Ivan Visin was a naval captain

Navigation

Navigation is the process of monitoring and controlling the movement of a craft or vehicle from one place to another. It is also the term of art used for the specialized knowledge used by navigators to perform navigation tasks...

 and explorer.

Visin was a Catholic

Catholic

The word catholic comes from the Greek phrase , meaning "on the whole," "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words meaning "about" and meaning "whole"...

 born in Prčanj

Prčanj

Prčanj is a small town in Bay of Kotor, Montenegro. According to the 2003 census, the town has a population of 1244 people.It is located 3 miles west of Kotor, opposite Dobrota and between the settlements of Muo and Stoliv. All its history has been written at sea...

, in the Bay of Kotor

Bay of Kotor

The Bay of Kotor in south-western Montenegro is a winding bay on the Adriatic Sea. The bay, sometimes called Europe's southernmost fjord, is in fact a submerged river canyon of the disintegrated Bokelj River which used to run from the high mountain plateaus of Mount Orjen...

, then under occupation of the French Empire

French colonial empire

The French colonial empire was the set of territories outside Europe that were under French rule primarily from the 17th century to the late 1960s. In the 19th and 20th centuries, the colonial empire of France was the second-largest in the world behind the British Empire. The French colonial empire...

. On request of the government of the Habsburg

Habsburg

The House of Habsburg , also found as Hapsburg, and also known as House of Austria is one of the most important royal houses of Europe and is best known for being an origin of all of the formally elected Holy Roman Emperors between 1438 and 1740, as well as rulers of the Austrian Empire and...

 monarchy, he circumnavigated the globe in a vessel called Splendido between 1852 and 1859. The journey started in Antwerpen and ended successfully in Trieste

Trieste

Trieste is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is situated towards the end of a narrow strip of land lying between the Adriatic Sea and Italy's border with Slovenia, which lies almost immediately south and east of the city...

. The ship was 30m long with 311 tonne

Tonne

The tonne, known as the metric ton in the US , often put pleonastically as "metric tonne" to avoid confusion with ton, is a metric system unit of mass equal to 1000 kilograms. The tonne is not an International System of Units unit, but is accepted for use with the SI...

s of cargo. For this undertaking of historical importance for the empire, he had been decorated with a flag of honour Merito navali by the Austrian Emperor Franz Josef

Franz Joseph I of Austria

Franz Joseph I or Francis Joseph I was Emperor of Austria, King of Bohemia, King of Croatia, Apostolic King of Hungary, King of Galicia and Lodomeria and Grand Duke of Cracow from 1848 until his death in 1916.In the December of 1848, Emperor Ferdinand I of Austria abdicated the throne as part of...

. The trophy is on display in Prčanj

Prčanj

Prčanj is a small town in Bay of Kotor, Montenegro. According to the 2003 census, the town has a population of 1244 people.It is located 3 miles west of Kotor, opposite Dobrota and between the settlements of Muo and Stoliv. All its history has been written at sea...

. Later, Visin became an honorary citizen of Trieste

Trieste

Trieste is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is situated towards the end of a narrow strip of land lying between the Adriatic Sea and Italy's border with Slovenia, which lies almost immediately south and east of the city...

.