¹ Achivio di Stato (Trieste)—Commissariato General Civile per la Venezia Giulia (hereafter AdS[TS]—CGCVG), Atti Generali (hereafter AG), 1919–22, busta (envelope) 82. Venezia Giulia, the Italian name given to the territory, will be used throughout the article. The area is roughly analogous (although not entirely) to the Slavic Julian March.

² Issues of citizenship, rather than name change, preoccupied those born outside the territory. For each petitioner, the official file holds the request, officials' notes on the disposition of the request, a copy of the name-change decree (where a change was granted), and documents related to any appeal of the official decision. The entreaties demonstrate a range of social, cultural, and political backgrounds by their diction, method of address, manner of writing, and even mode of preparation.

³ For the purposes of this paper, “ethnic” refers to cultural and social conceptions of identity conceived without specific reference to the state, while “national” refers to identity linked to state frameworks and citizenship. Of particular interest with regard to the rearticulation of interwar nationalism is Brubaker, Rogers, Nationalism Reframed: Nationhood and the National Question in the New Europe (Cambridge, 1996).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴ Haslinger, Peter refers specifically to this tendency from a regional perspective in “Building a Regional Identity: The Burgenland, 1921–1938,” Austrian History Yearbook 32 (2001): 105–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁵ See Scott, James C., Tehranian, John, and Mathias, Jeremy, “The Production of Legal Identities Proper to States: The Case of the Permanent Family Surname,” Comparative Studies of Society and History 44, no. 1 (2002): 6CrossRefGoogle Scholar, on the role of names in establishing “human topography.” Essays in Stahl, Peter, Name and Social Structure: Examples from Southeast Europe (Boulder, 1998)Google Scholar, explore naming and power in the Central and Eastern European context.

⁶ Berghold, Joe, Italien-Austria: Von der Erbfeindschaft zur Europäischen offnung (Vienna, 1997)Google Scholar, offers a provocative, albeit idiosyncratic, view of the historical development of the relationship between Austria and Italy. See also Cattaruzza, Marina, ed., Trieste, Austria, Italia tra settecento e novecento (Udine, 1996).Google Scholar

⁷ Dassovich, Mario, I molti problemi dell'Italia al confine orientale (Udine, 1989), 57–62Google Scholar. On Trieste and the Habsburg navy, see two books by Sondhaus, Lawrence, The Habsburg Empire and the Sea: Austria Naval Policy, 1797–1866 (West Lafayette, 1989)Google Scholar; and In the Service of the Emperor: Italians in the Austrian Armed Forces, 1814–1918 (Boulder, 1990).Google Scholar

⁸ On the relationship of liberal politics to national identity in the Habsburg Empire, see Judson, Pieter, Exclusive Revolutionaries: Liberal Politics, Social Experience, and National Identity in the Austrian Empire 1848–1914 (Ann Arbor, 1996).Google Scholar

⁹ On Italy and Yugoslavia at the Paris Peace Conference, see Albrecht-Carrié, René, Italy at the Paris Peace Conference (Hamden, 1938)Google Scholar; and Lederer, Ivo J., Yugoslavia at the Paris Peace Conference (New Haven, 1963).Google Scholar

¹⁰ Most notable, perhaps, was France's role in 1920 and 1921 in the formation of the Little Entente, which included Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Yugoslavia.

¹¹ This 1920 border was short-lived. As a result of Mussolini's revanchism and the dispute over the internationalized city of Fiume (Rijeka), it was redrawn in 1924.

¹² Quoted in Rusinow, Dennison, Italy's Austrian Heritage (Oxford, 1969), 59.Google Scholar

¹³ Ziller, Paolo, “Le nuove provincie nell'immediato dopoguerra. Tra ricostruzione e autonomie amministrative (1918–1922),” in Dal litorale austriaco alla Venezia Giulia: Miscellanea di studi giuliani, ed. Salimbeni, Fulvio (Udine, 1991), 249–52Google Scholar. For memoirs of the period written on the eve of the Fascist takeover, see Salata, Francesco, Per le nuove provincie e per l'Italia (Rome, 1922).Google Scholar

Orlando was the prime minister from October 1917 to June 1919. His administration was the longest of the postwar Liberal period. He was followed by Nitti, Francesco (06 1919–June 1920)Google Scholar, Giolitti, Giovanni (06 1920–June 1921)Google Scholar, Bonomi, Ivanoe (07 1921–February 1922)Google Scholar, and Facta, Luigi (02 1922–October 1922)Google Scholar. See Seton-Watson, Christopher, Italy from Liberalism to Fascism 1870–1925 (London, 1967), 505–629.Google Scholar

¹⁴ On Venezia Tridentina, see, in particular, Rusinow, , Italy's Austrian Heritage, 61–68.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Ibid., 109–11; and De Grand, Alexander, The Hunchback's Tailor: Giovanni Giolitti and Liberal Italy from the Challenge of Mass Politics to the Rise of Fascism, 1882–1922 (Westport, 2001), 229–33.Google Scholar

¹⁶ References to articles in 1919 in L'Osservatore Triestino and in April 1920 in Corriere della Sera appear in buste 82 and 97, passim.

¹⁷ Cattaruzza, Marina, “Slovenes and Italians in Trieste, 1850–1914,” in Ethnic Identity in Urban Europe, ed. Engman, Max (New York, 1992), 194, 213Google Scholar (table); and Melik, Vasilij, “Die Wählerfolge der Deutschen, Italianer und Slovenen in Laibach, Triest, Marburg an der Drau und anderen krainischen und untersteirischen Städten in den Jahren 1848–1927,” in Alpen-Adria-Städte im nationalen Differenzierungsprozeβ, ed. Moritsch, Andreas (Klagenfurt, 1997), 97Google Scholar. Melik suggests that 29,439 of 38,597 foreign residents were Italian.

Census counts of Slovenes had increased significantly from 1900 to 1910 as trends toward assimilation slowed. In 1910, the findings of the census were so contested that a recount was conducted in the Adriatic provinces. This significantly increased the number of Slovenes and Croats, much to the consternation of Italian proponents. Brix, Emil, Die Umgangssprachen in Altösterreich zwischen Agitation und Assimilation: die Sprachenstatistik in den zisleithanischen Volkszählungen, 1880 bis 1910 (Vienna, 1982)Google Scholar, analyzes the ambiguities and complexities of the census data.

¹⁸ Winkler, Eduard, Wahlrechtsreformen und Wahlen in Triest 1905–1909. Eine Analyse der politischen Partizipation in einer multinationalen Stadtregion der Habsburgermonarchie (Munich, 2000), 342–58Google Scholar, breaks down the affiliations of representatives in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

¹⁹ Trampus, Antonio, Vie e piazze di Trieste moderna: Toponomastica stradale e topografia storica (Trieste, 1989), 23–24.Google Scholar

²⁰ Ibid., 128,166,353, 517–18, 627. A letter protesting the commission's choice to name a street after musician and composer Luigi Ricci on the grounds that his contributions to the city were minor compared to those of others not honored testified to a public awareness, at least in some circles, of the bias in naming policies. Ibid., 523.

Many similarities are evident between Trieste and L'viv with regard to the development of toponyms. See the discussion by Binder, Harald, “Making and Defending a Polish Town: ‘Lwów’ (Lemberg), 1848–1914,” Austrian History Yearbook 34 (2003): 69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

²¹ For a discussion of the implications of allegiances to the Kulturnation and Staatsnation in the Italian case, see Boserti, Gilbert, “La jeune nation italienne entre ‘ethnos’ e ‘demos,’” in Marginalités: frontières, nations et minorités (Novecento, 1994), 48Google Scholar. On Austro-Germanness, see Judson, , Exclusive RevolutionariesGoogle Scholar. On the malleability of Triestine national and ethnie identities in the era of World War I, see Ara, Angelo and Magris, Claudio, Un identità di frontiera (Turin, 1982)Google Scholar; and Millo, Anna, L'Élite del potere a Trieste: Una biografia collettiva 1891–1938 (Milan, 1989)Google Scholar. For a review of perceptions of cosmopolitanism in the Habsburg city, see Ballinger, Pamela, “Imperial Nostalgia: Mythologizing Habsburg Trieste,” Journal of Modern Italian Studies 8, no. 1 (2003): 84–101.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

²² Sator, , La popolazione della Venezia Giulia (Rome, 1945), 40, 42.Google Scholar

²³ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 97, undated and unsigned report by Mosconi (Summer 1920?). (No date appears on the document, but its location in the file and reference to other documents suggest that it was sent in the summer of 1920.) The estimate gave no indication of how the “Italianness” of names was judged. After 1926, Fascist officials defined Italian names using the vague criteria of “those of Latin or Italian origins.” For Fascist purposes, Friulian names and other names derived from “Italian” dialects were considered Italian. On standards for Fascist name change, see Pizzagalli, Aldo, Per l'italianità dei cognomi nella provincia di Trieste (Trieste, 1929).Google Scholar

²⁴ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Grablovitz; busta 97, Bünger; busta 99, Znidarčič and busta 130, Nitsche.

²⁵ Scholars tend to agree that nationalism rests on perceptions of national community, but their attempts to catalog characteristics that delineate nations have been unsuccessful. The literature on ethnic and national identity is immense. See, for example, the variety of perspectives offered in Balakrishnan, Gopal, Mapping the Nation (London, 1996)Google Scholar; and Eley, Geoff and Suny, Ronald Grigor, eds., Becoming National (New York, 1996)Google Scholar. Most useful in the context of this article are approaches derived from seminal works in culture and anthropology, including Anderson, Benedict, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London, 1983)Google Scholar; and Hobsbawm, Eric, Inventing Tradition (Cambridge, 1983).Google Scholar

²⁶ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Poscher, Oblak, Albrecht, Laurencich, Bradach, and Scabar; busta 98, Gluncich; busta 99, Schert.

²⁷ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Albrecht; busta 113, Doliach.

²⁸ Italian authorities facilitated the emigration of railroad workers, customs agents, and other imperial agents. See AdS(TS)—CGCVG, di gabinetto, Atti (1919–1922)Google Scholar, busta 36.

²⁹ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Brandenburg, Dolzan, Poscher; and busta 130, Michelstädter.

³⁰ The complaint was dismissed. AdS(TS)—CGCVG, Divisione VII, busta 17,15 February 1919 and supporting documents.

³¹ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Goldschmiedt.

³² On Italian urban culture, see Ascoli, Albert and von Henneberg, Krystyna, eds., Making and Remaking Italy (Oxford, 2001)Google Scholar, in particular, the essays by Adrian Lyttelton and Silvana Patriarca. Binder, , “Making and Defending,” 59ff.Google Scholar, discusses the impact of this rural vision in the Polish case.

³³ On the coincidence of ethnic and social prejudice against Slavs in the immediate postwar period, see Hametz, Maura, “The Carabinieri Stood By: The Italian State and ‘Slavic Threat’ in Trieste, 1919–1922,” Nationalities Papers 29, no. 4 (2001): 559–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³⁴ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Feriancich, Marinig; busta 99, Vodopivez.

³⁵ Barker, Thomas, The Slovene Minority of Carinthia (Boulder, 1984), 80–84Google Scholar, discusses Slovene perspectives on trialism.

³⁶ Galli, Carlo, Diarii e lettere: Tripoli 1911 Trieste 1918 (Florence, 1951), 8–10.Google Scholar

³⁷ Rusinow, , Italy's Austrian Heritage, 28–29.Google Scholar

³⁸ Wolff, Larry, Inventing Eastern Europe (Berkeley, 1994)Google Scholar; and Todorova, Maria, Imagining the Balkans (New York, 1997)Google Scholar, explore the historic foundations of perceptions of the split between East and West in Europe.

³⁹ Rusinow, , Italy's Austrian Heritage, 27.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ Cattaruzza, , “Slovenes and Italians,” 199.Google Scholar

⁴¹ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Lussich, Pacovich, Lukac.

⁴² Rusinow, , Italy's Austrian Heritage, 58.Google Scholar

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⁴⁴ Trampus, , Vie e piazze, 318–19, 381, 644–45.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ Magris, Claudio, Danube (New York, 1989), 199.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Visintin, , L'Italia a Trieste, 52.Google Scholar

⁴⁷ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, buste 82, 97, 98, 99,113,114.

⁴⁸ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Löwy to Lesič in Belgrade and Kohn to Varadi in Budapest. The petitioners were clearly of Jewish birth; Italian authorities forwarded the changes to the Jewish Community. Laws in post-World War I Germany did not specifically prohibit name change for Jews, but made it difficult by precluding “arbitrary” changes. Bering, Dietz, The Stigma of Names: Antisemitism in German Daily Life, 1812–1933 (Cambridge, 1992), 136.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 97, undated response to an official query of 17 July 1919, discusses the Austrian legislation. De Felice, Emidio, Dizionario dei cognomi italiani (Milan, 2000), 11Google Scholar, cites the Italian law.

⁵⁰ Visintin, , L'italia a Trieste, 231.Google Scholar

⁵¹ Rusinow, , Italy's Austrian Heritage, 95–97Google Scholar, offers a typical assessment of Mosconi as a proto-Fascist. Many views of Mosconi derive from analysis of Mosconi, Antonio's book, I primi anni di governo italiano nella Venezia Giulia (Bologna, 1924)Google Scholar, published to please Fascist superiors; and from post-World War II literature, for example, Alatri, Paolo, Nitti, D'Annunzio e la questione adriatica (Milan, 1959)Google Scholar, which seeks to explain the rise of Fascism and Italy's interwar foreign policy.

⁵² AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 97.

⁵³ Lefebvre-Teillard, Anne, Le nom: droit et histoire (Paris, 1990)Google Scholar, examines the legislative and administrative importance of surnames in the French case. De Felice, , DizionarioGoogle Scholar; and Martini, Giovanni, “Names and the Law,” in Proceedings of the XIXth International Congress of Onomastic Sciences, Aberdeen, August 4–11, 1996 (Aberdeen, 1998), 206–13Google Scholar, offer limited discussions from the Italian perspective.

⁵⁴ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 97, quoted and requoted in several memoranda sent to Rome, July 1919 to February 1920. On Magyarization and names, see Panchyk, Richard R., “Magyarization: A Study of Given Names Among Jews in Buda, 1820–95” (MA thesis, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, 1994)Google Scholar. On Hungarian surname measures from 1881 on, see Schultheiss, Franz Guntram, Deutschtum und Magyarisierung in Ungarn und Siebenbürgen (Munich, 1898).Google Scholar

⁵⁵ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 97, 17 December 1919, and an undated and unsigned report by Mosconi (Summer 1920?).

⁵⁶ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Terzon, and busta 97, 9 02 1920.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Bassich.

⁵⁸ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 97, undated and unsigned report by Mosconi (Summer 1920?).

⁵⁹ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Fuchs. Cases related to ennoblement were referred directly to Rome. AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 97,9 February 1920.

⁶⁰ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 97,9 February 1920 and 13 August 1919; busta 82, Flego.

⁶¹ See, for example, AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Krainz, Schneider, and Zvetermich. On officials' views on illegitimacy and the law, see busta 97, 25 August 1919.

⁶² Carabinieri reports appear throughout the files.

⁶³ Ads(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 97, Fazzini; and busta 98, Hirn, Matosel, and Gioppo.

⁶⁴ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 98, Moretti; and busta 99, Vellig.

⁶⁵ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Venutti; and busta 97, Danese.

⁶⁶ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 114, Trobitz.

⁶⁷ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 82, Arnerrytsch. The change was granted on 19 August 1919.

⁶⁸ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 97, quoted and requoted in several memoranda sent to Rome, July 1919 to February 1920.

⁶⁹ AdS(TS)—CGCVG, AG, busta 97, undated and unsigned report by Mosconi (Summer 1920?).

⁷⁰ On the 1921 elections, see De Grand, , Hunchback's Tailor, 241–43Google Scholar; Seton-Watson, , Italy, 588–89Google Scholar; and Rusinow, , Italy's Austrian Heritage, 108Google Scholar. For a recent assessment of Italian Liberal government, see Ashley, Susan, Making Liberalism Work: The Italian Experience 1860–1914 (Westport, 2003).Google Scholar

⁷¹ Changes are listed in the Elenco dei comuni e delle frazioni di comune della Venezia Giulia secondo le nuove circoscrizioni amministrative e giudiziarie (Trieste, 1924)Google Scholar, reprinted in Parovel, Paolo, Identità cancellata: L'italianizzazione forzata dei cognomi, nomi e toponomi nella “Venezia Giulia” dal 1919 al 1945, con gli elenchi delle provincie di Trieste, Gorizia, Istria ed i dati dei primi 5,300 decreti (Trieste, 1985), 110–21.Google Scholar

⁷² Records of these name “rectifications” are held in Archivio di Stato (Trieste)—Prefettura della Provincia di Trieste, Divisione I: Riduzione Cognomi Trieste, No. 11419 (1926–43).