Gorizia - Gorizia

Gorizia (in Slovenian Gorica) is a city of Friuli Venezia Giulia, capital of the province of the same name.

To know

Background

The name of the city probably derives from the Slovenian word Gorica, what does it mean mound, referring to the relief on which a castle was built around the 11th century, which was divided by the will of Emperor Otto III between the patriarch of Aquileia and a nobleman. On that occasion, in 1001 Goriza was mentioned for the first time.

Later the town developed along the western side of the hill. It was the capital of a potentate, very important in the fourteenth century, which began to decline after some military defeats. In 1500 by the will of the last dead count without heirs it passed, after heated disputes with Venice, to the Habsburgs.

Under the various emperors Gorizia suffered some wars with Venice, as in 1615-1617, but above all it experienced a great development, as under the reign of Maria Theresa, when, in the second half of the eighteenth century, the city population increased by a third.

Later it was equipped with the railway, another great stimulus for development. The courses were opened for the occasion, flanked by elegant nineteenth-century palaces and villas with gardens.

Gorizia remained Habsburg until 1918. In the First World War Gorizia was on the front, which destroyed many buildings, including the castle, which was then rebuilt in 1932. On 8 August 1916 it was taken by the Italians, who lost it and finally got it back in 1918 , when they won the war. A museum is dedicated to the war in the building of the Provincial Museums.

Slovenian-speaking community in Italy and Italian national community in Slovenia

Since its establishment, the city of Gorizia has been located on the border between the area populated mainly by Italian-speaking inhabitants and the area populated mainly by Slovenian-speaking inhabitants. Linguistic map based on the 1880 census The intricate historical events did not allow to define a border between Italy and Slovenia, which would allow a clear separation between the two linguistic areas, and consequently in Italy there is a community of Slovenian-speaking Italian citizens, while in Slovenia there is a community of Italian-speaking Slovenian citizens. Both Italy and Slovenia recognize the right of members of their respective alloglot linguistic communities to use their mother tongue in relations with public institutions and as the language of instruction in compulsory education.

Gorizia remained Habsburg until 1918. In the First World War Gorizia was on the front, which destroyed many buildings, including the castle, which was then rebuilt in 1932. On 8 August 1916 it was taken by the Italians, who lost it and finally got it back in 1918 , when they won the war. A museum is dedicated to the war in the building of the Provincial Museums, followed by fascism, which raged especially with the Slovenian population by setting fire to the Trgovski dom in 1922, the seat of Slovenian associations, and exasperated the opposing nationalism between Slovenes and Italians. already hatched under the Habsburgs, prohibiting the use of the Slovenian language. Fascism then took it out on the Jewish community, which had given the city, as well as eminent intellectuals such as Carlo Michelstaedter who studied in Florence, a great philosopher who committed suicide at 23, even some of the most fervent Italian patriots such as the glottologist Graziadio Isaia Ascoli and Carolina Luzzatto. The assimilation of Friulian into Italian also began.

World War II brought bombing and Nazi occupation with the consequent extermination of the local Jewish community and roundups. The post-war period was still dramatic: on 8 May 1945 the Yugoslav partisans occupied the city for 40 days, after which more than 600 people had disappeared, probably killed and inflicted. The victims were not only people who had collaborated with the German occupiers or who had supported the fascist regime, but also actual or potential opponents of the possible annexation of the city to the future Yugoslav communist state that it was intended to create.

In 1947 Gorizia, after about 2 years of allied administration, returned to Italy, but about 95% of its historical territory, including some parts of its eastern periphery, passed to Yugoslavia, where a "replacement" city of Gorizia rose from nothing. which was called Nova Gorica. The relations on the border, tense and conditioned by recurrent crises, mainly affected the peasants, who, on both sides, had the land across the border, while the peasants who remained in Yugoslavia had lost the natural outlet of their products , that is the market of Gorizia. In 1953 the Udine agreements "loosened" the border, and made possible border trafficking and the resumption of part of the economic - and human - relations prior to 1947. On 1 May 2004, the entry of the Slovenia in the EU has put the economy that lived on the border in crisis, but has opened up new opportunities, which the city wants to seize by investing above all in tourism.

How to orient yourself

Neighborhoods Center, Montesanto-Piazzutta, San Rocco-Sant'Anna, Campagnuzza, Madonnina del Fante, Straccis

Fractions: Lucinico / Luzzinìs, Piedimonte / Podgora / Pudigori, Piuma / Pevma, Sant'Andrea / Standrež; minor settlements: Gardisciuta, Oslavia / Oslavje, San Mauro / Štmaver

How to get

By plane

All 'Friuli Venezia Giulia Airport - Ronchi dei Legionari (TRS), 20 km from the city, land direct flights from Milan, Rome, Naples, Genoa, Turin, London, Munich is Belgrade, in addition to seasonal flights to / from tourist destinations.

By car

To get to the parking in via Giustiniani

From the A34 motorway and the SS 55, take the exit for the center from the roundabout, and turn right at the traffic lights. Then continue along the main road for about 2 km, pass, leaving it on the right, the vast open space overlooking the international pass of Casa Rossa (Mednarodni Mejni Prehod Rozna Dolina) and find the car park after about 100 m on the left. From there, walking through the Bombi gallery, you reach the center (piazza della Vittoria).

For those arriving from Gradisca d'Isonzo or Udine (respectively from SR 351 and SR 56): after the bridge over the Isonzo, exit the roundabout following the signs for the center, pass a roundabout passing the railway underpass, you will reach the roundabout in piazzale Saba, then proceed straight. Follow the main road, and leave it at the second traffic light by turning right. Follow via Vittorio Veneto and, at the first traffic light, turn left. Then you leave the clearing of the Casa Rossa on the right and after 100 m on the left you reach the parking lot. This parking lot is almost always half-empty, except during important events, especially during the Sant’Andrea fair. From there, walking through the Bombi gallery, you reach the center (piazza della Vittoria).

How to get around

What see

Gorizia does not have great attractions for the hasty visitor who wants to see amazing things in the space of a morning, who instead wants to take the time to find the most hidden and evocative corners, can discover wonderful pieces of nature, humble but beautiful works of art and certainly history everywhere. He can evaluate the effects of the encounters as clashes of civilizations, and start again taking with him that feeling of nostalgia that cities that have been important but have fallen into have fallen. See aristocratic villas built when Gorizia was a holiday center for the moneyed, see the abandoned factories that tell of when Gorizia was among the main textile centers, see the sacred furnishings and the works of art of churches that prove that Gorizia was a much more important city also from the ecclesial point of view, etc., it gives a feeling of pleasant nostalgia and, together with the welcoming and cordial character, although a little grumpy and nostalgic of most of the Gorizia people, it almost certainly instills in the attentive and patient visitor the desire to return.Here is a list of the main attractions, more or less in order of fame.

• Gorizia Castle, Borgo Castello, 36. Those who come to Gorizia generally begin their visit starting from the castle, probably its best known monument, which stands on the highest point of a steep hill. The Castle of Gorizia welcomes visitors with a Venetian lion, which however has nothing to do with it, having been placed there not by the Venetians, who ruled the city for only one year, in 1508-09, but by the Italians when they finished, in 1937 , the radical restoration of the castle, which was heavily bombed during the Great War of '15 -'18. The restoration did not restore the previous Renaissance building, plastered in white, but gave the castle the appearance it probably had in the fourteenth century, at the time of the maximum splendor of the Counts, with exposed stone. Once inside, you go along a ramp that runs between the outer enclosure and the wall of the manor, and you reach the actual entrance. Upon entering, on the left is the ticket office, where information material is also distributed. Continuing, we arrive in the Corte dei Lanzi, the guards of the castle. Here you can see the foundations of the tower, perhaps prior to the 13th century, demolished in 1500. From here you can access the Palazzo degli Stati Provinciali and the Palazzetto Veneto. Under the loggia that connects these two buildings, there are everyday environments, as they appeared in the Middle Ages: the kitchen with tables and sideboards, cutlery and chairs, the special furniture for kneading bread, objects chosen in antique shops by the brothers Giovanni and Ranieri Mario Cossar in the thirties. Among the internal rooms, note the Hall of the Knights, formerly a banquet hall, prison, barracks, and now an exhibition of medieval weapons, and the Torture Chamber, on the ground floor, while on the first floor there is the Loggia degli Stemmi, with works sculptures and coats of arms of various Gorizia families, the Foresteria with the Music Room, an exhibition of philologically reconstructed medieval instruments, the Salone degli Stati Provinciali, which was the center of the city government from 1500 onwards and which hosts temporary exhibitions. On the second floor there are the Chapel of San Bartolomeo, with a wooden madonna and some Renaissance canvases, and the Didactic Room, which illustrates the urban development of Gorizia, the territorial expansion of the County, and a model shows the siege that Patriarch Bertrando struck on Christmas Eve in 1340. The Borgo extends south of the castle. The slopes of the hill are quite varied: to the south and south-east they are dotted with villas and houses with large gardens, to the west the medieval village extends outside the walls, while to the east and north the slopes are covered by a splendid wood, property in part of the Archiepiscopal Curia, in part of the Municipality, in the portion of which, approximately 4.5 hectares wide and rather steep, there is a park, formerly a municipal nursery. 
• Park of the Castle. Although currently rather neglected, it is frequentable, and the spring blooms, especially of the daffodils, are worth seeing. The park is accessed by turning right under the retaining walls of the road that leads to the entrance door of the castle (coming from the panoramic sidewalk overlooking Slovenia), passing a barrier, leaving the ruined buildings on the right (perhaps the ancient foresterie), and then, heading left, you reach a steel staircase that allows you to overcome the difference in height formed by the surrounding wall. You are then catapulted into the green of the wood composed mainly of locust and maple, field and plane trees, as well as isolated specimens of lime, mulberry, chestnut, ailanthus, hornbeam, and an undergrowth with a rich presence of hazelnuts, elderberries and brambles. The path winds along the slope, and finally you reach a large clearing, equipped for picnics with wooden tables and benches. Beyond the pitch there is a slight depression, from there it is already in private property. Beyond the depression, it is possible to see, and after about 5 minutes, reach a magnificent wood of about 50 centuries-old chestnut trees: in documents dating back to the end of the eighteenth century the diameters of the trunks of some of them already measured 80 cm, today none of them less than 2m. Yet it seems that they have overcome chestnut cancer unscathed as well as the laws that required the killing of diseased plants, and now, imposing, they guard the top of the hill. However, it should be remembered that it is private property, but perhaps, accompanied by the owner, it is possible to visit the wood, with bunkers dating back to the Second World War, and a splendid sixteenth-century farmhouse, located where was the ancient access to Gorizia from the north. before 1660. 
• Fountain of Neptune, Victory Square. 
• Church of Sant'Ignazio, Victory Square. 
• Church of the Exaltation of the Cross and the Cobenzl Palace, Via Arcivescovado 2. 
• Synagogue, Via Ascoli. 
• 45.949213.62041 Coronini Cronberg Palace with park, Viale XX Settembre, ☎ 39 481 533485, fax: 39 481 547222, @[email protected]. Wed-Sun 10-13 15-18. House museum in the center of Gorizia. Last home of Charles X of Bourbon, it houses the collections of the Coronini counts in its richly furnished rooms. 
• 45.94913.62742 Attems-Petzenstein Palace (Picture Gallery of the Provincial Museums), Piazza de Amicis 2. It houses the collection of paintings of the Provincial Museums of Gorizia and is home to temporary exhibitions. 
• Cathedral of Saints Ilario and Taziano. Corte Sant'Ilario. It derives from a small church, dedicated to the two saints of the same name, which was probably built between the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Nearby was the chapel of Sant'Acazio. The two buildings, incorporated into a single structure, form the Duomo. The building was massively modified in 1525 and between 1688 and 1702, in 1866 a piece was demolished to make way for a street, in the first heavily bombed World War it was practically rebuilt in 1924. And despite everything, it is possible to admire the memories of all the eras and styles it lived through: fifteenth-century frescoes, a 1497 cenotaph of the last Gorizia count, statues and various eighteenth-nineteenth-century works of art, all in a rich baroque frame with three naves, with the ancient chapel of Sant'Acazio. 
• 45.93334113.6319613 Basaglia Park, Via Fabio Filzi, 174. Former psychiatric hospital where today guided tours are possible inside. During the visit it will be possible to learn about the history of the asylum from its inauguration, in 1933, to its closure with the law 180/78, also through the "voices" of some inmates proposed by the Radio Fragola Gorizia team. The urban regeneration process of Gorizia area 174 is still in an initial phase, however, the itinerary complies with safety regulations and is equipped for the access of people with disabilities. 

Events and parties

• Mittelmoda international competition for emerging stylists, in September
• World Folklore Festival in August, gathering of folkloric groups from all over the world
• Frontier flavors tasting and market of typical gastronomic products, especially Central European, end of September-beginning of October
• competition for the film script "Sergio Amidei", at the end of July, for years it has been rewarding world-famous screenwriters, has so far been held in the Castle, but the "emergency" setting in Coronini park (a restoration was underway in the castle) of the 2007 edition has aroused many and motivated appreciation and it is not excluded that this may be the venue for the event also for next year.

What to do

Shopping

How to have fun

Where to eat

Average prices

• Trattoria da Gianni, Via Morelli. Absolutely to try. Famous for its gigantic portions. 

Where stay

High prices

• Grand Hotel Entourage, Piazza Sant'Antonio, 2, ☎ 39 0481 550235, fax: 39 0481 30138. 

Safety

Gorizia, also given its small size, is among the safest municipalities in Italy, although there is no lack of episodes - however relatively sporadic - of petty crime. It is possible to walk at any time in absolute tranquility even in the most peripheral or less illuminated areas. Cases of harassment of women in the space of a year can be counted on the fingers of one hand.Once upon a time Gorizia was known to be one of the entry doors of illegal immigrants into Italy, today the phenomenon of illegal entry and with it organizations that exploit it have largely moved elsewhere. There is a certain amount of drug trafficking, with drug dealers and drug addicts getting their supplies in Slovenia.

How to keep in touch

Around

• Cormòns
• The Collio wine-growing area, the wine and cherries route
• Monte Sabotino
• Monte San Michele
• Gradisca d'Isonzo - It is one of the centers of the association of the most beautiful villages in Italy. It was a Venetian city fortified against the incursions of the Turks; passed under the Habsburgs, it lived its golden period during which it prospered becoming the seat of the County and greatly enriching its urban structure.
• Monfalcone
• Aquileia - It was an important Roman city; its excavation area of ​​that era is certainly unique in the regional context for importance, quality and quantity of evidence, and is rightly placed among the archaeological destinations of great national importance. It was later the most important center of the region in medieval times; the Patriarchate of Aquileia reached the apex of its splendor in the first decades of the year 1000: its splendid Romanesque Basilica remains.
• Degree - Formerly a Roman port for the trade of Aquileia, the ancient lagoon city has a very respectable historic center. In contemporary times it has developed an important seaside activity.
• Mouth of the Isonzo Nature Reserve with the island of Cona.
• Doberdò del Lago / Doberdob
• Fogliano Redipuglia
• Trieste and surroundings: Muggia, Grignano-Miramare Castle, Duino-Aurisina, Sistiana, Sgonico-Grotta Gigante, Trieste Karst, Terrano wine route, e val Rosandra
• In Slovenia: the adjacent town of Nova Gorica, the bridge of Salcano, the sanctuary of Monte Santo (Sveta gora), the monastery of Castagnevizza (Kostanjevica), the Panoviz forest (gozd Panovec).

Other projects

• Wikipedia contains an entry concerning Gorizia
• Commons contains images or other files on Gorizia
• Wikiquote contains quotes from or about Gorizia
• Wikinews contains current news on Gorizia

Usable : the article respects the characteristics of a draft but in addition it contains enough information to allow a short visit to the city. Use i correctly listing (the right type in the right sections).