[1559 - 1871] Risorgimento: The Forging of a Nation

Our story begins not with a bang, but with a stifling silence. The year is 1559. The Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis has just been signed, ending decades of war and effectively handing control of the Italian peninsula to the Spanish Habsburgs. The vibrant, chaotic energy of the Renaissance, which had made Italy the envy of the world, has been extinguished. What remains is a mosaic of duchies, kingdoms, and city-states, all living under the shadow of foreign powers. In the south, the Spanish crown rules the vast Kingdom of Naples and Sicily with an iron fist. In the north, their Austrian cousins hold the fertile lands of Lombardy. In the center, the Papal States, governed by the Pope-King, stretch across the peninsula, a temporal kingdom as much as a spiritual one. Only a few states, like the maritime republics of Venice and Genoa or the rugged Duchy of Savoy, cling to a precarious independence. For two centuries, this fragmented Italy slept. Society was a rigid pyramid. At the top, a powerful aristocracy lived in opulent baroque palaces, their lives a performance of elaborate etiquette and leisurely pursuits, funded by the toil of the masses below. Beneath them, a vast and impoverished peasantry worked the land, their lives governed by the seasons, the local priest, and the tax collector. A year of bad harvest could mean starvation. Daily life for most was a simple, gruelling affair of polenta, bread, and back-breaking labour. Yet, even in this dormancy, the embers of Italian identity glowed. The shared language of Dante, the artistic legacy of Michelangelo, and the architectural splendors of Rome and Florence were a constant, silent reminder of a shared, glorious past. It was a memory waiting for a spark. That spark came, as it so often did in those centuries, from France. The ideas of the Enlightenment—of liberty, reason, and the rights of man—began to seep across the Alps, whispered in secret societies like the Carbonari, the “charcoal burners,” who met in secret to plot against foreign rulers. Then came the man who would shatter the old order entirely: Napoleon Bonaparte. In 1796, his revolutionary army stormed into Italy. He swept away the ancient monarchies, redrew maps, and established new republics. For the first time in centuries, Italians saw the possibility of a unified administration, even if it was under French dominion. Napoleon introduced his legal code, built roads, and inadvertently fanned the flames of a new, potent idea: Italian nationalism. The dream was short-lived. After Napoleon’s defeat, the great powers of Europe met at the Congress of Vienna in 1815 with one goal: to turn back the clock. They meticulously restored the old rulers to their thrones, determined to crush the spirit of revolution. But it was too late. A seed had been planted. The era of the Risorgimento, the “Resurgence,” had truly begun. The next thirty years were a story of romantic, heroic, and often tragic failure. Uprisings flared up in Naples in 1820 and Piedmont in 1821, only to be ruthlessly suppressed by Austrian troops. But from these defeats, the leaders who would define the struggle emerged. First, there was Giuseppe Mazzini, the “Soul” of Italy. A philosopher and revolutionary from Genoa, he founded the secret society “Young Italy.” From his exile in London, Mazzini wrote endlessly, his words inspiring a generation with an almost religious faith in a united, republican Italy, under the banner of “God and the People.” He was the idealist, the dreamer who kept the vision alive through the darkest years. Then came the man who would become his perfect, practical counterpart: Camillo di Cavour, the “Brain.” The shrewd, aristocratic Prime Minister of Piedmont-Sardinia, Cavour was a master of realpolitik. He had no time for romantic revolutions; he believed Italy could only be forged through cunning diplomacy, economic modernization, and military strength. While Mazzini dreamed, Cavour built. He expanded Piedmont’s railway network from a mere 8 kilometers to over 800, modernized the army, and sought a powerful ally. He was the chess master, moving the pieces of Europe to his advantage. And finally, there was the indispensable hero, Giuseppe Garibaldi, the “Sword.” A charismatic sailor and guerrilla fighter, he was a man of action, a born leader whose exploits fighting for republics in South America had already made him a legend. With his iconic red shirt and unwavering courage, he was the folk hero who could translate the dreams of Mazzini and the plans of Cavour into reality on the battlefield. The year 1848 saw revolution explode across Europe, and Italy was at its heart. The “Five Days of Milan” saw citizens with makeshift barricades and antiquated muskets drive the professional Austrian army from their city. Republics were declared in Venice and, most daringly, in Rome itself, from which the Pope had fled. Mazzini rushed to the city to lead his dream government, and Garibaldi commanded its defense. For a few glorious months, the Roman Republic stood as a beacon of liberty. But the powers of Europe would not tolerate it. A French army was dispatched to restore the Pope. Garibaldi’s volunteers fought with incredible bravery, holding the walls of Rome against a superior force, but the end was inevitable. The Republic fell, and Garibaldi led a desperate retreat across Italy, a hunted man who had now become a living legend. The failed revolutions taught Cavour a valuable lesson: passion was not enough. In 1859, his moment came. Having secured an alliance with France’s Napoleon III, he provoked Austria into war. The combined French-Piedmontese armies won bloody victories at Magenta and Solferino. The battle of Solferino was so horrific, with nearly 40,000 casualties in a single day, that it inspired a Swiss witness, Henri Dunant, to found the International Red Cross. Victory seemed near, but then the French emperor, fearing a prolonged war, made a separate peace, leaving the crucial territory of Venetia still in Austrian hands. Cavour was enraged, but much of northern and central Italy was now free to join with Piedmont. It was then that Garibaldi, impatient with diplomacy, launched the most audacious campaign of the Risorgimento. In May 1860, he and a thousand volunteers, his legendary “Redshirts,” set sail for Sicily to overthrow the Bourbon monarchy. The Expedition of the Thousand was a spectacular gamble. Landing at Marsala, they defeated the royal army at Calatafimi, their victory inspiring Sicilians to join their cause. Garibaldi’s army swelled as he marched triumphantly across the island and then up the Italian mainland. Naples fell to him without a fight. He was the undisputed master of southern Italy, hailed as a liberator. Cavour, in the north, now faced a crisis: would Garibaldi, the lifelong republican, march on Rome and create a rival state? He sent the Piedmontese army south to intercept him. The fate of Italy hung on the meeting of two men. At Teano, on October 26, 1860, the revolutionary met the king. In a moment of supreme patriotism that would define his legacy, Garibaldi the republican hero raised his hat and hailed Victor Emmanuel II as the “first King of Italy,” handing over all of his conquests in the name of a united nation. It was the ultimate sacrifice of personal belief for the greater good. On March 17, 1861, the Kingdom of Italy was officially proclaimed. The forging was nearly complete. Two crucial pieces remained. In 1866, by allying with Prussia in a war against Austria, Italy was rewarded with Venetia. The final prize, Rome, remained under the protection of a French garrison. But in 1870, the Franco-Prussian War forced France to recall its troops. On September 20, Italian soldiers breached the ancient walls of Rome near the Porta Pia. After more than a thousand years, the temporal power of the Papacy was at an end. In 1871, Rome was declared the capital of a geographically united Italy. The long, painful, and glorious struggle of the Risorgimento was over. A map had been made whole. The much harder task, as one leader famously put it, now began: “Now that we have made Italy, we must make Italians.”