The Locanda Grande was the main hotel in Trieste in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, located in Piazza Grande (today's Piazza Unità d'Italia), and represented the heart of the city's hospitality during the Habsburg era.
The Napoleonides at the Locanda Grande
The Locanda Grande entered history by hosting some of the most illustrious figures of the Napoleonic era who came to Trieste after the fall of the Empire. On August 6 or 7, 1814, two important members of the Bonaparte family took up residence there:
- Jérôme Bonaparte, former King of Westphalia and Napoleon's brother, who arrived incognito under the name of Count of Hartz
- Elisa Baciocchi, Napoleon's sister, Duchess of Campignano
The two siblings of Napoleon stayed at the Locanda Grande in the first phase of their Triestine sojourn, before finding more stable accommodations in the city. Jérôme subsequently purchased Palazzo Romano in Via Lazzaretto Vecchio — where his son was born — and in March 1815, during the Hundred Days, he escaped from Trieste on a fishing boat to reach his brother in France.