Unification of Italy

 

Unification of Italy

Till the last quarter of 19^th century Italy was a divided country by and large. It was divided into many kingdoms such as Sicily, Tuscany, Venetia, Parma, Lombardy and Piedmont and Sardinia. These kingdoms ruled by different rulers. The people living in all these kingdoms were Italians. They spoke Italian language and shared same culture, history, heritage. There food habits were also the same.

Austria, a powerful country from continental Europe was mainly responsible for the

division and disintegration of Italy. Metternich, the then chancellor of Austria used to say that in Italy, provinces are against province, towns against towns, families against families and men against men.

In 19th century, slowly and steadily, the Italians started developing the sense of unity and nationalism. They realised people living in different kingdoms of Italy share common history, language, culture, etc. Hence these provinces should be united and a united Italy must be created. The Italians who wanted and at- tempted for unification of Italy were grouped into three = 1. The Republicans, 2. The Federalists, 3. The Royal Sardinian Party.

 

 

The Republicans

Giuseppe Mazzini was considered as the main person responsible for promoting the Republican group for achieving the goal of Unification of Italy. He was born in Genoa in

1805. He was legal expert and a great thinker. He inspired and encouraged the Italian youth in order to unite Italy. He affirmed an organization called as the 'young Italy' in order to spread the sense of nationalism and unity and ultimately fulfil the dream of unification of Italy. The young Italy became popular among the students and many other people. The banner of this organization had words like ‘unity’ & ‘independence on one side and liberty, equality and humanity on other side. Mazzini, through young Italy, tried to promote the sense of unity and liberty.

 

The Federalists

The group believed that a federation of Italy should be established and leader of Italian federation should be Pope. The Pope was the religious leader of Roman Catholic Christians. A priest from Piedmont named Vincent Gioberti mainly promoted this idea in his book titled ‘The moral and civil Privacy of Italians’ published in 1843. This idea was seemed to be impossible when liberal Pope namely Pious IX exceeded in 1846.

 

The Royal Sardinian Party

The kingdom of Piedmont & Sardinia took the leadership of actually unifying the Italy. Charles Albert, the king of Piedmont practically became the leader of war of unification of Italy. The Pope and the Duke of Tuscany were ready to join the struggle for unification of Italy under the leadership of Piedmont. Piedmont and Charles Albert had understood that in or- der to achieve the goal of unification. It was needed to defeat Austria. In 1849, his son Victor Emmanuel II became the ruler of Piedmont.

Count Camillo di Cavour, the prime minister of Victor Emmanuel II played a crucial role in the Unification of Italy. He had served in Sardinian army. He was influenced by the liberal, political, ideas of Britain/England. Hence, he wanted to establish constitutional government in unified Italy. In 1848, King Charles Albert established constitutional parliament in Piedmont and Count became a member of Parliament - minister of agriculture and commerce and later on became prime minister in 1852 under Victor Emmanuel II.

Cavour as prime minister of Piedmont under Victor Emmanuel II, introduced various reforms and strengthened the democracy of Piedmont. He also introduced military reforms and strengthened the fortress and also the constructed new ones. He also improved the agriculture and overall economy of Italy. He improved the infrastructure in Italy, especially roads and railway network.

During the Crimean war, Cavour supported Britain and France against Russia. He did so because he wanted to ensure the support of great powers like Britain and France in the eventuality of war against Austria in unification of Italy.

 

War with Austria

Cavour ensured the support of Napoleon III against Austria and created such circumstances which made Austria to declare war on Piedmont of 19th April 1859. On 8th July 1859 by the treaty of Villa franca, Lombardy became the part of kingdoms of Piedmont. In August 1859, the northern kingdoms of Modena, Tuscany and Romagna decided to accept leadership of Piedmont and merge their kingdoms in Piedmont. In this way, most of parts of northern Italy were united under the leadership of Piedmont and Sardinia in 1859. As far as southern Italy, consisting the Sicily and Naples, were concerned, Giuseppe Garibaldi played a crucial role.

He was born in 1807. When he was young, he had joined the Young Italy. He had revolted at Genoa in 1833 out of his nationalistic feelings. Hence, he had to run away in order to save his life and he went to South America in 1834 In, South America also, he participated in Guerrilla war’s. He came back to Italy in 1848 & participated in a revolutionary activities.

Aimed at unification of southern & northern Italy He was forced to run away from Italy again and he went to New York He was involved in small time business in New York and earned wealth & with that money the brought an Island of Capera near Italy. He organized military force called as Red shirts. And he entered Sicily in 1860 and conquered Naples and with permission of people at Maples it was declared as part of Piedmont & Victor Emmanuel II came to Maples. After annexing Naples to Piedmont, Garibaldi went back to Island of Capera.

Now, the task of uniting Venetia and Rome had remained, which was achieved after the Astro Russian 1866 and Franco-Prussian war of 1870 respectively. In these wars Prussia defeated Austria and France. In the month of July 1871 to victor Emmanuel Ⅱ Eternal made his entry in city of New York Rome. Thus, the journey of Unification of Italy was completed fully by 1872 when Rome became the of capital of Unified Italy in 1872.