Violence Against Women in Trieste in the First Period after the Second World War

Drawing on an analysis of unpublished primary sources kept in the British, Italian and former Yugoslav Archives, and also newspapers, the paper presents some cases of violence against women in Trieste in the first period after the Second World War, particularly in March 1946 and September 1947. During a manifestation on 10 March 1946 in the suburb Servola (Škedenj) the Allied (Anglo-American) police fired shots against civilians, killing two people, one of whom was a woman – a mother of three little children. The second case was the murder of a girl of eleven; she died in the centre of Trieste in a terrorist attack on 13 September 1947. The paper highlights also the very intricate context of these key studies, particularly problems related to the future of the Italian-Yugoslav border and the fierce nationalistic and ideological clashes.

About the author

Gorazd Bajc lectures contemporary European History, focusing particularly on the history of the Balkans. He works as a researcher at the Institute of Nova revija for Humanities, Ljubljana and at the Institute IRRIS, Koper/Capodistria. He has been a member of the board of editors (since 2005) and editor (since 2014) of the high-impact scientific journal Acta Histriae, editor (since 2014) of the high-impact scientific journal Annales – Series historia et sociologia, and a member of the board of editor (since 2012) of the series Fontes – Studia diplomatica, and (since 2016) of two scientific journals, Qualestoria and Sodobni vojaški izzivi/Contemporary Military Challenges. He authored three monographs, two university textbooks and more than fifty-five scientific papers, co-authored four monographs and edited nine books (some as co-editor). In 2017 he received the Seal of Excellence from the European Commission, the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions.

He collaborates on the EIRENE project.