The Topotheque "Zagreb Historical Center" started as a project of the University of Zagreb University Department of Croatian Studies (from 2020 The Faculty of Croatian Studies). The Topotheque was conceived as a combination of active historical research of students, digitized history and public presentation of the history of the City of Zagreb (the central historical part of the city) originally originated with two main goals: realization of practical work of students on the field (in archives, libraries, museums, various organizations and institutions important for the history of the City...) and creation of a digital presentation of historic Zagreb. Thus, The Topotheque was a direct result of the work of students who present their work and their city through a digital platform. In this way students were sharing the history of Zagreb with its citizens, historical researchers and many visitors who visit it daily, both personally and through web search.
Digitized property is owned by various archives, libraries, private and legal entities that have allowed the materials in their ownership to be shared on the pages of this platform, but the most of the materials is a property of the State Archives in Zagreb.
The materials are presented in the order of processing. Chronologically it handles the period from the second half of the 19th century to the end of the 20th century. Various collections of photos, postcards, photographic materials made on different occasions, photographs of well-known and lesser-known Zagreb photographers have been used, which have perpetuated many important or everyday events of their city.
In addition to talking about streets, squares and historic buildings, this material is perpetuating its citizens, so its photographs can be found and sometimes recognized by famous faces of the history of the two centuries from the world of theater, photography, architecture, politics, music, academic circles etc. There are also maybe forgotten workers who raised the walls of the Croatian National Theater, employees of the factory Gredelj, workers who raised their first overpasses in the city center or crashed their streets after the bombing in 1944.
We would like to thank all the owners, private ones or the institutions, of the materials that gave us the material for publishing:
State Archives in Zagreb
The Croatian Railway Museum
Student Center in Zagreb
Special thanks to students of the course "Humanities in Information Age" and "Archivism for Historians" of the Faculty of Croatian Studies, Department of History (year 2018/2019 and 2019/2020), who contributed most to the collection of the published material during the first two years of its existing.
