Boundary Stones and Their “Hidden" Legacy in Slovenia with Matija Zorn (AMGI)

Matija Zorn
March 31, 2023
2:30PM - 4:00PM
Enarson Classroom Building Room 160

Date Range
2023-03-31 14:30:00 2023-03-31 16:00:00 Boundary Stones and Their “Hidden" Legacy in Slovenia with Matija Zorn (AMGI) Speaker Biography: Matija Zorn, Ph.D., is the Head of the Anton Melik Geographical Institute of the Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts (Ljubljana, Slovenia) and a lecturer at the Faculty of Humanities of the University of Primorska (Koper, Slovenia). He is a geographer and a historian, and his main research interests include physical geography (especially geomorphology), natural hazards, land degradation, environmental history, historical geography and geographic information systems. Most recently he co-edited a book titled The Geography of Slovenia: Small But Diverse (Springer Nature) and co-authored a book Cartographic Treasures Of Slovenian Territory. He is Chairman of the Commission on Land Degradation and Desertification of the International Geographical Union Abstract: A boundary stone or border stone is a robust physical marker that identifies a land boundary, especially a change in the direction of a boundary. Natural stone was used for boundary stones, and later they were made of concrete or other materials. They were usually placed in a particularly visible spot. Many boundary stones feature information, such as an abbreviation identifying the holder of the border and a date. Boundary stones separating countries usually include abbreviations of the countries they are separating, as well as the date when the border was delineated. In Slovenia, boundary stones dating back to Roman times can be found. In this presentation we will focus on boundary stones on the territory of present-day Slovenia, highlighting four case studies: the provincial border within the Habsburg Monarchy, before World War I, which separated the Duchy of Styria and the Kingdom of Hungary; the state border of the interwar period, which separated the Kingdom of Italy and the Kingdom of Yugoslavia; the World War II state border that separated the German Reich and the Kingdom of Italy; and the World War II state border that separated the German Reich and the Independent State of Croatia. These boundary stones no longer serve their original purpose, even though some of them correspond to today's cadastral, municipal, state, etc. borders; however, as “markers” of the past, they are historical “witnesses.” Nowadays, old boundary stones are interesting from the aspect of cultural heritage – intangible in terms of tradition of regulating rights in space and tangible as archaeological remnants. The lecture is a result of the national research projects titled “Make This Land German ... Italian ... Hungarian ... Croatian! The Role of the Occupation Border in the Denationalization Policy and the Lives of the Slovene Population” (No. J6-8248), “Creating, Maintaining, Reusing: Border Commissions as the Key for Understanding Contemporary Borders” (No. J6-2574) and “The Rapallo Border: A Quarter-Century of Existence and a Century of Heritage and Memory” (No. J6-3124). Enarson Classroom Building Room 160 America/New_York public

Speaker Biography: Matija Zorn, Ph.D., is the Head of the Anton Melik Geographical Institute of the Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts (Ljubljana, Slovenia) and a lecturer at the Faculty of Humanities of the University of Primorska (Koper, Slovenia). He is a geographer and a historian, and his main research interests include physical geography (especially geomorphology), natural hazards, land degradation, environmental history, historical geography and geographic information systems. Most recently he co-edited a book titled The Geography of Slovenia: Small But Diverse (Springer Nature) and co-authored a book Cartographic Treasures Of Slovenian Territory. He is Chairman of the Commission on Land Degradation and Desertification of the International Geographical Union

Abstract: A boundary stone or border stone is a robust physical marker that identifies a land boundary, especially a change in the direction of a boundary. Natural stone was used for boundary stones, and later they were made of concrete or other materials. They were usually placed in a particularly visible spot. Many boundary stones feature information, such as an abbreviation identifying the holder of the border and a date. Boundary stones separating countries usually include abbreviations of the countries they are separating, as well as the date when the border was delineated. In Slovenia, boundary stones dating back to Roman times can be found. In this presentation we will focus on boundary stones on the territory of present-day Slovenia, highlighting four case studies:

  1. the provincial border within the Habsburg Monarchy, before World War I, which separated the Duchy of Styria and the Kingdom of Hungary;
  2. the state border of the interwar period, which separated the Kingdom of Italy and the Kingdom of Yugoslavia;
  3. the World War II state border that separated the German Reich and the Kingdom of Italy; and
  4. the World War II state border that separated the German Reich and the Independent State of Croatia.

These boundary stones no longer serve their original purpose, even though some of them correspond to today's cadastral, municipal, state, etc. borders; however, as “markers” of the past, they are historical “witnesses.” Nowadays, old boundary stones are interesting from the aspect of cultural heritage – intangible in terms of tradition of regulating rights in space and tangible as archaeological remnants.

The lecture is a result of the national research projects titled “Make This Land German ... Italian ... Hungarian ... Croatian! The Role of the Occupation Border in the Denationalization Policy and the Lives of the Slovene Population” (No. J6-8248), “Creating, Maintaining, Reusing: Border Commissions as the Key for Understanding Contemporary Borders” (No. J6-2574) and “The Rapallo Border: A Quarter-Century of Existence and a Century of Heritage and Memory” (No. J6-3124).