Rijeka


Rijeka is the principal seaport and the third-largest city in Croatia. It is located in Primorje-Gorski Kotar County on Kvarner Bay, an inlet of the Adriatic Sea and in 2021 had a population of 107,964 inhabitants. Historically, because of its strategic position and its excellent deep-water port, the city was fiercely contested, especially between the Holy Roman Empire, Venice, Italy and Yugoslavia, changing rulers and demographics many times over centuries. According to the 2021 census data, 85% of its citizens are Croats, along with small numbers of Serbs, Bosniaks and Italians.
Rijeka is the main city and county seat of the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County. The city's economy largely depends on shipbuilding and maritime transport. Rijeka hosts the Croatian National Theatre Ivan pl. Zajc, first built in 1765, as well as the University of Rijeka.
In 2016, Rijeka was selected as the European Capital of Culture for 2020, alongside Galway, Ireland.

Name

Historically, Rijeka was called Tharsatica, Vitopolis, or Flumen in Latin. The city is called Rijeka in Croatian, Reka in Slovene. In the local dialects of the Chakavian language it is called Reka or Rika. It is called Fiume in Italian and in Fiuman Venetian. All these names mean 'river' in their respective languages. Meanwhile, in German the city has been called Sankt Veit am Flaum/Pflaum.
Today, the name Fiume is not used for official purposes for legal reasons. Beginning in 2018 there was an attempt on the initiative of the city's Italian community to install a number of signs, including a route confirmation sign, featuring both names on the west entrance to the city among other places, but as of 2021 no such signs have been installed due to technical difficulties.

Geography

Rijeka is located in western Croatia, south-west of the capital, Zagreb, on the coast of Kvarner Gulf, in the northern part of the Adriatic Sea. Geographically, Rijeka is roughly equidistant from Milan, Budapest, Munich, Vienna and Belgrade. Other major regional centers such as Trieste, Venice and Ljubljana are all relatively close and easily accessible. The Bay of Rijeka, which is bordered by Vela Vrata, Srednja Vrata and Mala Vrata is connected to the Kvarner Gulf and is deep enough to accommodate large commercial ships.
The City of Rijeka lies at the mouth of the river Rječina and in the Vinodol micro-region of the Croatian coast. From three sides Rijeka is surrounded by mountains. To the west, the Učka range is prominent. To the north/north-east are the Snežnik plateau and the Risnjak massif with its national park. To the east/south-east is the Velika Kapela range. This type of terrain configuration prevented Rijeka from developing further inland and the city mostly lies on a long and relatively narrow strip along the coast. Two important inland transport routes start in Rijeka. The first route runs north-east to the Pannonian Basin. This route takes advantage of Rijeka's location close to the point where the Dinaric Alps are the narrowest and easiest to traverse, making it the optimal route from the Hungarian plain to the sea. It also makes Rijeka the natural harbour for the Pannonian Basin. The other route runs north-west across the Postojna Gate connecting Rijeka with Slovenia and further through the Ljubljana Gap with Austria and beyond. A third more coastal route runs east-west connecting Rijeka with Trieste and northern Italy.

History

Neolithic through late antiquity

Though traces of Neolithic settlements can be found in the region, the earliest modern settlements on the site were Celtic Tharsatica on the hill, and the tribe of mariners, the Liburni, in the natural harbour below. The city long retained its dual character. Rijeka was first mentioned in the 1st century AD by Pliny the Elder as Tarsatica in his Natural History. Rijeka is again mentioned around AD 150 by the Greek geographer and astronomer Ptolemy in his Geography when describing the "Location of Illyria or Liburnia, and of Dalmatia".
In the time of Augustus, the Romans rebuilt Tarsatica as a municipium Flumen, situated on the right bank of the small river Rječina. It became a city within the Roman Province of Dalmatia until the 6th century. In this period the city was part of the Liburnia limes. Remains of these walls are still visible in some places today.
After the 4th century Rijeka was rededicated to Saint Vitus, the city's patron saint, as Terra Fluminis sancti Sancti Viti or in German Sankt Veit am Pflaum. From the 5th century onwards, the town was ruled successively by the Ostrogoths, the Byzantines, the Lombards, and the Avars. The city was burned down in 452 by the troops of Attila the Hun as part of their Aquileia campaign.

Middle Ages

settled the city starting in the 7th century. At the time, Rijeka was a feudal stronghold surrounded by a wall. At the center of the city, its highest point, was a fortress.
In 799 Rijeka was attacked by the Frankish troops of Charlemagne. Their Siege of Trsat was at first repulsed, during which the Frankish commander Duke Eric of Friuli was killed. However, the Frankish forces finally occupied and devastated the castle, while the Duchy of Croatia passed under the overlordship of the Carolingian Empire. From about 925, the town was part of the Kingdom of Croatia, from 1102 in personal union with Hungary. Trsat Castle and the town were rebuilt under the rule of the House of Frankopan. In 1288 the Rijeka citizens signed the Law codex of Vinodol, one of the oldest codes of law in Europe.
From about 1300 to 1466 Rijeka was ruled by a number of noble families, the most prominent of which was the German Walsee family. Rijeka even rivalled Venice when in it was sold by Vitus Butinarius to the Habsburg emperor Frederick III, Archduke of Austria in 1466.

Under Habsburg rule

The city would remain under Austrian Habsburg rule for over 450 years until the end of World War I in 1918.
Austrian presence on the Adriatic Sea was seen as a threat by the Republic of Venice and during the War of the League of Cambrai the Venetians raided and devastated the city with great loss of life in 1508 and again in 1509. However, the city did recover and remain under Austrian rule. For its fierce resistance to the Venetians it received the title of the "most loyal city" as well as commercial privileges from the Austrian emperor Maximilian I in 1515. While Ottoman forces attacked the town several times, they never occupied it. From the 16th century onwards, Rijeka's present Renaissance and Baroque style started to take shape. Emperor Charles VI declared the Port of Rijeka a free port in 1719 and had the trade route to Vienna expanded in 1725.
On November 28, 1750 Rijeka was hit by a large earthquake. The devastation was so widespread that the city had to be almost completely rebuilt. In 1753, the Austrian Empress Maria Theresa approved the funding for rebuilding Rijeka as a "new city". The rebuilt Rijeka was significantly different - it was transformed from a small medieval walled town into a larger commercial and maritime city centered around its port.
By order of Maria Theresa in 1779, the city was annexed to the Kingdom of Hungary and governed as corpus separatum directly from Budapest by an appointed governor, as Hungary's only international port. From 1804, Rijeka was part of the Austrian Empire, in the Croatia-Slavonia province.
During the Napoleonic Wars, Rijeka was briefly captured by the French Empire and included in the Illyrian Provinces. During the French rule, between 1809 and 1813, the critically important Louisiana road was completed. The road was the shortest route from Rijeka to the interior and gave a strong impulse to the development of Rijeka's port. In 1813 the French rule came to an end when Rijeka was first bombarded by the Royal Navy and later re-captured by the Austrians under the command of the Irish general Laval Nugent von Westmeath. The British bombardment has an interesting side story. The city was apparently saved from annihilation by a young lady named Karolina Belinić who - amid the chaos and destruction of the bombardment - went to the English fleet commander and convinced him that further bombardment of the city was unnecessary. The legend of Karolina is warmly remembered by the population even today. Karolina Riječka became a folk hero and has been celebrated in plays, movies and even in a rock opera.
In the early 19th century, the most prominent economical and cultural leader of the city was Andrija Ljudevit Adamić.
Fiume also had a significant naval base, and in the mid-19th century it became the site of the Imperial and Royal Naval Academy, where the Austro-Hungarian Navy trained its officer cadets.

Hungarian Crown

During the Hungarian revolution of 1848, when Hungary tried to gain independence from Austria, Rijeka was captured by the Croatian troops commanded by Ban Josip Jelačić. The city was then annexed directly to Croatia, although it did keep a degree of autonomy.
Giovanni de Ciotta proved to be an authoritative local political leader. Under his leadership, an impressive phase of expansion of the city started, marked by major port development, fuelled by the general expansion of international trade and the city's connection to the Austro-Hungarian railway network. Modern industrial and commercial enterprises such as the Royal Hungarian Sea Navigation Company "Adria", a rival shipping company the Ungaro-Croata and the Smith and Meynier paper mill, situated in the Rječina canyon, producing cigarette paper sold around the world.
The second half of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century was a period of great prosperity, rapid economic growth and technological dynamism for Rijeka. Many authors and witnesses describe Rijeka of this time as a rich, tolerant, well-to-do town which offered a good standard of living, with endless possibilities for making one's fortune. The Pontifical Delegate Celso Costantini noted in his diary "the religious indifference and apathy of the town". The further industrial development of the city included the first industrial scale oil refinery in Europe in 1882 and the first torpedo factory in the world in 1866, after Robert Whitehead, manager of the "Stabilimento Tecnico Fiumano", designed and successfully tested the world's first torpedo. In addition to the Whitehead Torpedo Works, which opened in 1874, the oil refinery and the paper mill, many other industrial and commercial enterprises were established or expanded in these years. These include a rice husking and starch factory, a wood and furniture company, a wheat elevator and mill, the Ganz-Danubius shipbuilding industries, a cocoa and chocolate factory, a brick factory, a tobacco factory, a cognac distillery, a pasta factory, the Ossoinack barrel and chest factory, a large tannery, five foundries and many others. At the beginning of the 20th century more than half of the industrial capacity in Croatia was located in Rijeka.
Rijeka's Austro-Hungarian Marine Academy became a pioneering centre for high-speed photography. The Austrian physicist Peter Salcher working in the Academy took the first photograph of a bullet flying at supersonic speed in 1886, devising a technique that was later used by Ernst Mach in his studies of supersonic motion.
Rijeka's port underwent tremendous development fuelled by generous Hungarian investments, becoming the main maritime outlet for Hungary and the eastern part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. By 1913–14, the port of Fiume became the tenth-busiest port in Europe. The population grew rapidly from only 21,000 in 1880 to 50,000 in 1910. Major civic buildings constructed at this time include the Governor's Palace, designed by the Hungarian architect Alajos Hauszmann. There was an ongoing competition between Rijeka and Trieste, the main maritime outlet for Austria—reflecting the rivalry between the two components of the Dual Monarchy. The Austro-Hungarian Navy sought to keep the balance by ordering new warships from the shipyards of both cities.
In the 19th century, the city was predominantly Italian-speaking, regardless of ethnic background. Italian nationalism arose in the city at the end of the century, and was less intense compared to autonomism. According to the census of 1880, in Rijeka there were 9,076 Italians, 7,991 Croats, 895 Germans and 383 Hungarians. The 1851 census reported a Croatian majority, though considered not very reliable by Italian historians.
At the last Austro-Hungarian census in 1910, the corpus separatum had a population of 49,806 people and was composed of the following linguistic communities:
Languages in 191149,806 inhabitants
Italian23,283
Croatian15,731
Slovenian3,937
Hungarian3,619
German2,476
English202
Czech183
Serbian70
French40
Polish36
Romanian29

By religion, the census of 1910 indicates that - from the total of 49,806 inhabitants - there were 45,130 Catholics, 1,696 Jewish, 1,123 Calvinist, 995 Orthodox and 311 Lutheran. The Jewish population expanded rapidly, particularly in the 1870s-1880s, and built a large synagogue in 1907. On the eve of WWI, there were 165 inns, 10 hotels with restaurants, 17 cafés, 17 jewellers, 37 barbers and 265 tailor shops in Rijeka.