Occupation
After the armistice of Villa Giusti (3 November 1918) the Italian army occupied the Littoral and parts of Carniola and Carinthia. The extent of the occupation up to the signing of Rapallo is marked by the 1919 demarcation line.
More →The ZDRM's area of activity covers 47 Slovenian municipalities — 36% of the surface of Slovenian state territory on both sides of the former border.
The Society was founded in Podbrdo (Municipality of Tolmin) and has since worked on research, public awareness and networking experts and history enthusiasts.
The Rapallo Border was a shared history of three nations. We cooperate with Slovenian, Italian and Croatian researchers of the border area.
After the armistice of Villa Giusti (3 November 1918) the Italian army occupied the Littoral and parts of Carniola and Carinthia. The extent of the occupation up to the signing of Rapallo is marked by the 1919 demarcation line.
More →On 12 November 1920 Italy and the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes fixed the border at Rapallo. Italy received a quarter of Slovenian ethnic territory, with more than 300,000 Slovenes.
More →In September 1919 the “peaceful poet” D’Annunzio and his legionaries seized Rijeka: black shirts, the Roman salute, a leader on the balcony and an applauding crowd. A dress rehearsal for fascism, watched closely by Mussolini. After Rapallo, Rijeka became a free state; in December 1920 the Italian navy “liberated” it with cannon fire, and in 1924 Italy annexed it. Sušak remained with the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes.
More →The burning of the Narodni dom in Trieste (13 July 1920) was the prelude to systematic violence. The fascists abolished societies and parties, the Gentile reform (1923) abolished Slovenian schools, and surnames and place names were Italianised. Resistance was crushed by the Special Tribunal, and loud murders served as a warning to the whole community.
More →Tens of thousands of Slovenes and Croats left the Littoral for Yugoslavia and across the ocean. The authorities settled Italians in their jobs and on their land.
More →Italy saw Yugoslavia as a rival in the Adriatic and the Balkans. In 1939 it annexed Albania; together with Germany, which annexed Austria in 1938, it was backed by Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria. Yugoslavia was squeezed from the west and south.
From 1927 Italy built the Alpine Wall (Vallo Alpino), a fortification system along the Alpine frontier from Liguria to the Kvarner, officially completed in 1942. Along the Rapallo border the Kingdom of Yugoslavia built the Rupnik Line, which the army did not defend in 1941: it withdrew even before the Italian attack.
More →On 6 April 1941 the Axis powers attacked Yugoslavia. Slovenia was divided between Germany, Italy and Hungary, and the Independent State of Croatia (an Italian protectorate) also occupied part of it. Italy annexed the Province of Ljubljana.
More →The Italian authorities imprisoned civilians in camps such as Rab, Gonars and Monigo. For most of the crimes nobody was held to account. The photographs show violence against civilians.
More →In 1942, following Roatta’s Circular 3C, Italian divisions encircled villages, shot hostages, burned homes and drove civilians into camps. Lipa (1944) was a crime of the fascist RSI forces and the Wehrmacht. Hover over a point to see details.
More →On 10 July 1943 the Allies landed in Sicily and began fighting their way north. On 8 September Italy capitulated, its units withdrew from the Balkans towards northern Italy, and authority in the Littoral collapsed.
More →At the end of April and the beginning of May 1945 the Yugoslav Army liberated most of the Littoral and Trieste. Under the agreement of 9 June 1945 it withdrew behind the Morgan Line.
More →Defeated Italy sat at the table among the vanquished, Yugoslavia among the victors. The Paris Treaty (10 February 1947) abolished the Rapallo border and annexed most of the Littoral to Yugoslavia; Trieste received a special status.
More →Bazovica, 6 September 1930
For the four executed TIGR members and the more than 6,400 Slovenian victims of the Italian occupier, the wish came true: most of the Littoral is freed from Italy.
Source of the victim figure: Institute of Contemporary History, register of victims 1941–1945.
The Rapallo Border Historical Society (ZDRM) was founded in 2017 in Podbrdo. It focuses on interdisciplinary research, public awareness-raising and networking among professional and amateur researchers, as well as organising a wide range of events — from field visits to international symposia. Our work bridges the gap between individuals, organisations and institutions engaged with the period of the Rapallo border.
In the final military operations of the First World War, Italian forces advanced into western Slovenian ethnic territory. The Treaty of Rapallo in November 1920 formalised this occupation and divided the Slovenian national body for 27 years. This was no brief interlude — it was a quarter-century odyssey of western Slovenian territory.
The Rapallo Border Historical Society aims through its work to prevent the forgetting of a period that was a severe trial for Slovenia and the Slovenian community. We place at the forefront the lives of the inhabitants along the border and of those who guarded and monitored it on both sides — with all the lights and shadows of that time.
At ZDRM we take a comprehensive view of the area along the Rapallo border — covering both the municipalities that remained in Yugoslavia after 1920 and those that were part of Italy. We recognise that all these experiences shaped the specific political, cultural and demographic development of the region and continue to define the fundamental socio-geographical characteristics of the area today.
ZDRM encourages and supports the publication of scholarly works on the Rapallo period. Selected titles:
From the first days after the collapse of Austria-Hungary to the signing of the Paris Peace Treaty in 1947, the western Slovenian lands experienced occupation, partition and a slow national renewal. The Rapallo Border marked a quarter of Slovenian ethnic territory and shaped the lives of hundreds of thousands of Slovenes living under foreign rule.
The National Council of SCS in Ljubljana proclaims the State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs. In the Littoral — in Gorizia, Trieste and elsewhere — national councils seize power and declare accession to the new state. The Italian army, which occupies the territory in the following days, dissolves these bodies and declares their authority illegitimate, ending the brief period of Slovenian self-rule in the Littoral.
On the basis of the armistice between Austria-Hungary and the Entente, Italian forces occupy western Slovenian territory. Italy invokes the London Pact of 1915, which promises it extensive territorial gains in the eastern Adriatic.
Italy and the Kingdom of SCS sign a bilateral border agreement in Rapallo. The border cuts off Trieste, Gorizia, Istria and a large part of the interior as far as Snežnik from Slovenia. The treaty is signed in Villa Pagana (then Villa Spinola) by, among others, Carlo Sforza and Ante Trumbić.
The joint border commission with Italian and Yugoslav representatives definitively marks the border on the ground. Border stones with Roman numerals are placed; the commission completes its work in 1925.
The Fascist authorities systematically suppress Slovenian culture and language through administrative and educational reforms. In parallel, both sides construct defence systems: the Alpine Wall on the Italian side and the Rupnik Line on the Yugoslav side.
Italy, together with Germany and Hungary, attacks Yugoslavia — for Italy already the third attack on its eastern neighbour, following the war with the Austrian Empire in 1866 and entry into the First World War in 1915. Italy's eastern border had never been attacked from its side. Slovenian territory is carved up: Germany occupies Styria and Upper Carniola, Italy establishes the Province of Ljubljana. Mass internments, the burning of villages and the taking of hostages in the Ljubljana region spur the formation of the Liberation Front and the growth of partisan resistance.
Yugoslav forces and Liberation Front units liberate the Littoral in the first days of May 1945. After twenty-five years of Italian rule, the territory returns to Yugoslav administration, but the definitive border between Italy and Yugoslavia remains an open diplomatic question.
The signing of the peace treaty officially closes the Rapallo period. The Slovenian Littoral returns to Yugoslavia; the Free Territory of Trieste (FTT) is established, which the London Memorandum finally dissolves in 1954.
The border was not merely an administrative dividing line — it was a living force that shaped everyday life, identity and the memory culture of the whole region. We can still read these traces today in the landscape, in linguistic peculiarities and in the social networks of communities along the former border.
The society's activities, website development, field work and exhibitions are only possible with members' support. With an annual membership fee of €20 you actively contribute to the preservation of the Rapallo border heritage and fund future projects.
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