In order to understand how the Italian state was engineered a couple of centuries ago, it is important to understand the political context of the time, mainly the crucial role that England and France played. Shall we say that the “nation-building” that gave birth to the Italian nation happened in a bad neighborhood? The Kingdom of Sardinia (Piedmont or Savoy), mainly through the machinations of its cunning prime minister Cavour helped the demise and then the annexation of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. Because in the end, the real objective was not the unification but the expansion of the Kingdom of Sardinia to the entire peninsula.

European context

The wolf pack

The Italian nation was officially born is March 17, 1861. Its birth was not without pains and did not happen in a vacuum. Many powerful players were involved as shown in the picture on the left. For simplicity, among all the other states of the Italian peninsula, the picture shows only the Kingdom of Two Sicilies and the Kingdom of Sardinia. This is because they played a crucial role in the birth of the nation the first being occupied and the second being the occupier. Below we summarize the main events of a multi-secular and complicated history of greed and power struggle that in many ways are still going on in Europe, albeit in different shapes and forms.

Brief historical excursus

The following sections provide some essential albeit limited information of the history of the Italian peninsula, of the past few centuries, in the European context, to provide the background of the events leading to the creation of the Italian nation. For more information, see History of Italy. The foreign invasions of Italy known as the Italian Wars began with the 1494 invasion by France that wreaked widespread devastation on Northern Italy and ended the independence of many of the city-states. Originally arising from dynastic disputes over the Duchy of Milan and the Kingdom of Naples, the wars rapidly became a general struggle for power and territory among their various participants, marked by an increasing number of alliances, counter alliances, and betrayals. The French were ruled by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V at the Battle of Pavia (1525) and again in the War of the League of Cognac (1526–30). Eventually, after years of inconclusive fighting, with the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis (1559) France renounced all its claims in Italy thus inaugurating a long Habsburg hegemony over the Peninsula.

The history of Italy following the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis was characterized by foreign domination and economic decline. The North was under the indirect rule of the Austrian Habsburgs in their positions as Holy Roman Emperors, and the South was under the direct rule of the Spanish branch of the Habsburgs. Following the European wars of succession of the 1700s, the south passed to a cadet branch of Spanish Bourbons and the north was under the control of the Austrian House of Habsburg-Lorraine. During the Napoleonic era, Italy was invaded by France and divided into a number of sister republics (later in the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy and the French Empire). The Congress of Vienna (1814) restored the situation of the late 18th century, which was however quickly overturned by the incipient movement to unify Italy.

Austria, Spain, and Savoy

The War of the Spanish Succession (1701–1714) was triggered by the death without heirs of the last Habsburg king of Spain, Charles II, and the entire Spanish inheritance went to Philip, Duke of Anjou, the second grandson of King Louis XIV of France. In the face of the threat of French hegemony over much of Europe, a Grand Alliance between Austria, England, the Dutch Republic, and other minor powers (within which the Duchy of Savoy) was signed in The Hague. The Alliance successfully fought and defeated the Franco-Spanish “Party of the Two Crowns”, and the subsequent Treaty of Utrecht and Rastatt pass control of much of Italy (Milan, Naples, and Sardinia) from Spain to Austria, while Sicily was ceded to the Duchy of Savoy. However, Spain attempted again to retake territories in Italy and to claim the French throne in the War of the Quadruple Alliance (1718–1720), but was again defeated. As a result of the Treaty of The Hague, Spain agreed to abandon its Italian claims, while Duke Victor Amadeus II of Savoy agreed to exchange Sicily with Austria, for the island of Sardinia, after which he was known as the King of Sardinia. The Spaniards regained Naples and Sicily following the Battle of Bitonto in 1738.

France and England

France and England and their rivalry played a fundamental role in the birth of the Italian nation. The shrewd political establishment of the Kingdom of Sardinia (also known as the Kingdom of Savoy), led by Camillo Benso Count of Cavour, used this rivalry and the established connections with the establishments in both countries to its own advantage. In the end, he obtained the support of both to invade the other states of the peninsula and incorporate them, especially with regard to the Kingdom of Two Sicilies. It suffices to say the official language of the court of Savoy was French and close diplomatic, military, and commercial ties existed with France. As an example, Mr. Cavour did not hesitate to use the “skills” of his beautiful cousin Countess of Castiglione to gain the support of Napoleon III, emperor of France, in the fight against the Austro-Hungarian empire. Similarly, the Kingdom of Sardinia had long-established ties with the British establishment. These ties can be traced back to a dynastic connection between the royal houses of the two countries. In fact, Charles Emmanuel III King of Sardinia was a direct descendent of Charles I of England. To all this add the protestant religion and masonic memberships as elements to use against the catholic Kingdom of Two Sicilies.

France and England were interested in the Italian peninsula for its strategic position in the Mediterranean sea directly related to their imperialistic and economic goals. They both mingled in the peninsula affairs for centuries exploiting the rivalry amongst the various local states.

According to the “logic of the chessboard”, a united Italy was convenient to London as a counterpart to Paris. But first, it was necessary to demolish the Kingdom of the Two Sicily, unwilling to do “the business” of His British Majesty. Stretching out into the Mediterranean, with thousands of kilometers of coastline to defend, united Italy wanted and supported by London, would always have been blackmailed by the powerful English fleet. A project that did not always go the right way (for the British). See also:

Austro-Hungarian and Russian empires

On the other hand, the Kingdom of Two Sicilies had commercial, dynastic, and diplomatic ties with the Austro-Hungarian and Russian empires. It suffices to say that the Kingdom royals had religious beliefs shared with the emperor of Austria and the czar of Russia. Emblematic of all this was the Crimean War a military conflict fought from October 1853 to February 1856 in which Russia lost to an alliance of France, the Ottoman Empire, the United Kingdom, and Piedmont-Sardinia. The “official” cause of the war involved the rights of Christian minorities in Palestine, which was part of the Ottoman Empire. The actual causes involved the decline of the Ottoman Empire, the expansion of the Russian Empire in the preceding Russo-Turkish Wars, and the British and French dogged will to defend their predominance and their desire to preserve their commercial routes by blocking Russia expansion in the Mediterranean Sea. While all this was happening Ferdinand II kept increasing the commerce with Russia, denied harboring the French and British fleets in route toward the Black Sea and Crimea, and refused to provide supplies to the Western troops as requested by France and England, In the meantime, the “foxy” king of Sardinia Vittorio Emanuel II and his prime minister Cavour sent a “calculated” military contingent to fight alongside the Frenches and the Brits.

Just 4 years after the Crimean War ended the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies was invaded by a foreign state, the Kingdom of Sardinia, with crucial help from England and France, invaded the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies under the disguise of freeing the Southern people from the Burbon oppressor. Today they would have invoked exporting democracy and nation-building.

Eugenio Scalfari, a well-known journalist and founder of the newspaper “La Repubblica”, said this about unified Italy:
It was not unity – explained the founder of the Republic – it was a Piedmontese occupation, and if the Kingdom of Naples, which was much richer and more powerful, had done it, it would have been different. The Savoyard mentality was not Italian. Cavour spoke French. And the Italians hated that new state. To enable the subtitles in your language. read these instructions.

Eugenio Scalfari: “The Italians hate the state because the Piedmontese invaded them”

See also