Abstract
This work deals with the every-day life in POW camps of Austria-Hungary during the Great War and the situation of Italian war prisoners. It is focused on the historical development of POW camps till the Great War with the reasons for international agreement to solve the captivity questions.
The main attention is about the situation of the Central Powers after the breakthrough at Caporetto, where 300,000 Italian soldiers were captured, and this unprecedented one-time influx of prisoners caused considerable problems in the organization and structure of the camps of Austria-Hungary. The current system of the empire was not ready for such an influx of prisoners in such a short time even with all the efforts of the War Ministry.