There must be some musical history in Trieste and around, but I am not aware of any, except that the Triestans love opera and the Trieste opera house is regularly frequented. I will have to research that further. However, Trieste has a lot of literary history and James Joyce spent much time in the city around the time of the 1st world war. The Joyce Museum was closed when I was there, so I will have to visit it another time. Petrarch also had a presence there, apparently, according to a small exhibition I visited in the council offices. Other famous writers attracted to Trieste were Maria Rainer Rilke, Sigmund Freud, Italo Svevo and Gabriele d'Annunzio. But there are many others who made major contributions to Italian literature.

Pasquale Revoltella was a rich Triestan business man who made his fortune in wood and who had a hand in the construction of the Suez Canal. He spent a lot of money supporting local artists in the Trieste region and his luxurious mansion has now been converted into the Museo Revoltella (EUR8). This is a huge exhibition of the art he collected, including that of several central European artists, which is spread across several floors. Budget at least two hours to see works by Rovan Ruggero, Carlo Wostry, Isidoro Grunhut and Gino Parin, among many others, not forgetting the modern art collection on the top floor. There were many bourgeois families in Trieste because a lot of money was made with the commerce in the port.

Just wandering the streets of Trieste will evoke a feeling of the Austro Hungarian Hapsburg empire, with a mix of architectural styles reflecting Austria and Northern Italy. Many of the guild mansions have amazingly elaborate decorations and stone carvings on their facades. The old style coffee houses are really worth a visit, such as the Antico Caffè Torinese, but I found it difficult to get a cup of coffee that actually pleased me. And it's worth a ploughter about the harbour area, along with the Canale Grande and the Borgo Teresiano district.



This statue of James Joyce is on a bridge crossing the Canal Grande in Trieste


This bronze sculpture of Gabriele d'Annunzio is just in front of the Trieste opera house


The library in the museum of entrepreneur and collector Pasquale Revoltella


Pasquale Revoltella was very much involved in the financing and construction of the Suez Canal, shown in this painting


The frame on the left is in fact a peephole on the street outside, so Revoltella could see who was approaching the mansion


A look inside the wonderful Serbian church in Trieste


One of the famous traditional cafes in Trieste, but I was unable to find my happiness there - if you go to Trieste, all the coffee types have completely different names