holy Trinity and Saint Spyridon
The Serbian
Orthodox temple of the Holy Trinity and San Spiridione is the church
of the Serbian Orthodox community of Trieste. Work of the architect
Carlo Maciachini (1869), it stands on the site of the pre-existing
church of San Spiridione, which was built in 1753. The architectural
complex, located in the Borgo Teresiano near the Grand Canal of
Trieste, reflects a Byzantine taste which is characterized by a dome
higher than the four bell towers, due to the blue hemispherical caps
and the large mosaic decorations that adorn the external walls. Nine
large statues by the Milanese sculptor Emilio Bisi adorn the facade.
Synagogue of Trieste
The synagogue of Trieste, inaugurated in
1912, located between via San Francesco, via Donizetti and via
Zanetti in Trieste is considered one of the largest Jewish religious
buildings in Europe, second in size only to the Great Synagogue of
Budapest, reflecting its economic importance , cultural and social
aspects of the Jewish communities within the Austro-Hungarian
Empire. With the first annexation of Trieste to Italy, which took
place in 1920 at the end of the First World War, the Julian city
became, together with the synagogues of Rome, Genoa and Livorno, one
of the four great synagogues of the twentieth century on Italian
soil.
Church of Santa Maria Maggiore
The church of the
Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, better known as
the church of Santa Maria Maggiore, also known as the baroque church
of the Jesuits, has a baroque style. Built in the 17th century by
the Jesuit company, it has been managed by the Franciscan friars
since 1922. The church is located in via del Collegio, at the foot
of the San Giusto hill and near the basilica of Christ the Savior
(formerly called the basilica of San Silvestro), in the immediate
vicinity of the historic center of Trieste.
Church of
Sant'Antonio Taumaturgo
The church of Sant'Antonio Taumaturgo,
commonly called the church of Sant'Antonio Nuovo, is the main
religious building in the Borgo Teresiano and in the center of
Trieste. The design of the church dates back to 1808, but the works
did not begin until 1825. The facade of the building is
characterized by six Ionic columns. Also on the main facade, in the
attic, there are six statues sculpted by Francesco Bosa in 1842,
depicting San Giusto, San Sergio, San Servolo, San Mauro,
Sant'Eufemia and Santa Tecla. The church is located in the square of
the same name, close to the Canale Grande.
Marian shrine of
Monte Grisa
The national temple to Mary Mother and Queen (in
Slovenian Svetišče na Vejni), the original name of the religious
building which was later elevated to a sanctuary, is a Catholic
church north of the city of Trieste, located at an altitude of 330
meters on the mountain Grisa (in Slovenian Vejna), from where you
have a spectacular view of the city and the gulf. It was designed by
the architect Antonio Guacci on a sketch by the bishop of Trieste
and Koper Antonio Santin: the triangular structure evokes the letter
M as a symbol of the Virgin Mary. The construction took place
between 1963 and 1965, while the inauguration, by the bishop
himself, took place on May 22, 1966. The sanctuary is characterized
by an imposing structure in reinforced concrete, with the presence
of two superimposed churches.
Church of San Pasquale Baylon
The church of San Pasquale
Baylón is a Catholic place of worship in Trieste. It is located in
the Chiadino district, inside the large park of the noble villa of
Baron Pasquale Revoltella, in via Carlo de Marchesetti 37. The
church, in neo-Romanesque style with a Greek cross plan, was built
between 1863 and 1866 on project by the architect Giuseppe Josef
Andreas Kranner of Prague and was consecrated on 17 May 1867 by
bishop Bartolomeo Legat.
The church of San Pasquale Baylón stands
on a base under which there is a crypt where two sarcophagi are
buried which preserve the bodies of Baron Pasquale Revoltella and
his mother Domenica. A testamentary disposition of 13 October 1866
by Baron Pasquale Revoltella constituted a Pious Foundation with the
obligation, for the chaplain, of the school education and spiritual
assistance of the villagers of the place as well as the celebration
of two masses every year in suffrage for himself and his mother (
one on 17 May, the feast of Saint Pasquale Baylón, and one on 15
August, the feast of the Assumption).
Post Office Building
The Palazzo delle Poste di Trieste is an
important historical building of the Julian city. The main entrance
is in Piazza Vittorio Veneto. Inside is the Trieste headquarters of
the Italian Post Office and the Postal and Telegraphic Museum of
Central Europe. The Palazzo delle Poste in Trieste was built between
1890 and 1894 by the architect Friedrich Setz.
The area occupied
by the Customs (built on the ancient salt pans that once occupied
the area on which the Borgo Teresiano currently stands) was destined
for the new building. The building, arranged on a rectangular area
of almost 7 100 square meters, was conceived from the beginning to
house both the post and telegraph offices, and those of finance, so
the interior is structured in two distinct bodies of 3 500 square
meters each. The building currently houses the Trieste branch of the
Italian Post Office on the side of Piazza Vittorio Veneto and the
Central European Postal and Telegraphic Museum on the ground floor.
Justice palace
The Palace of Justice is a judicial building
in Trieste which is located near the Foro Ulpiano. In February 1895,
during the Austro-Hungarian era, the Provincial Diet of Trieste and
the Civic Magistrate decided to build a single architectural complex
that contained all the judicial offices, prisons and the archive of
the Tavolari Books, at the time located in different areas of the
city, including in via Santi Martiri (now via Duca d'Aosta), in via
della Sanità (now via Armando Diaz) and in the Bordeaux building.
The Austrian government asked for financial help from the
municipality of Trieste which, after an initial refusal due to lack
of funds, agreed to sell to the Treasury a land of 37 214 m3 at the
subsidized price of 324 919 Austro-Hungarian florin, with a contract
stipulated on 25 July 1898.
Galatti Palace
Palazzo
Galatti, commonly called Palazzo della Provincia, is a
nineteenth-century palace in Trieste, located in the city center, in
Piazza Vittorio Veneto but with accesses also from the streets of
Rome, Galatti and of the Geppa. The building consists of three
floors above ground.
Until 30 September 2017, the date of
suppression of the institution, it was the registered office and the
most important operational headquarters in the province of Trieste.
Following the implementation of the L.R. 26/2014 Reorganization of
the Region system - Local Autonomies in Friuli Venezia Giulia.
Arrangement of inter-municipal territorial unions and reallocation
of administrative functions, the property passed to the autonomous
region of Friuli Venezia-Giulia for which it houses the offices of
the Presidency, Social Services and Policies and Higher School
Building of the UTI Giuliana.
State Railways Building
The
Palazzo delle Ferrovie dello Stato is a nineteenth-century palace in
Trieste, located in the center of the city, in Piazza Vittorio
Veneto but also with access from the streets of Milan, Galatti and
Filzi. The building consists of five floors above ground. Currently,
following the implementation of a plan to move the offices of the
Railways to other structures, the building is empty and has been put
up for sale. The building of the Departmental Directorate of the
State Railways was built between 1894 and 1895 on a project by the
architect Raimondo Sagors. The building housed on the ground floor
some commercial activities including Ignazio de Brull's shop, while
in the rear part of the building complex, in the Fascist era, there
was the Teatro del Dopolavoro Ferroviario, which became Cinema
Vittorio Veneto, inaugurated in 1949.
Palace of the Austrian Lieutenancy
The palace of the Austrian
Lieutenancy, or the palace of the Prefecture of Trieste, is one of
the most important buildings dating back to the Habsburg rule
present in Trieste. The main and monumental entrance is in piazza
dell'Unità d'Italia, but the building also overlooks piazza Verdi
and via San Carlo. Formerly the seat of the Austrian Lieutenancy,
today it houses the seat of the Prefecture of Trieste. The palace
stands on the site of the old Palazzo Governiale, built in 1764 by
order of Maria Theresa of Austria according to the design of
Giovanni Fusconi, where once the offices of the Imperial Arsenal of
Trieste were located. Originally the structure consisted of only two
floors, to which a third one was added in 1825. Demolished in 1899,
the old building gave way to the new building built between 1901 and
1905 on a design by Emil Artmann.
Town Hall Building
Immediately after the decision to bury the old mandrake, a stretch
of water reserved for the mooring of small boats also present in the
port of Trieste (the related works then took place between 1858 and
1863), the square was subject to a total redesign. In fact, the idea
of a space completely open to the sea prevailed, surrounded by
buildings and with the town hall placed as a front base, with the
consequent demolition of the walls and buildings that then closed
the square from the sea side. On the place designated to give rise
to the modern Palazzo del Municipio stood several houses, a loggia
and some buildings. In 1875, the Trieste architect Giuseppe Bruni
won the tender for the design of the new building. The new building
consisted of a single monumental body dominated, in the central
part, by a tower. The Town Hall is dominated by the bell tower on
which two Moors are installed, friendly called by the Trieste
residents Micheze and Jacheze (from the Slovenian Mihec and Jakec),
also designed by Bruni, who since 1876 mark the passage of time
every quarter of an hour , as well as the civic bell with the town
halberd.
Model Building
The building, located between the
Palazzo del Municipio and Palazzo Stratti, was also built by the
architect Giuseppe Bruni between 1871 and 1873, taking the place of
the old churches of San Pietro and San Rocco that were located in
the same place. The building was designed following indications from
the municipality of Trieste and was nicknamed "Model Building"
because it was to serve as an architectural example for the
restructuring that was taking place in the then Piazza Grande. At
the beginning Palazzo Model was used as a hotel, later called Hotel
Delorme, which stopped operating towards 1912. In place of the hotel
business, part of the municipal offices found space. In 2007,
following the devastation that was caused by a fire, the
municipality of Trieste sold it to the then municipal company
AcegasApsAmga with the aim of building its new headquarters. On the
top floor of the building you can see telamons, that is male statues
intent on holding up the tunic.
Carciotti Palace
Palazzo
Carciotti is an eighteenth-century palace in Trieste, located in the
city center, at the beginning of the Grand Canal of Trieste. The
building was built on the aforementioned area that was once used for
salt pans. The client was the Greek merchant Demetrio Carciotti, who
settled in Trieste in 1775. Enriched with the trade of cloths from
Bohemia, at the end of the eighteenth century Demetrio Carciotti
bought the five houses that were located on the right side of the
canal entrance. For the construction of this palace, Demetrio
Carciotti entrusted the architect Matteo Pertsch, who presented his
project in 1798. Immediately began the construction works, which
Giovanni Righetti supervised, which lasted until 1805.
Tergesteo Palace
Palazzo del Tergesteo in Trieste is an important
building in the city. The main entrance is in piazza della Borsa,
but the building also overlooks piazza Verdi. Formerly the seat of
the Trieste stock exchange, it has been renovated several times, the
last of which between 2009 and 2011. In 1838 the land where Palazzo
del Tergesteo now stands was sold by Giuseppe Brambilla to the
Tergesteo company, established with the aim of erecting a majestic
multifunctional building in the center of Trieste. The company
structure is divided into 1 500 shares, among which the shareholders
of Austria Karl Ludwig von Bruck and Baron Pasquale Revoltella are
remembered. Construction work began in 1840 and ended in 1842.
Palazzo del Lloyd Triestino
The Lloyd Triestino building in
Trieste is an important construction of the city. The main entrance
is in Piazza dell'Unità d'Italia, but the building also overlooks
via dell'Orologio, along the Mandracchio bank and via del Mercato
Vecchio. Formerly the headquarters of the shipping company Lloyd
Triestino di Navigazione, later Lloyd Triestino, it has been
renovated several times, and now houses the offices of the
presidency and the council of the autonomous region of Friuli
Venezia Giulia. Lloyd Triestino, established in 1833, had its first
headquarters in piazza Tommaseo, then moved to piazza della Borsa.
Trieste maritime station
In 1924 the administration of the
General Warehouses decided to build a maritime station for
passengers in Trieste. The Fascist government included this
construction among the public works of immediate execution, given
its importance. The Trieste maritime station, which was designed by
Umberto Nordio and Giacomo Zammattio, was built between 1926 and
1930. The building, located on the Molo dei Bersaglieri, is the
result of the transformation of a simple warehouse in the port of
Trieste, which during the Habsburg domination was mainly used for
the storage of wines imported from Italy.
Aedes Palace
Palazzo Aedes, commonly called the Red skyscraper, is a
twentieth-century palace in Trieste, located in piazza Luigi Amedeo
Duca degli Abruzzi, that is, at the meeting point between the Grand
Canal of Trieste and the banks. It was built between 1926 and 1928
next to the Gopcevich palace on a project by the architect Arduino
Berlam. The building draws inspiration from New York's new red brick
skyscrapers, and is known as the first true skyscraper built in
Trieste.
Gopcevich Palace
Palazzo Gopcevich houses the
Carlo Schmidl Civic Theater Museum. The building, with its
characteristic white and red plaster, is located in the center of
the city, in the Borgo Teresiano, on the bank of the Grand Canal of
Trieste and was built in 1850 on a project by the architect Giovanni
Andrea Berlam on behalf of the Serbian shipowner Spiridione
Gopcevich , hence the name of the building. The façade overlooking
the canal, with an eclectic style, composed of a red and yellow
Greek design, is also enriched by statues, friezes and medallions
that recall the protagonists of the battle of the Piana dei Merli,
fought on 15 June 1389, the day of San Vito, from the army of the
alliance of the Serbian kingdoms against the Ottoman army, in the
Piana dei Merli, a plain in today's Kosovo. The interior of the
building features highly refined environments, both in the
furnishings and in the inlaid floors, as well as in the decorated
ceilings. The last radical restoration of Palazzo Gopcevich dates
back to 1988.
San Marco coffee
Caffè San Marco is a
historic café located in via Battisti 18. Founded in 1914, the place
is famous for having always been one of the main meeting places of
the city's intellectuals. Caffè San Marco is housed in a building
erected in 1912 by Assicurazioni Generali, who rented the ground
floor to Marco Lovrinovich, a native of Parenzo, who inaugurated the
historic café on January 3, 1914. The place gradually became the
main meeting place for young students and intellectuals. of the
city, but not only: the café, in fact, began to host young Italian
irredentists, also functioning as a laboratory for the production of
false passports to allow anti-Austrian patriots to escape to Italy.
For these reasons, in the middle of the First World War, on 23 May
1915, a group of soldiers from the Austro-Hungarian army broke into
the premises, devastating it and decreeing its permanent closure.
Lovrinovich himself was brutally expelled and transferred to
Liebenau prison in Upper Austria, because he had voluntarily caused
trachoma with a bacterial solution in order not to be enrolled in
the imperial and royal Austro-Hungarian army, just mobilized for the
Italian front, given the declaration of war just declared by Italy,
which thus made its entry into the world conflict.
Trieste
lighthouse
The lighthouse of the Lanterna di Trieste is located
on top of the Fratelli Bandiera pier, at the west end of the city,
marking the entrance to the old port. The construction of the
lighthouse, which came into operation on 11 February 1833, was
commissioned by the governor of the city Carlo Zinzendorf based on a
project by Matteo Pertsch. The optical group is supported by a stone
column with a cylindrical base which rises from a Maximilian tower
embattled with two orders of thrones. In addition to the function of
lighthouse, in fact, the construction also had to carry out a
function of defense of the port. The foundations of the lighthouse
rest on what was once the Scoglio dello Zucco.
Victory Lighthouse
The Vittoria lighthouse was built between
January 15, 1923 and May 24, 1927, by the Italian architect Arduino
Berlam. In addition to fulfilling the functions of a lighthouse for
navigation, illuminating the Gulf of Trieste, the Faro della
Vittoria also functions as a memorial monument in honor of the
fallen of the sea during the First World War, as evidenced by the
inscription placed on its base:
"Shine and remember the cadavts
svl mare (Mcmxv - Mcmxviii)"
(Inscription on the base of the
Victory Lighthouse dedicated to the fallen of the sea during the
First World War)
In particular, the Roman numerals Mcmxv and
Mcmxviii recall the years of beginning and end of the First World
War for Italy, namely 1915 and 1918.
Villa Necker
Villa
Necker is a historic residence in neoclassical style, located in via
Università 2. Villa Necker stands on the area originally occupied by
the land owned by the "Santi Martiri". Much of the criticism
attributes the construction of the villa to the architect Giacomo
Marchini, based on a project by the French Champion, who arrived in
the city in 1784 and to whom we also owe the design of Villa Murat,
which no longer exists today. The structure, set within a large
park, has three floors above ground.
Villa Engelmann
Villa
Engelmann is located in via di Chiadino 5 in front of the Beata
Vergine delle Grazie church. The villa and the adjacent park were
designed at the behest of Francesco Ponti in 1840 with the
construction works that lasted three years. In 1888 Villa Engelmann
was bought by Frida Engelmann, while in 1938 it was inherited by
Guglielmo Engelmann. The whole area was ceded to the city of Trieste
by his son Werner.
Villa Sigmundt
Villa Sigmundt is
located in Via Rossetti at numbers 44 and 46. It was designed by
Giovanni Andrea Berlam in 1861 on commission of Edmund Sigmundt, a
rich Trieste sponge merchant. Built in the Chiadino district, it has
remained unchanged since its inauguration.
Castelletto
Geiringer
The Castelletto or Villa Geiringer rises in a dominant
position on the Scorcola hill. It was built as the personal
residence of the Trieste architect Eugenio Geiringer in 1896.
Kleine Berlin anti-aircraft tunnels
Kleine Berlin (little Berlin in German. Actually incorrect, because
in German Berlin is not feminine, since we should say Kleines
Berlin) is the largest complex of underground anti-aircraft tunnels
dating back to the Second World War still existing in Trieste. Given
its hilly conformation, Trieste is crossed by numerous anti-aircraft
tunnels, but the Kleine Berlin complex is particular for its size,
its extension, and for the fact that it can be visited by the
public.
Miramare Castle
Miramare Castle was built as the
residence of the Hapsburg court in the current homonymous district
of Trieste at the behest of Maximilian of Hapsburg-Lorraine,
Archduke of Austria and Emperor of Mexico, to make it his home to
share with his wife Charlotte of Belgium . In recent times the
castle has been transformed into the historical museum of the
Miramare castle, which registered, in 2016, 257 237 visitors, while
the park of the Miramare castle registered 833 300 visitors.
Castle of San Giusto
The castle of San Giusto is a
fortress-museum located on the hill of the same name. As a historic
residence, it was restored in the 2000s and was used as a civic
museum by the Municipality of Trieste, whose structure has belonged
to the municipal property since 1930. On the Lalio Bastion, the
Tergestino Lapidarium was inaugurated on 4 April 2001, consisting of
inscriptions, sculptures, bas-reliefs and fragments of Roman
architecture. It can be visited only in part: in addition to the
lapidary, the Chapel, the Caprin Room, the large internal courtyard
- site of events in the summer - and the stands, from which you can
enjoy a wide view of the city below, are in fact accessible.
Duino Castle
Duino Castle is located in the municipality of
Duino-Aurisina, in the province of Trieste. The castle has been
owned for over 420 years by the Della Torre family, in particular by
the Della Torre branch of Valsassina first and then by the Dukes
Della Torre and Tasso. Since 2003 the castle is - together with its
park - open to the public. From the manor you can enjoy a vast
panorama of the steep rocky walls overlooking the sea. In the park
there is a bunker used during the Second World War. The history of
the Della Torre and Tasso family is linked to the management of
postal services, as it exercised this activity in various European
countries, including Italy, Austria, Germany, Hungary and the
Netherlands from the 15th century to the end of the 19th century.
Muggia Castle
The castle, which overlooks the small port of
Muggia in an elevated position, is owned by the sculptor Villi Bossi
and his wife Gabriella. It is open to the public on special
occasions, in particular for cultural and musical initiatives. The
first nucleus of the castle was a tower built by the patriarch of
Aquileia Marquardo di Randeck in 1374 in Borgolauro, a modern
central district of the neighboring town of Muggia, located along
the sea. Its construction lasted until 1399.
Grand Canal of Trieste
The Grand Canal of
Trieste is a navigable canal located in the heart of the Borgo
Teresiano, in the historic center, halfway between the Trieste
Centrale station and Piazza Unità d'Italia, with its entrance from
the San Giorgio del Porto Vecchio basin. It was built between 1754
and 1756 by the Venetian Matteo Pirona, further digging the main
collector of the salt pans, when these were buried to allow the
urban development of the city outside the walls. It was built so
that boats could go straight to the city center to unload and load
their goods.
Molo Audace
The Molo Audace is located on the
banks of Trieste, in the heart of the city, a few steps from Piazza
Unità d'Italia and the Grand Canal of Trieste. In 1740 the ship San
Carlo sank in the port of Trieste, near the shore. Instead of
removing the wreck, it was decided to use it as a basis for the
construction of a new pier, which was built between 1743 and 1751
and was named after San Carlo. The Molo Audace separates the San
Giorgio basin from the San Giusto basin of the Porto Vecchio. On
November 3, 1918, at the end of the First World War, the first ship
of the Italian Royal Navy to enter the port of Trieste and dock at
the San Carlo pier was the destroyer Audace, whose anchor is now
exposed at the base of the Faro della Vittoria of Trieste. In memory
of this event, in March 1922, the name of the docking from Molo San
Carlo to Molo Audace was changed. At the end of the pier itself, in
1925, a bronze compass rose was erected, with an epigraph in the
center that recalls the historic landing of the Audace ship, and on
the side the words
"Cast in enemy bronze III November Mcmxxv"
(Inscription present on the Molo Audace)
The Roman numeral
III November Mcmxxv (3 November 1925) recalls the date of the
ceremony that commemorated, seven years later, the docking of the
destroyer Audace, and with it the subsequent landing of the Italian
sailors in the Trieste just liberated by the Austro-Hungarian
troops.
Opicina tramway
The
Opicina tramway (tram de Opcina in Trieste dialect, Openski tramvaj
in Slovenian), also known as the Opicina railway, one of the tourist
attractions of the city of Trieste, is a panoramic interurban
tramway operated by Trieste Trasporti. Its unique feature in Europe
is that it has a steep slope of about 800 m (up to 26%) along which
the cars are pushed (uphill) or held back (downhill) by shield
wagons tied to a funicular system. . The service, classified as line
2, has an urban route in the center of Trieste (at sea level) and an
interurban section connecting with the hamlet of Villa Opicina on
the Carso plateau, at 329 m asl. In operation since 9 September
1902, it is just over 5 km long.
Unity
of Italy Square
Piazza Unità d'Italia is the main square of
Trieste. It is located at the foot of the San Giusto hill, between
Borgo Teresiano and Borgo Giuseppino. Rectangular in plan, the
square opens onto the Gulf of Trieste on one side, while on the
other it is surrounded by numerous palaces and various public
buildings. Overlooking the square are the headquarters of various
bodies: the Trieste town hall, the building of the Friuli Venezia
Giulia Regional Council and the prefecture of the capital. The
square has a total area of 12 280 m². In ancient times it was
called Piazza San Pietro, from the name of a small church there,
then changed its name to Piazza Grande, while during the Austrian
period the name was changed to Piazza Francesco Giuseppe, from the
name of the emperor Franz Joseph of Austria. It took its current
name in 1918, when the city was annexed to Italy.
Stock Exchange Square
Piazza della Borsa is one of the main
squares of Trieste. Also known as the second good city lounge, the
square was the economic center of the city throughout the 19th
century. It is the square immediately adjacent to Piazza Unità
d'Italia that continues, narrowing, until the beginning of Corso
Italia, an important city artery. The place where the square stands
was once just outside the city walls. In fact, at the point where
the passage with Piazza Unità is located, there was the gateway to
Vienna. The houses that delimit the square towards the outskirts of
the city instead follow the line of the ancient walls towards the
Riborgo tower.
Neighborhoods
Borgo Teresiano
The Borgo
Teresiano is a district of Trieste built around the middle of the
18th century and commissioned by the then emperor of Austria Charles
VI and - after his death - by Maria Theresa of Austria. The
neighborhood was designed to give some respite and development to
the city that was witnessing the flourishing of port trade. It was
obtained from the burial of the ancient salt pans of Trieste by
urbanizing an area outside the walls. With its orthogonal road axis,
it is one of the first examples of modern city town planning. The
Borgo Teresiano develops between via Carducci, corso Italia, the
Trieste Centrale station and the banks.
Borgo Giuseppino
Borgo Giuseppino is a district of Trieste designed and built
starting from the end of the 18th century. The name derives from the
Austrian Emperor Joseph II of Austria, son of the Empress Maria
Theresa of Austria, who continued the reform period already
initiated by his mother. The village extends outside the walls of
the ancient Porta Cavana reaching the land of the Lazzaretto di San
Carlo. After the city had expanded into Borgo Teresiano, a place
formerly occupied by the ancient salt pans, it needed new and
numerous spaces, given the dizzying growth it was witnessing. The
project for the construction of the district was started in 1788 by
the architect Domenico Corti.
Tergeste
The strategic importance of the ancient Roman city of
Tergeste, which later gave rise to modern Trieste, is also indicated
by its mighty walls. Made of stone blocks, they surrounded the city
starting from the hilly areas down to the sea. The ancient Roman
Trieste, in fact, had a port in the Campo Marzio area, where the
railway station of the same name is now located and the related
railway museum, equipped with modest-sized stopovers along the
coast, which were located under the promontory of San Vito and near
the modern town of Grignano, where there were also some patrician
villas, extending up to Santa Croce. The water needs of the city
were satisfied at the time by two aqueducts: that of Bagnoli and
that of San Giovanni di Guardiella.
Fundamental for the economic
development of the city was a Roman road built by the Emperor
Flavius Vespasian, called Via Flavia, which was built between 78
and 79, which over the decades became the most important road in the
Augustan region of Venetia et Histria. Its route developed from
Tergeste along the Istrian coast passing through Pola and Fiume; it
finally reached Dalmatia, but it has been assumed that it was
originally supposed to extend as far as Greece. It was one of the
most important routes among those that did not start directly from
Rome.
Another important road that passed through the ancient city
was the Via Gemina, which connected Aquileia to Emona (modern
Ljubljana) and which was built after 14 BC. from legio XIII Gemina.
The Via Gemina followed the first stretch of the ancient via
dell'ambra: when they split, the latter then continued up to the
Danube towards Carnuntum.
Roman theater of Trieste
The
Roman theater of Trieste is located at the foot of the San Giusto
hill, in the historic center, on the edge of the old city, between
via Donota and via del Teatro Romano. At the time of its
construction, the theater was located outside the city walls by the
sea, which at that time reached that area. On its tiers, also built
taking advantage of the natural slope of the hill, from 3 500 to 6
000 spectators could be accommodated, depending on the various
sources. The construction of the theater is dated to the end of the
1st century BC, with its expansion occurring at the beginning of the
2nd century AD. It was probably built at the behest of Quinto
Petronio Modesto from Trieste, procurator and flamine of the emperor
Trajan, mentioned in various inscriptions, who according to other
sources only took care of the renovations.
Early Christian basilica of Trieste and the temples to Jupiter
and Athena
The early Christian basilica of Trieste, built between
the 4th and 5th centuries, contains some very valuable mosaics, a
tangible sign of the wealth of the local church and the city of
Tergeste until the late imperial age. The remains of the early
Christian basilica were discovered under the current Cathedral of
San Giusto. On the hill of San Giusto some remains of the temples of
Jupiter and Athena are still visible. Of the latter, some
architectural structures have been preserved in the foundations of
the cathedral, identifiable from the outside thanks to special
openings in the walls of the bell tower and in the subsoil (through
access from the Civic Museum of History and Art of Trieste).
Civil Basilica of Trieste
To the north of the temples to Jupiter
and Athena there was the forum (which functioned as the main square)
which was divided into three naves with an internal apse and which
was completed by a portico with an adjoining civil basilica. The
donor was Quinto Baieno Blassiano, Trajan's procurator who exercised
his office before 120-125.
Arch of Riccardo
According to
some sources, the Arch of Riccardo is one of the Roman gates of
Trieste dating back to the 1st century BC, probably built under the
emperor Octavian Augustus in the years 33-32 BC. The forms of the
architectural decoration allow us to date the current form of the
arch to the Claudian-Neronian age or perhaps to the Flavian age
(50-75 AD). According to other sources, however, it is one of the
entrances to the sanctuary of the Magna Mater. It is a single fornix
arch, 7.2 m high, 5.3 m wide and 2 m deep. It also has an upper
crown, devoid of decoration.
Antiquarium in via del Seminario
The Antiquarium in via del Seminario is an archaeological site in
the city of Trieste, where a section of the Roman walls is
preserved. The archaeological remains of the Antiquarium in via del
Seminario are among the oldest in the Julian city. In fact, they
date back to the late Republic, i.e. the end of the 1st century BC.
In the Antiquarium you can observe a stretch of the walls, built by
Octavian (when he had not yet assumed the title of Augustus) between
33 and 32 BC. for the defense of the colony of Tergeste. The
preserved section is 4 meters long and 2.4 meters wide. The external
faces of the walls are made of sandstone blocks, while the internal
filling is of sand mixed with rock. At the base of the walls a
channel for the drainage of water is visible.
Antiquarium of
via Donota
The Antiquarium of via Donota is an archaeological
site of the city of Trieste, located in the lower part of the San
Giusto hill, where it is possible to visit what remains of a domus
and a burial ground from the Roman age. The domus was built at the
end of the 1st century BC, a period in which the entire part of the
slope of the hill of San Giusto facing the sea was subject to a work
of arrangement, thanks to the construction of terraces on which it
was later built. At the end of the 1st century AD the domus was
abandoned, so starting from the second century a part of it was
reused as a pagan necropolis.
Cattinara Castle
The
castelliere of Cattinara, which is located between the valleys of
Longera and Rozzol, was inhabited from prehistoric times to Roman
times. In prehistoric times its inhabitants lived on its summit,
which was later flattened, while in Roman times along its southern
slope, which was better sheltered from the winds. The finds
discovered in this castle are numerous and very varied, such as
shards, animal remains and tools. Worthy of note are two bronze
fibulae, one of which belongs to the culture of La Tène, it being
understood that the necropolis has not been found, a discovery that
would perhaps allow its dating.
Roman aqueduct of Val
Rosandra
in the nearby Val Rosandra there are remains of a Roman
aqueduct built in the first century which originally was 14
kilometers long reaching the center of Tergeste. Perhaps along its
sides there was a Roman road with small permanent lookout posts. The
Roman aqueduct of Val Rosandra remained in use until the sixth
century (or, according to other sources, until the seventh), when it
was irreparably damaged. In the eighteenth century it was still
fairly well preserved, and therefore the Trieste municipal
administration considered its possible restoration to supply the
city, which was in full development, with drinking water. The idea
was later abandoned when it was realized that it was more convenient
to exploit other sources of water. The remains of the Roman aqueduct
that reached the 21st century have a length of about one hundred
meters.
Antiquarium of Borgo San Sergio
The Antiquarium of Borgo San
Sergio consists of two areas, one where the archaeological finds are
located and the other where the finds are exhibited as in a classic
museum. In the first section there are the remains of a Roman house
dating back to the 1st century, while in the exhibition part there
are remains found during the excavations carried out at the Roman
theater in Trieste.
Torri di Slivia cave
The Torri di Slivia Cave is located in the municipality of
Duino-Aurisina, in the province of Trieste, at the foot of the small
village of Slivia, an agricultural center inhabited by a
predominantly Slovenian population of around 130 inhabitants. It was
named after the first explorers who mapped it at the end of the 19th
century for the numerous stalagmite towers that characterize it. The
relief of the cave, which dates back to 6 January 1885, was the work
of the engineer. Costantino Doria, of the Triestine Mountaineering
Society. The first expedition entered from the main well, which has
been known since ancient times. The works to create the artificial
entrance for tourist use were started in 1964. In 1967 the internal
path and the iron staircase were created, while in 1968 the first
tourist tickets were removed.
Remembrance Park
The Parco
della Rimembranza is located in the historic center of Trieste.
Among the urban interventions of the Fascist era, the arrangement of
the area that later gave rise to the park, which is located on the
hill of San Giusto, certainly stands out. The works were started
with the creation of the wide Via Capitolina, a panoramic road that
climbs gently around the hill until it reaches the cathedral. The
entire slope of the hill between this road and the castle was
consecrated to the memory of the "fallen in all wars" fought by
Italian soldiers after national unity, which took place in 1861. For
this reason, the Parco della Rimembranza is dotted with rough
stones. of karst stone with the names of known and unknown fighters.
At the top stands the Monument to the Fallen, 1935, by Attilio
Selva, dedicated to the Trieste volunteers who fell in the First
World War. There is also a plaque dedicated to the Triestine fallen
of the First World War who fought for the Imperial and Royal
Austro-Hungarian army.
Marine nature reserve of Miramare
The Miramare Marine Nature Reserve is located in the Gulf of Trieste
and winds all around the Miramare promontory, where the Miramare
Castle of the same name also stands. The fully protected area, which
is 30 hectares with a width of 200 km and a length of 1.8 km that
extends along the coast, is surrounded by a buffer zone (established
by order of the Trieste Harbor Master's Office n. 76/95 and 28/98),
of another 90 hectares for a width of further 400 meters with
partial protection where professional fishing is prohibited. The
maximum depth that is reached in the reserve is 18 meters. The coast
is formed by a limestone rock typical of the Karst, a territory of
which the Miramare promontory represents a small extension of the
coast.
Napoleonic road
The Napoleonic road is included
from the Borgo San Nazario car park, located on the outskirts of the
Prosecco district, up to the Obelisco di Opicina pitch. This road is
therefore entirely located in the municipality of Trieste. The
official name of the path is Strada Vicentina, from the name of the
engineer Giacomo Vicentini who designed the route and began
construction in 1821. The current conformation is due to the
improvements carried out immediately after World War II.
Trieste, overlooking the homonymous gulf in the northernmost part
of the Upper Adriatic, is located between the Italian peninsula and
Istria, a few kilometers away from the border with Slovenia in the
historic region of Venezia Giulia.
In particular, Venezia
Giulia is an Italian historical-geographical region located in the
extreme north-east of the Italian peninsula, between the Julian Alps
and the Adriatic Sea, including the lands between the Gulf of
Trieste, the Gulf of Fiume and the Karst, a plateau limestone rock
belonging to the Dinaric Alps that stretches between the north-east
of Italy, Slovenia and Croatia.
The name Venezia Giulia was
conceived in 1863 by the linguist from Gorizia Graziadio Isaia
Ascoli to contrast it with the name Litorale, created instead by the
Austrian authorities in 1849 to identify the region.
Venezia
Giulia, together with Venice Tridentina and Venezia Euganea,
constitutes the Triveneto, a term that appeared in some cultural
circles in the mid-nineteenth century, shortly after the second
Italian war of independence, coined in 1863 by Graziadio Isaia
Ascoli, with the intent to mark lands such as Venice Tridentina and
Venezia Giulia with Italian character (without irredentist nuances),
which at the time were still subjected to the Habsburg rule that
only after the First World War were annexed to the Kingdom of Italy.
The city area of Trieste is mainly occupied by a hilly slope
that rises in altitude to mountainous terrain even in the areas
adjacent to the town. The inhabited area of Trieste is located
between 2 and 450 meters above sea level on a rocky, calcareous and
arid landscape, known for its caves and sinkholes, at the foot of an
imposing escarpment that descends sharply from the Karst towards the
sea. The highest point in the municipal area reaches 674 meters
(Monte Cocusso).
The municipality of Trieste is divided into
various climatic zones, depending on the distance of the area from
the sea and its altitude. Characteristic of this area is the
abundance of red earth, soil with an accentuated presence of red
clay fraction resulting from the erosion of limestone, particularly
suitable for the cultivation of wine grapes.
In the district of the city of Trieste there are numerous
watercourses, some important - Timavo river, Rosandra torrent, Rio
Ospo - and others less known but no less relevant from the
hydrogeological, historical and naturalistic point of view. Many of
them flow underground in the Julian city covered by the road
surface.
The springs of these minor courses, which generally
have lengths of a few kilometers (in some cases, even less), are due
to the outflow of rainwater that falls on the karst plateau. Once
free to flow outdoors, they have been channeled since the city
developed urban planning, an event that began in the second half of
the eighteenth century, in special pipes. Even today these waterways
run through the undergrounds of today's via Carducci (previously
called via del Torrente), via Battisti (formerly Corsia Stadion),
viale XX Settembre (formerly viale dell'Acquedotto), via delle Sette
fontane or piazza tra i Rivi .
To the south of the city flows
the Rio Ospo, which marks the geographical border with Istria.
Furthermore, the modern city area between the railway station, the
sea, via Carducci and Piazza della Borsa, Borgo Teresiano, was built
in the 18th century after the burial of the previous salt pans by
order of the Empress Maria Theresa of Austria.
The
climate of the city of Trieste, according to the Köppen
classification, falls within the humid subtropical type. Thanks to
an intermediate latitude between the North Pole and the equator, and
to its coastal position, the city of Trieste enjoys a mild climate
in winter and rather warm, but not torrid, in summer.
Relative to the official thirty-year reference period of world
climatology (IPCC / WMO) 1971-2000, the annual average of
temperatures at the various meteorological stations in Trieste was
15 ° C, while the average temperatures of the coldest month
(January) settled around 5.8 ° C and those of the hottest month
(July) slightly above 24 ° C.
In the winter months the
temperatures, at least on the coast, rarely drop below freezing;
vice versa, in the karst fractions, negative night lows are often
recorded. There are also few days along the coast with snow, fog or
hail. The average annual humidity is 64%, while the daily
temperature range is 4.5 ° C: both are among the lowest in Italy.
Given the peculiarity of the city, it can be said that the center
of Trieste, which developed along the coast, has relatively mild
temperatures and a fair amount of sunshine, while the hamlets and
karst localities developed on the plateau behind at a height between
200 and 500 m have a decidedly more continental climate: in
Basovizza, located at about 370 meters above sea level, the average
annual temperature is around 11 ° C with an average of 1.5 ° C for
the coldest month (January) and the hottest month. (July) of 20.6 °
C.
Exceptions to the generally mild climate are the days,
rare in some years, more frequent in others, in which the Bora
blows, a katabatic wind from east / north-east, which blows with
particular intensity especially towards the Upper and Middle
Adriatic. Trieste wedges itself from the hinterland, channeling
itself along the low passes that open up between the mountains
behind the city, to descend on the inhabited center and on the
homonymous gulf. Although due to adiabatic compression the
temperature of the air, descending on the city, still warms by three
or four degrees, the gusts considerably increase the perception of
cold even with relatively mild temperatures.
Exceptionally,
the bura blows for very short periods even in summer, this time very
hot, always coming from east north east, therefore from the
continent, which is warmer, towards the sea, sometimes raising
temperatures even above 35 ° C. The gusts of continental air coming
from east-north-east, heading towards the Adriatic outlet, acquire
further speed, and in exceptional cases, in the open sea, they can
reach 50 knots, as recorded in December 1996. In some areas the bora
is stronger and more frequent than in others, and only the area of
the Trieste coast that goes from Miramare to Sistiana is sheltered
from the effect of this wind.
Very interesting for the
climate trend is the variation that has occurred in the last hundred
years in the frequency of the bora and generally of the eastern
winds, which decreased by 28 days a year, while the sirocco and
southern winds, in the same period, increased in frequency by 26
days. nodded.
Given the proximity of the reliefs, short rains
can occur throughout the year (this is the main inconsistency with
respect to the typical Mediterranean climate), while during the
summer months rainfall is still rare and mainly of a stormy nature
(July is generally the month more dry). Precipitation peaks in
frequency and intensity in November and April, when the flow of
Atlantic perturbed currents usually drops in latitude.
The city of Trieste is one of the best known in Italy
from a botanical point of view. The urban flora, object of study
since the second half of the 19th century, was the subject of an
in-depth census by F. Martini, who mapped the distribution of 1024
species and subspecies. The great floristic richness is due to
several factors, among which the main ones are:
The
penetration into the urban fabric of areas with natural vegetation,
such as the Bosco del Farneto or the Villa Giulia Park
The
transitional characteristics of the city from a climatic point of
view, with a strong temperature gradient and rainfall from the coast
to the plateau
The coexistence in the city of both arenaceous and
calcareous substrates,
The presence of important commercial,
industrial and port areas that favor the presence of alien
neophytes. The urban flora of Trieste can be consulted through an
interactive portal that allows even non-botany experts to identify
its species.
The historical gardens of relevance from a botanical
point of view in Trieste are the Muzio de Tommasini historical
garden, the historical garden of Villa Revoltella, the historical
garden of Villa Engelmann, the historical garden of Villa Sartorio,
the historical garden of Villa Cosulich, the Skabar historic garden,
the historic garden of piazza Libertà, the historic garden of via
Catullo, the historic garden of piazza Hortis, the Passeggio
Sant'Andrea, the historic garden of piazza Carlo Alberto, the
historic Basevi garden, while among the worthy urban parks of
mention are the Farneto Park and the Villa Giulia Park.
The
carnation of Trieste grows in the Trieste area, an Illyrian endemism
also present in the Julian city.