Inventing Tourism in the Naval Port: The Case of the Brijuni Islands during the Habsburg Empire

The present paper presents the results of the archival and field research conducted in the framework of the author’s research project ‘Valorisation of the common European heritage of Pula as the former main Austrian naval port and Brijuni Islands as an elite resort’ in Austrian archives, with the focus on the Kupelwieser Collection kept in the Austrian National Library. The research aimed to offer a new perspective in the elaboration of the key initial phases of the development of modern tourism on the Brijuni Islands, by analysing their important function as an aristocratic residence near the main naval port in a comparative and transnational framework. The main research question was whether Brijuni followed a European model of development of an aristocratic resort near a major port. Combining archival and field research, the author has explored and compared some of the well-known island aristocratic residences in Europe and the Mediterranean, which developed as popular seaside resorts in the 19th and 20th centuries, such as the Isle of Wight, Mallorca, Corfu, and Brijuni. An overview of the available recent theoretical literature provided comparative insights into the search for such a model of the successful symbiosis of resorts and ports. As a case study, the author analysed the development of tourism on the Brijuni Islands in the most dynamic and dramatic periods before, during, and after the First World War, bearing in mind their importance as an elite resort in close proximity to Pula as the former main Austrian (Austro-Hungarian) naval port.