Adriatic Society of Natural Sciences since its establishment in 1874 until the First World War

Abstract

Since 1874, Trieste natural scientists were brought together by the Adriatic Society of Natural Sciences or Società Adriatica di Scienze Naturali. They held scientific and popular-scientific lectures, socialized in their reading clubs, read natural-scientific literature from all over the world, edited their own scholarly journal (Bollettino della Società Adriatica di Scienze Naturali in Trieste), as well as organized professional excursions to places of interest, etc. The workings of the society, which has so far been largely overlooked by researchers into Trieste’s past, are depicted here with special emphases regarding the embeddedness of the Adriatic Society of Natural Sciences in the imperial, European, and even global frameworks, reflected in the excellence of Trieste natural scientists. The article also deals with the use of languages and examines any possible correlations between language choices made by the society’s members and the growing adherence to Italian nationalism in the decades before the First World War.