ITALIAN UNIFICATION

1859 1860 1861

1870 1919

ITALY TO 1850: A BATTLE GROUND FOR GREAT POWERS:• CAVOUR AND

GARIBALDI IN ITALY

• A. Count Cavour (1810-1861), the liberal prime minister (1852 - 1861) of Sardinia, build Sardinia into a liberal and economically sound state.

ITALY TO 1850: A BATTLE GROUND FOR GREAT POWERS:• 1. He was a moderate nationalist; he had served

as editor of to Risorgimento (a newspaper which argued for Sardinian leadership in unification); he initially sought unity only for the northern and perhaps central areas of Italy.

• 2. He worked in the 1850's to consolidate Sardinia as a liberal state capable of leading northern Italy and to attract the support of Great Britain and France.

ITALY TO 1850: A BATTLE GROUND FOR GREAT POWERS:• B. Cavour's Sardinian Reforms• 1. Law on Convents, Siccardi Law: curtailed the

influence of the Catholic Church• 2. Reform of the judicial system • 3. Implementation of the Statuto, Sardinian

constitution modeled on the liberal French Constitution of 1830

• 4. Support for economic development projects such as railroad, port and high way construction

ITALY TO 1850: A BATTLE GROUND FOR GREAT POWERS:• C. Cavour's Unification Strategy• 1. Support of France and Britain against Russia

in the Crimean War (1855) gave Cavour a place at the table at the 1856 Paris Peace Conference. Cavour advanced the idea of eliminating the Austrian presence from northern Italy.

• 2. Napoleon III's sympathy with Sardinia translated into the 1859 Plombieres Agreement in which he promised military assistance in exchange for Nice and Savoy. Cavour

ITALY TO 1850: A BATTLE GROUND FOR GREAT POWERS:• 3. Napoleon III had second thoughts when he

faced dissent from French Catholics. He abandoned Cavour and made a separate peace with Austria at Villafranca in July, 1859, gaining Nice and Savoy, giving Venetia to Austria and Lombardy to Sardinia.

• 4. Cavour resigned in disgust but nationalists throughout Italy pursued unification through plebiscites in the provinces, agreeing to annexation to Sardinia. Cavour returned to power in 1860. Northern and central Italy were united in 1860.

ITALY TO 1850: A BATTLE GROUND FOR GREAT POWERS:• 5. Garibaldi and his Red

Shirts liberated the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies from Bourbon control (Francis II). Victor Emmanuel II was declared king of a united Italy March 17, 1861.

ITALY TO 1850: A BATTLE GROUND FOR GREAT POWERS:• 6. Italy was granted

Venice in 1866 as a reward for supporting Prussia in the Seven Weeks War. Rome joined in 1870 after the withdrawal of French troops (needed for Franco-Prussian War)

ITALY - Problems of Unification

• 1. There were strong class divisions.

• 2. There were also strong cultural divisions between the northern and southern areas, called the Mezzagiorno

• 3. There were Italians living in Trieste, Nice, and Savoy. Nationalists called these areas Italia Irredenta - Italy unredeemed. They sponsored irredentism with the goal of annexing these areas.

ITALY - Problems of Unification

• 4. Opposition by the papacy to the new Italian state

• 5. Economic underdevelopment• 6. A corrupt political system known as

trasformismo (bribing of political opponents)

• 7. Because late to national unity, Italy often compensated by aggressively seeking colonies

ITALY – LOOK FORWARD

• 1. Humbert I (1878-1900): Succeeded his father, Victor Emmanuel II. He had married (1868) his cousin Margherita, a domineering nationalist. In 1882, Humbert led Italy out of isolation into the Triple Alliance with Austria- Hungary and Germany.

ITALY – LOOK FORWARD• He also spurred Italy onto an imperialist course that

led to the acquisition (1889) of Italian Somaliland and the consolidation (1890) of the colony of Eritrea. This phase of Italian expansionism ended with defeat by the Ethiopians in 1896. Ensuing unrest caused the king to impose martial law in Milan where the army killed 80 civilians in 1898. In 1900 an anarchist assassinated Humbert at Monza.

Mare Nostrum

ITALY – LOOK FORWARD

• 2. Victor Emmanuel III (1900-1946): Son of Humbert I. He revealed his dislike for liberal government in 1922 when, instead of resisting the Fascists, he invited their leader, Mussolini, to become premier and acquiesced to his dictatorship and all his wars. After the Allies invaded Sicily in 1943, however, he conspired to arrest Mussolini and set up (July 25) a royal dictatorship with Marshal Pietro Badoglio. The choice of Badoglio and the undignified flight of both the king and Badoglio from Rome after the armistice (September 1943) with the Allies incurred much public hostility. Victor Emmanuel was forced to relinquish all power to his son, Prince Humbert, on June 5, 1944, and formally abdicated in his favor on May 9 1946. On June 2, however, Italy voted for a republic, forcing both kings into exile.