Page 205 - Upland Families, Elites and Communities

Urban Opportunities

coincided with a politically and economically turbulent period marked
by French occupations, particularly evident during the era of the Illyri-
an provinces (1809−1814) when the broader north Adriatic area suffered
from the British naval blockade and the greatly weakened Trieste econ-
omy. This economic crisis persisted and deepened in the initial years of
the pre-March era, for other reasons as well (Kalc 2011). The demographic
effects in the Tomaj curacy are also evident in marriage dynamics, a di-
rect marker of social well-being, with the number of marriages declining
by a quarter in the second decade of the nineteenth century. However,
this stagnation represented only a brief episode within a long-term trend
of positive growth that extended from the eighteenth century into the
1840s. During the 1820s and 1830s, the population experienced vigorous
growth, with annual rates of 9.9 and 9.6 per thousand, respectively (table
7.2). This trend mirrors developments in the entire Slovenian ethnic ter-
ritory, where the 1820s, 1830s, and partly the 1840s witnessed significant
demographic expansion (Blaznik et al. 1970; Zwitter 1936). In less than
20 years, the population of the Tomaj curacy increased by almost a fifth.
However, in the 1850s, this growth phase came to an end, marking the
beginning of a new historical trend that lasted until the First World War
and beyond. Over this period, the population registered negligible change,
indicating a new long-term stationary dynamic. The annual growth rate
from 1838 to 1910 was a mere 0.2 per thousand, resulting in a population
growth of only 1.2 percent. Between 1869 and 1910, the population grew
by just 0.8 percent.³ In Goriška, one of the Austrian provinces character-
ized by lower demographic growth during that time, and within which the
Tomaj area was politically and administratively situated, the population
increased by 26 percent over the same forty-year period (Kalc 2013).
The low demographic growth observed in the second half of the nine-
teenth century and up to the First World War characterized the entire
Karst area, except for villages within the municipal territory of Trieste.
In the case of the Tomaj area, this trend was even more pronounced. As
evidenced by table 7.3, which compares data with the neighbouring parish
of Povir and the Karst villages of the municipality of Trieste, the popula-

³ The population increase would have been even more modest if not for the establishment of
the SchoolSistersconvent,alongwithaschoolandboardingfacility, inTomajin1898. Start-
ing from 1902, students from more distant areas were also accommodated there (Cencič
2013, 293). This development contributed to the sex disparity observed in the final Austri-
an census of 1910, which recorded 238 men and 330 women in Tomaj (Spezialortsrepertorium
der österreichischen Länder 1918).

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