This introductory essay provides an outline of the history of the international relations of Ca’ Foscari through its 150 years’ history. It describes how one of the original purposes behind its creation in 1868 was to give an international flavour to the Regia Scuola of Venice, instituted in the most important city on the Adriatic as the oldest of the Italian higher commercial institutes, based on the French-Belgian model, and with foreign languages being an important part of the curriculum. As the contributions to this volume illustrate, the history of Ca’ Foscari is characterised by intense cultural, educational and scientific exchanges with people and institutions outside the national context, and its internationalisation was – and still is – promoted through the presence of foreign teachers and students and native language instructors, the exchange of bulletins and scientific publications with foreign institutions, the international contacts and networks developed by the alumni both individually and collectively, a growing number of scholarships of different kinds for study abroad as well as a growing number of foreign visiting scholars and professors. This volume reconstructs only a part of the history of the intense international relations of Ca’ Foscari, but eloquently testifies to the eminently international vocation that has characterised it since its foundation.