Trieste has a surly grace. If it's liked, it's like a tomboy harsh and voracious, with blue eyes and hands too big to give a flower, like a love, with jealousy.

The castle of San Giusto

The Castle of San Giusto is a fortress-museum situated on the hill with the same name, in Trieste.

Dating back to the 1300's, it was progressively built up over several centuries and is now a museum. It was restored in the year 2000. On the Bastione Lalio, the Lapidario Tergestino was inaugurated on 4 April, 2001, displaying inscriptions, sculptures, bass-reliefs and fragments of ancient Roman architecture.

You can only visit parts of the castle, apart from the lapidario you can visit the chapel, the Sala Caprin, the large internal courtyard - where events are held in summer - and the battlements from which you can enjoy a vast panorama over the city.

The Castle of Miramare

The Castle of Miramare was build on the command of Maximilian of Hapsburgs, archduke of Austria and later Emperor of Mexico, to make a home for him and his beloved wife Carlotta of Belgium.

It was designed by the Vienna's architect Carl Junker and built on the Gulf of Trieste, a few kilometers north of the city, between 1856 and 1860. It is surrounded by a big park of 22 hectares characterized by a large variety of plants, many of which were chosen by the archduke himself, during his trips around the world made as an admiral of the Austrian Navy.

In the park you will also find the Castelletto (little castle), a building of smaller dimensions in which the young couple lived during the construction of the castle itself. Carlotta was later confined there when she went insane after the execution of her husband in Mexico.

The ground floor of the castle was designated the residence of the Imperial couple, while the floor above was, later on, residence of the Duke Amedeo d'Aosta, who lived there for about seven years and redecorated some of the rooms.

The Cathedral of San Giusto

It is the principal Catholic building of Trieste and is situated close to the Castle of San Giusto, on the top of the hill which dominates the city.

It was formed by the joining of two earlier basilicas of the fourteenth century: Santa Maria and San Giusto, united by the Bishop Roberto Pedrazzani da Robecco to provide the city with an imposing cathedral.

The first record regarding the cathedral is from 1337 when the bell tower of the ex-church of Santa Maria was strengthened by the addition of a thicker wall to support the new building. Works on the bell tower ended in 1343, but in the church continued up to the end of the century. Originally, the bell tower was higher but in 1422 it was struck by lightning and reduced to its current size.

After the final surrender of the city to Austria in 1382, the emperor Leopoldo III nominated the first German bishop of Trieste, Enrico de Wildenstein, who on 27 November 1385, consecrated the major altar of the cathedral.

Piazza Unita d'Italia

This is the principal square of Trieste, at the foot of the hill of San Giusto, between Borgo Teresiano and Borgo Giuseppino.

The square is on one side of the Gulf of Trieste and is surrounded by numerous palaces and public buildings. It is rectangular and it’s the largest square in Europe, overlooking the sea (there are few places overlooking the sea, another well-known is the square of Commerce in Lisbon).

In the square there are now, among others, the Municipality of Trieste, the building of the Regional Council of Friuli-Venezia Giulia and the prefecture of the city.

Faro della Vittoria

The Faro della Vittoria was built between 15 January 1923 and 24 May 1927 by Arduino Berlam, architect from Trieste.

Besides functioning as a lighthouse for navigation, it is also a commemorative monument in honour of those died at sea during the First World War, as witnessed by the inscription on its base:

«SHINE AND REMIND OF THE FALLEN AT SEA (MCMXV - MCMXVIII)»

 

Caffè San Marco

The Caffè San Marco is an historical coffee room in Trieste, in via Battisti 18.

Founded in 1914, the coffee room is famous for being and having been one of the principal meeting places of the intellectuals of the city.

Among the intellectuals and artists that attended the Caffè San Marco, there were Italo Svevo, Umberto Saba, James Joyce.

Tram de Ópcina

The tramway of Opicina (better known as the Tram de Ópcina in the dialect of Trieste, Openski tramvaj in slovenian), one of the tourist attractions of the city, is a panoramic, interurban tramway.

 

Feature, maybe unique in the world, is a stretch of steep slopes along which the vehicles are pushed (uphill) or retained (downhill) by a particular funicular device.