Description
Kleine Berlin, "little Berlin", is the largest complex of Second World War air-raid tunnels left in Trieste. You go down beneath the Scorcola hill, right in the centre, to discover the shelters for civilians and the ones dug by the Germans for the SS command.
The entrance is on Via Fabio Severo, in the Barriera Nuova district. The complex is split into two sectors that connect but could not be more different: the one built by the city for the population, and the German military one, used as a depot and shelter.
The German sector is a long tunnel with large rooms opening off to the right and left, about 1,000 square metres in all. Pipes, sinks, toilets and the remains of the electrical and forced-ventilation systems are still there, along with the generator room.
In one of the side tunnels you can still see traces of a wooden spiral staircase that came down a shaft. From there Odilo Globocnik, born in Trieste and SS commander in the region, went from his villa to his offices in the Palace of Justice without ever showing himself outdoors.
Beyond a door the Italian shelter begins, and the atmosphere is completely different. Here water has been at work for decades: stalactites, stalagmites and little pools with a film of running water make it feel more like a natural cave than a man-made tunnel.
In the civilians' tunnels you can still spot the slots in the floor for the wooden benches, as well as an infirmary and the toilets. The last stretch has been left as rough excavation, because it was never finished.
The name comes from the time when Trieste was the "capital" of the Adriatic Littoral created by the Germans after 8 September 1943, with the SS command between Piazza Oberdan and the Foro Ulpiano. Strictly speaking it is ungrammatical: in German Berlin is not feminine, and it should be Kleines Berlin.
That the tunnels can be visited at all is thanks to the Club Alpinistico Triestino, which found them abandoned in 1995 and restored them at its own expense. Since the early 2000s some rooms have hosted exhibitions, including ones on the bombing of Trieste and on the caves of the Great War.
The entrance is on Via Fabio Severo, in the Barriera Nuova district. The complex is split into two sectors that connect but could not be more different: the one built by the city for the population, and the German military one, used as a depot and shelter.
The German sector is a long tunnel with large rooms opening off to the right and left, about 1,000 square metres in all. Pipes, sinks, toilets and the remains of the electrical and forced-ventilation systems are still there, along with the generator room.
In one of the side tunnels you can still see traces of a wooden spiral staircase that came down a shaft. From there Odilo Globocnik, born in Trieste and SS commander in the region, went from his villa to his offices in the Palace of Justice without ever showing himself outdoors.
Beyond a door the Italian shelter begins, and the atmosphere is completely different. Here water has been at work for decades: stalactites, stalagmites and little pools with a film of running water make it feel more like a natural cave than a man-made tunnel.
In the civilians' tunnels you can still spot the slots in the floor for the wooden benches, as well as an infirmary and the toilets. The last stretch has been left as rough excavation, because it was never finished.
The name comes from the time when Trieste was the "capital" of the Adriatic Littoral created by the Germans after 8 September 1943, with the SS command between Piazza Oberdan and the Foro Ulpiano. Strictly speaking it is ungrammatical: in German Berlin is not feminine, and it should be Kleines Berlin.
That the tunnels can be visited at all is thanks to the Club Alpinistico Triestino, which found them abandoned in 1995 and restored them at its own expense. Since the early 2000s some rooms have hosted exhibitions, including ones on the bombing of Trieste and on the caves of the Great War.