Exhibition "Valvasor in Istria. A Journey Through the Book: The Glory of the Duchy of Carniola"

The exhibition "Valvasor in Istria. Journey through the Book: The Glory of the Duchy of Carniola" will be inaugurated on Friday, October 17, 2025, at 5:00 p.m., at the Castle of San Giusto in Trieste. It will be open to the public in the exhibition spaces of the Bastione Fiorito from Saturday, October 18, 2025, to Sunday, January 11, 2026. It will be open during the Castle's opening hours and is included in the standard Museum ticket.
Opening hours: until November 3 > daily 10:00 am - 7:00 pm / from November 4 > Tuesday-Sunday 10:00 am - 5:00 pm

The Valvasor in Istria exhibition was conceived and curated by the Historical and Naval Museum of Istria to mark the 333rd anniversary of the publication of Johann Weichard Valvasor's monumental work, Die Ehre deß Hertzogthums Crain (The Glory of the Duchy of Carniola). The exhibition focuses on the work, The Glory of the Duchy of Carniola, published in 1689 and dedicated to the description of the Duchy of Carniola, the former Habsburg province with its capital in Ljubljana, which included present-day Slovenia and parts of Croatian Istria and Italy. A true monument of local historiography, the Glory bears witness to the visionary genius and encyclopedic culture of Johann Weichard Valvasor, a scholar, naturalist, and chronicler born in Ljubljana in 1641. Valvasor dedicated his life to documenting the geography, historical events, folklore, customs, churches, natural wonders, and localities of his homeland, Carniola. To achieve this, Valvasor created a copperplate engraving workshop in his castle in Bogenšperk, where, aided by numerous assistants, he meticulously oversaw the process of creating the materials for his precious publication. The undertaking put such a strain on his finances that, shortly after the book was printed in Nuremberg, Valvasor was forced to sell much of his possessions, including Bogenšperk Castle. But his ambitious work remains a pillar of local historiography to this day.
The exhibition "Valvasor in Istria" focuses on the depictions of Istrian landscapes in the "Gloria." The copperplate engravings are presented in elegant reproductions on metal plates and accompanied by the original descriptions. For the Trieste exhibition, illustrations and descriptions of Trieste and Duino, as well as San Servolo/Socerb, not present in the Polesine edition of the exhibition, have also been added. Although Trieste was not part of the Duchy of Carniola, Valvasor still included it in his work, within the Inner Carniola (Notranjska), believing that in the past it had been annexed or in some way associated with the Duchy. In this way, he left posterity a very important—and rightly renowned—depiction of Trieste, useful for reconstructing the city's layout in the 17th century, before the urban transformation that followed the granting of the Free Port status (1719). In particular, the view offers a detailed description of the salt mines, soon to disappear to make way for the new city, today's Borgo Teresiano.

Also on display at the Bastione Fiorito are the four volumes of The Glory of the Duchy of Carniola in the original 1689 edition, on loan from the "Attilio Hortis" Civic Library, a true treasure trove of bibliographical resources.

Info: castellosangiusto@comune.trieste.it / +39 040 309362

Comune di Trieste -Musei Storici - Museo del Castello di San Giusto in collaborazione con la Regione Istriana e con il Museo Storico e Navale dell’Istria - Povijesni i pomorski muzej Istre di Pola-Pula