Introduction

Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference of the International Research Project "Triplex Confinium" - Tolerance and Intolerance on the Triplex Confinium - Religions, Cultures, Societies, Political Structures of the "Other" in the Eastern Adriatic (15th - 19th centuries), Padova, 25 - 27 March 2004. The Triplex Confinium, or triple border, was an actual point in the proximity of the town of Knin in Croatia, between the Habsburg Empire, the Ottoman Empire and the Republic of Venice after the peace treaty of Karlowitz in 1699. The Triplex Confinium, as an area and experience of living on the crossroads of different civilizations, cultures and religions in a long historical perspective, inspired an international research project focused upon the comparative history and intercultural approaches of borders and borderlands in Southeast Europe, where three distinctive political, cultural and confessional contexts encountered each other over the centuries. The Triplex Confinium is above all a metaphor of cultural challenges in the areas of multiple borderlands.