Turriaco

The name of Turriaco may mean land of the bisons. One theory brings it from Latin, from a landowner called Turrius or Thorius with the suffix of belonging -acus; but according to the most recent toponymic studies it is instead a Slavic name, formed on the base tur, the wild bull, with the suffix -jak: it would mark a place where the bisons coming down from the Nanos plateau had been seen, or hunted. The dating would fall between the seventh and the tenth century, because the whole Monfalcone area was colonised by Slavs from the seventh century on, and the Venetian shift began only in the fifteenth century and was finished two centuries later. The first written record is of 1267, already in the form «in Turriaco», and in the following centuries one finds Turiacco, Turiach, Turiacho, Turyach. In Slovene the village is still called Turjak.

To stand on the Isonzo, though, has meant standing on a line. In the first world war the people were split between pro-Austrians and pro-Italians, and suffered deportations from both sides; on 5 June 1915 the Italian troops came in, and the front line ran through here, of which stretches of trench remain. Villa Mangilli was Cadorna's headquarters and also housed king Victor Emmanuel III, while villa Priuli served as a military hospital. After the second war the English camped here, then New Zealanders and Brazilians — the area has been called el Brasil ever since — and finally Yugoslav troops; for years the village was disputed between Italy and Yugoslavia, and the matter closed only on 15 September 1947, with the peace treaty of Paris. There is one thing, though, that has never changed here: after the cholera epidemic of 1836 the inhabitants made a vow, and every year, on the first Sunday of June, they still go on pilgrimage to the sanctuary of the Madonna di Barbana.