Rijeka, a multilingual city, saw Italian as the language of business, reflecting its cultural influence and educational ties to Italy. Croatian was common among lower classes, while Hungarian was limited to state institutions despite efforts to impose it through education. Newspapers were published in four languages, reflecting the city’s diversity. Class divisions overshadowed ethnic identities, with multilingualism prevalent in business and industry, advertisements and celebrations often featuring Italian, Hungarian, and Croatian languages, demonstrating the pragmatic approach to language use in a diverse urban environment (Sujoldžić, Iveković Martinis, 2016).

Marácz (2012) argues that in multilingual dualist Hungary, ethnic groups designated as “nationalities” held influence, with their languages constitutionally and legislatively recognised. Moreover, that the educational system reflected this, with separatist schools prevailing until Hungarian became compulsory in non-Hungarian schools after 1879, though with limited success, and, that despite inconsistencies in educational policy, labelling it as “magyarization” oversimplifies a complex situation. Marácz (2012) notes that the recognition of separate ethnic groups hindered integration, intensifying ethnic tensions and contributing to the collapse of dualist Hungary.

Donáth wrote his Hungarian as a foreign language course book in 1904, and the book was published in Fiume, which was then part of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire. Rončević and Blažević (2019) in their study intended to explore the linguistic landscape of Rijeka (Fiume) in the Monarchy of Austria-Hungary. Their paper aimed to study the “multilingualism and multiculturalism in public discourse in the town … in the period from 1870 to 1918”. Rončević and Blažević (2019) note that as the town was mainly inhabited by Italians, Germans, and Croatians, the government attempted to impose a “magyarization” policy on the population.

Rončević and Blažević (2019) mention that “Rijeka witnessed a number of cultural and social movements that were written about in several local papers, in different languages”. They also mention that the “Hungarians tended to work in civil service, held important positions in the economy and the railway, and were followed by the locals of Italian heritage”, which suggests a need for tight cooperation between inhabitants of Hungarian and of Italian heritage. Having analysed Italian “receipts, travel tickets, and time schedules”, Rončević and Blažević (2019) claim that in Rijeka “Italian was used in daily life, rather than Hungarian”. They conclude that “Hungarians could not ignore Rijeka’s orientations towards Italy, so for purely practical reasons they issued the above items in Italian because that was the language the majority of local people could speak, rather than Hungarian”. Moreover, they add that “the high percentage of monolingual signs points not just to the existence of minority communities, but also to the entire population being multilingual” and that “Hungarian was the official language and the linguistic politics sought to impose the language”. However, according to Rončević and Blažević (2019), “this intention was not accomplished, given that Italian and German languages were heavily present in the public sphere”.