Send Gift Baskets to Vrhnika, Slovenia

In antiquity, Nauportus was known in Latin and as … in Greek at the location of today’s Vrhnika. The name was borne by Laybaco, Oberlaybach, and Ober Laybach in the medieval period and Vernich in the medieval period, which corresponds to the modern Slovene name. A typical German name for the town was Oberlaibach in the past. According to local legend, the Slovene name is a compound of very top, summit’ and nice creek, spring.’ Nauportus is a Latin compound of Davis ‘boat’ + Portus ‘transfer,’ which refers to places along trade routes where the cargo was transferred from ships to pack animals or carts. It appears in Pliny the Elder’s Natural History that the Latin name refers to a boat’s portage (specifically, the Argo).

A key communication point during Roman times was Nauportus. During the High Middle Ages, Vrhnika developed into what it is today.

Until the beginning of the 18th century, Vrhnika was one of the wealthiest towns in Carniola. However, it remains one of the essential transportation junctions in Inner Austria due to its strategic location at the crossroads between Trieste and Vienna and Rijeka and Klagenfurt. Austrian Southern Railway construction in the 1840s bypassed the town, severely impairing its development. The city lost importance then, becoming a satellite of Ljubljana, which remains to this day.