Trieste History by Jmill42
Trieste, to me, is a city of class and elegance in the mold of Vienna. It has a sort of regal air that every other Italian city I visited doesn't. It has a very clean city center, and everyone seems to be much friendlier and outgoing than in other parts of Italy. Being on part of Italy since 1954, Trieste still has a large population of Slovenians, of which the city was a part of until 1954.Triest began the the 20th century as part of the Ausrto-Hungarian empire, but was ceded to Italy after the WWI. After that the large Slovene population was mistreated by the Italians; forcing them to change their names to Italian versions, outlawing the Slovene language and print, archives were destroyed and priests were exiled. Even the names on headstone were changed from Slovenian to Italian. Of a million Slovenians that lived in Trieste's area prior to WWI, only 1/10 remained post WWI.
From the end of WWII until 1954, Trieste was under the rule of the Allied forces of Britain and the United States.