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This episode of Ten Minute History (like a documentary, only shorter) covers Italy in the wake of the Napoleonic Wars and the tumultuous decades which followed it. The focus is on liberal revolutionaries, like Mazzini and Garibaldi, and their conservative opponents like Victor Emmanuel II and Cavour. The episode covers the many revolutions (emphasis on 1848) in Italy across the 19th  century and the wars with the Austrian Empire with Napoleon III of France and Prussia. All of this led to a sudden explosion of Piedmont-Sardinian territory in the years 1859-1861 which ended with the proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy. Finally, Venice and Rome would be added to the kingdom, making Italy (almost) what it is today.

Recommended books:

A Concise History of Italy by Christopher Duggan - Part of a great series of survey books. This one is great for Italy post-Napoleon I. It's pretty lacking with respect to the rest of Italian history (its coverage of the Renaissance/ Early Modern Italy isn't great, frankly.

During his time as the French Emperor he had redrawn the borders of the states in Italy to look like this.

After the Vienna settlement they were changed to this, mostly to what they had been before except that the Austrian Empire was given control over Lombardy and Venetia.

The Austrians were basically given overlordship of Italy since these states were also their allies and only the kingdom of Piedmont Sardinia was truly independent.

So whilst the victors of the Napoleonic Wars could reshape borders, they couldn't destroy the liberal ideas that the French had brought with them to Italy.

The most notable of these ideas being that the Italians should see themselves as a single people and dismiss any foreign intervention.

Naturally, this upset the many recently restored kings of the Italian states who reacted fiercely against any calls for liberal reform, earning them the title Reactionaries.

The years following the Vienna Settlement were troubled with unrest with many liberal thinkers forming secret societies such as the Carbonari in the south.

In 1820 and 1821 a series of revolts and coups were launched across the Italian states in order to force through liberal reforms.

In the Kingdom of the 2 Sicilies there were 2, with those in Naples calling for the introduction of a new constitution and those on Sicily demanding independence for the island.

Basically no 1 in these revolutionary movements could agree on anything and the Austrian army soon after had come down and crushed them.

1821 saw Piedmont's Sardinia plunged into chaos as well when an anti-Austrian liberal revolt broke out.

King Victor Emmanuel I also hated the Austrians since he wanted Lombardy, but he hated liberals more and instead of giving in to their demands, he abdicated.

The throne went to his brother Charles Felix who refused to give in to the revolutionaries' demands and so nothing happened.

The next decade saw continued resentment by liberals as well as little to no economic growth barring some industrialisation and limited investment in southern Italy by Britain.

In 1830 and 1831 more liberal led revolts broke out, inspired by the July Revolution of 1830 in France which saw King Charles X vested.

He was replaced by Louis Philippe who was importantly a constitutional monarch which gave hope that the same could be achieved in Italy.

The revolts in Italy were all yet again crushed by the Austrian army and many of the notable liberal revolutionaries fled to France including a certain Giuseppe Mazzini.

Mazzini was a nationalist and believed that Italy was destined to be unified and dominate the continent.

He formed a secret society, Young Italy, to pursue this goal and would soon be joined by another man, Giuseppe Garibaldi.

Young Italy, which was based in France, tried to ferment revolution across Italy but had no success.

So there were many barriers to unification and the nationalist cause.

The states within the Italian peninsula and even individual cities had fierce rivalries with each other and did not see themselves as 1 and the same people.

This isn't to say that there was no sense of Italian-ness.

The people in Italy knew very well of the legacies of the Roman Empire and the Renaissance and they nearly universally despised Austrian interference.

The 1840s saw an uptick in nationalist sentiment across Italy for numerous reasons.

Few of these nationalists could agree on what they wanted though except for less Austria.

Mazzini wanted Italy to be a unified modern Republic.

A priest and an important thinker, Vincenzo Gioberti, wanted Italy to be a confederation led by the Pope, like some discount Holy Roman Empire.

Another, called Massimo d'Azeglio, the Prime Minister of Piedmont-Sardinia, wanted Italy to be a moderate monarchy under Piedmontese leadership.

In 1846, Pope Gregory XVI kicked the bucket and was replaced by Pope Pius IX, much to the excitement of the liberals since he was somewhat sympathetic to them.

The revolution spread across Europe and importantly to Austria which weakened its grip on Italy.

This in turn led to uprisings in Milan and Venice who wanted their independence.

Side note, it was during this time that the Italian tricolour started to be used as a symbol of a united Italy.

In Piedmont, the revolutionaries actually made some headway.

King Charles Albert conceded to the revolutionaries' demands and issued a constitution.

He also declared his support for the rebels in Austrian lands and hastily marched his army across the border.

The Austrians, led by Marshal Radetzky, at first retreated.

It wasn't long though before they returned and defeated the Piedmontese at Costoza and Charles Albert was forced to sign an armistice.

In the rest of Italy the revolutions were faltering.

In Rome Pius IX was forced to flee and Mazzini took over, declaring the Republic of Rome in 1849.

The heart of the Catholic world falling to revolutionaries was a bit of a shock to those in France which was a republic.

Here, its president, Louis I'm-not-the-Emperor-yet Napoleon, decided to intervene militarily to restore the Pope.

It wasn't long before the French had seized the city, forcing the rebels to flee.

Importantly, Garibaldi took refuge in San Marino, the relevance of which will become clear shortly.

In Piedmont, Charles Albert had restarted the war with Austria.

It was mostly to stop unrest at home, but to put it mildly, it went terribly.

After a series of defeats Charles Albert abdicated and was succeeded by Victor Emmanuel II who paid heavily for a peace treaty.

So by 1850 very little had changed since most of the Italian states refused to honour the reforms from the 1848 revolutions.

There were some differences, Lombardy, Venetia found themselves without any local autonomy, Rome was basically occupied by French troops and Piedmont-Sardinia had a new flag and kept its fancy new constitution.

This constitution gave Victor Emmanuel a great deal of power and as a result, a difficult relationship with his prime minister, who in 1852 was a man called Camillo Benso, the Count of Cavour.

Cavour was a moderate, a pragmatist, and a proponent of free trade.

He wanted to model Piedmont after Britain, slowly introducing change and avoiding a repeat of the previous decade's revolutionary turmoil.

Cavour's policies made Piedmont quite a bit richer and thus able to pursue a more ambitious foreign policy.

Piedmont was in a unique position since it acted as a buffer state between France and Austria meaning that neither could take territory from it lest they threaten the other.

This allowed Cavour to make alliances with other great European powers against Austria with near impunity.

The first attempt at this came about in 1853 with the outbreak of the Crimean War.

Cavour joined the war because he wanted a seat at the peace negotiations to secure British and French help with expanding Piedmont and kicking Austria out of Italy.

Britain wanted nothing to do with it, leaving Cavour with France under Louis I'm-now-an-Emperor-just-like-my-uncle Napoleon III.

Napoleon had previously been a member of the Carbonari and so was open to helping but only so far as the Papal States remain unharmed and that Piedmont remain under French guidance.

The details were agreed in 1858 and the next year an uprising was staged in Medina which Piedmont quickly came to the aid of.

The Austrians were quick to intervene, the French sided with Piedmont and Garibaldi was given command of some volunteers and launched a fierce guerrilla campaign against the Austrians.

Some more states rose up in rebellion and formed an alliance against Austria called the United Provinces of Central Italy, thus widening the war.

This is why this war is referred to as the Second War of Italian Independence, 1848 being the first.

The 2 major battles in this were Magenta, which was a French victory, and Solferino, which was a combined Franco-Piedmontese victory.

Incidentally, the Battle of Solferino, which involved over a quarter of a million men, was so bloody that it led to the foundation of the International Red Cross.

Napoleon was worried about Prussian intervention and so made peace with Austria without telling Piedmont, which led to Gauvaux resigning in a rage.

The peace gained Lombardy for Piedmont, who in turn gave Savoy and Nice to France.

The United Provinces of Central Italy were pretty riotous at this point in time, and its leaders, fearing a complete breakdown of society, sought union with Piedmont.

In 1860 they were annexed into the kingdom, importantly taking some Papal territory with them.

The French were upset because the Pope, whom Napoleon had pledged to protect, had lost territory.

The Austrians weren't happy for obvious reasons and the Piedmontese were dissatisfied because they wanted Venice.

So in 1859 an uprising kicked off in Sicily, again.

Garibaldi saw this as an opportunity and so launched what is known as the Expedition of the Thousand in 1860.

With only a thousand men, Garibaldi conquered Sicily before moving on to Naples against the orders of Cavour, who was Prime Minister again.

A few months later, Garibaldi had taken Naples and after this, Piedmont invaded the Papal States but not Rome itself and conquered all of this territory.

Except for the tiny state of San Marino which maintained its independence because when Garibaldi had fled there earlier it was agreed that San Marino wouldn't be incorporated into any larger Italian state.

Garibaldi kept this promise by pressuring Cavour not to annex it.

In late 1860 a referendum was held in the south on unification with Piedmont which the people backed overwhelmingly.

Soon after Garibaldi met Victor Emmanuel at Tiano, here, and handed him control over Naples.

This was a big deal since Garibaldi was a republican and was thus setting aside his dislike for monarchy for the purposes of unifying Italy which says a lot about him.

On March 17th 1861 the Kingdom of Italy was proclaimed with King Victor Emmanuel II as its first king and with Florence as its capital.

Cavour and Victor Emmanuel had the difficult task of integrating the rest of the kingdom and this caused many issues.

1 being that southern manufacturing couldn't compete with a more industrialized north and thus it was devastated.

Furthermore, those in the south had to now help pay off Piedmont's debts from its wars with Austria.

Taxes rose substantially and the government cracked down fiercely on any dissent.

The government also had bad relations with the church who weren't happy that they'd lost a lot of authority and that the Pope had also lost territory.

To make matters worse, the Brigands War broke out in 1861 which saw Brigands, i.e.

As a result of the turmoil, many turned to revolutionaries such as Garibaldi who led a few minor revolts but all of them failed.

Garibaldi wasn't punished because he was basically a celebrity at this point and was well loved across much of Europe and North America.

Garibaldi's marches against his own government wouldn't be his last fight though, since in 1866 the Brothers War between Austria and Prussia broke out.

Italy still didn't include either Venice or Rome and this was something Victor Emmanuel wanted to change.

An agreement was reached with Prussia that in return for Italian help in the war, they would both seek Venetia for Italy.

Long story short, Italy performed poorly but Prussia performed well and so Austria lost Venice to France because they didn't want to give territory to those who they felt didn't deserve it.

France then gave it to Italy, thus making all of that a waste of time.

It wasn't long before another major European war broke out that Italy could use to its advantage, the Franco-Prussian War of 1870.

Napoleon had to withdraw the French troops in Rome to fight the Prussians which meant that it was now an easy target.

It wasn't long before the walls of Rome had been breached and Rome itself conquered.

The Pope was offered a bunch of concessions and an annual allowance to win his approval but he refused.

His approval didn't matter though since Italy was happening either way.

In 1871 Rome was, after much arguing, declared the new capital of Italy.

This new kingdom of Italy was now a rising power on the world stage whose influence would extend across Europe, greatly changing the course of its history forevermore.

I hope you enjoyed this episode and thank you for watching.

There are some book recommendations in the description below if you'd like to learn more.


Speaker 0: 1815 and Napoleon has been defeated. During his time as the French Emperor he had redrawn the borders of the states in Italy to look like this. After the Vienna settlement they were changed to this, mostly to what they had been before except that the Austrian Empire was given control over Lombardy and Venetia. The Austrians were basically given overlordship of Italy since these states were also their allies and only the kingdom of Piedmont Sardinia was truly independent. So whilst the victors of the Napoleonic Wars could reshape borders, they couldn't destroy the liberal ideas that the French had brought with them to Italy.

The most notable of these ideas being that the Italians should see themselves as a single people and dismiss any foreign intervention. Naturally, this upset the many recently restored kings of the Italian states who reacted fiercely against any calls for liberal reform, earning them the title Reactionaries. The years following the Vienna Settlement were troubled with unrest with many liberal thinkers forming secret societies such as the Carbonari in the south. In 1820 and 1821 a series of revolts and coups were launched across the Italian states in order to force through liberal reforms. In the Kingdom of the 2 Sicilies there were 2, with those in Naples calling for the introduction of a new constitution and those on Sicily demanding independence for the island.

Basically no 1 in these revolutionary movements could agree on anything and the Austrian army soon after had come down and crushed them. 1821 saw Piedmont's Sardinia plunged into chaos as well when an anti-Austrian liberal revolt broke out. King Victor Emmanuel I also hated the Austrians since he wanted Lombardy, but he hated liberals more and instead of giving in to their demands, he abdicated. The throne went to his brother Charles Felix who refused to give in to the revolutionaries' demands and so nothing happened. The next decade saw continued resentment by liberals as well as little to no economic growth barring some industrialisation and limited investment in southern Italy by Britain.

In 1830 and 1831 more liberal led revolts broke out, inspired by the July Revolution of 1830 in France which saw King Charles X vested. He was replaced by Louis Philippe who was importantly a constitutional monarch which gave hope that the same could be achieved in Italy. The revolts in Italy were all yet again crushed by the Austrian army and many of the notable liberal revolutionaries fled to France including a certain Giuseppe Mazzini. Mazzini was a nationalist and believed that Italy was destined to be unified and dominate the continent. He formed a secret society, Young Italy, to pursue this goal and would soon be joined by another man, Giuseppe Garibaldi.

Young Italy, which was based in France, tried to ferment revolution across Italy but had no success. So there were many barriers to unification and the nationalist cause. The states within the Italian peninsula and even individual cities had fierce rivalries with each other and did not see themselves as 1 and the same people. This isn't to say that there was no sense of Italian-ness. The people in Italy knew very well of the legacies of the Roman Empire and the Renaissance and they nearly universally despised Austrian interference.

The 1840s saw an uptick in nationalist sentiment across Italy for numerous reasons. Few of these nationalists could agree on what they wanted though except for less Austria. Mazzini wanted Italy to be a unified modern Republic. A priest and an important thinker, Vincenzo Gioberti, wanted Italy to be a confederation led by the Pope, like some discount Holy Roman Empire. Another, called Massimo d'Azeglio, the Prime Minister of Piedmont-Sardinia, wanted Italy to be a moderate monarchy under Piedmontese leadership.

In 1846, Pope Gregory XVI kicked the bucket and was replaced by Pope Pius IX, much to the excitement of the liberals since he was somewhat sympathetic to them. The revolution spread across Europe and importantly to Austria which weakened its grip on Italy. This in turn led to uprisings in Milan and Venice who wanted their independence. Side note, it was during this time that the Italian tricolour started to be used as a symbol of a united Italy. In Piedmont, the revolutionaries actually made some headway.

King Charles Albert conceded to the revolutionaries' demands and issued a constitution. He also declared his support for the rebels in Austrian lands and hastily marched his army across the border. The Austrians, led by Marshal Radetzky, at first retreated. It wasn't long though before they returned and defeated the Piedmontese at Costoza and Charles Albert was forced to sign an armistice. In the rest of Italy the revolutions were faltering.

In Rome Pius IX was forced to flee and Mazzini took over, declaring the Republic of Rome in 1849. The heart of the Catholic world falling to revolutionaries was a bit of a shock to those in France which was a republic. Again. Here, its president, Louis I'm-not-the-Emperor-yet Napoleon, decided to intervene militarily to restore the Pope. It wasn't long before the French had seized the city, forcing the rebels to flee.

Importantly, Garibaldi took refuge in San Marino, the relevance of which will become clear shortly. In Piedmont, Charles Albert had restarted the war with Austria. It was mostly to stop unrest at home, but to put it mildly, it went terribly. After a series of defeats Charles Albert abdicated and was succeeded by Victor Emmanuel II who paid heavily for a peace treaty. So by 1850 very little had changed since most of the Italian states refused to honour the reforms from the 1848 revolutions.

There were some differences, Lombardy, Venetia found themselves without any local autonomy, Rome was basically occupied by French troops and Piedmont-Sardinia had a new flag and kept its fancy new constitution. This constitution gave Victor Emmanuel a great deal of power and as a result, a difficult relationship with his prime minister, who in 1852 was a man called Camillo Benso, the Count of Cavour. Cavour was a moderate, a pragmatist, and a proponent of free trade. He wanted to model Piedmont after Britain, slowly introducing change and avoiding a repeat of the previous decade's revolutionary turmoil. Cavour's policies made Piedmont quite a bit richer and thus able to pursue a more ambitious foreign policy.

And by ambitious, I mean aggressive. Piedmont was in a unique position since it acted as a buffer state between France and Austria meaning that neither could take territory from it lest they threaten the other. This allowed Cavour to make alliances with other great European powers against Austria with near impunity. The first attempt at this came about in 1853 with the outbreak of the Crimean War. Cavour joined the war because he wanted a seat at the peace negotiations to secure British and French help with expanding Piedmont and kicking Austria out of Italy.

Britain wanted nothing to do with it, leaving Cavour with France under Louis I'm-now-an-Emperor-just-like-my-uncle Napoleon III. Napoleon had previously been a member of the Carbonari and so was open to helping but only so far as the Papal States remain unharmed and that Piedmont remain under French guidance. The details were agreed in 1858 and the next year an uprising was staged in Medina which Piedmont quickly came to the aid of. The Austrians were quick to intervene, the French sided with Piedmont and Garibaldi was given command of some volunteers and launched a fierce guerrilla campaign against the Austrians. Some more states rose up in rebellion and formed an alliance against Austria called the United Provinces of Central Italy, thus widening the war.

This is why this war is referred to as the Second War of Italian Independence, 1848 being the first. The 2 major battles in this were Magenta, which was a French victory, and Solferino, which was a combined Franco-Piedmontese victory. Incidentally, the Battle of Solferino, which involved over a quarter of a million men, was so bloody that it led to the foundation of the International Red Cross. Napoleon was worried about Prussian intervention and so made peace with Austria without telling Piedmont, which led to Gauvaux resigning in a rage. The peace gained Lombardy for Piedmont, who in turn gave Savoy and Nice to France.

The United Provinces of Central Italy were pretty riotous at this point in time, and its leaders, fearing a complete breakdown of society, sought union with Piedmont. In 1860 they were annexed into the kingdom, importantly taking some Papal territory with them. In the end, nobody was really happy. The French were upset because the Pope, whom Napoleon had pledged to protect, had lost territory. The Austrians weren't happy for obvious reasons and the Piedmontese were dissatisfied because they wanted Venice.

So in 1859 an uprising kicked off in Sicily, again. Garibaldi saw this as an opportunity and so launched what is known as the Expedition of the Thousand in 1860. With only a thousand men, Garibaldi conquered Sicily before moving on to Naples against the orders of Cavour, who was Prime Minister again. A few months later, Garibaldi had taken Naples and after this, Piedmont invaded the Papal States but not Rome itself and conquered all of this territory. Except for the tiny state of San Marino which maintained its independence because when Garibaldi had fled there earlier it was agreed that San Marino wouldn't be incorporated into any larger Italian state.

Garibaldi kept this promise by pressuring Cavour not to annex it. In late 1860 a referendum was held in the south on unification with Piedmont which the people backed overwhelmingly. Soon after Garibaldi met Victor Emmanuel at Tiano, here, and handed him control over Naples. This was a big deal since Garibaldi was a republican and was thus setting aside his dislike for monarchy for the purposes of unifying Italy which says a lot about him. On March 17th 1861 the Kingdom of Italy was proclaimed with King Victor Emmanuel II as its first king and with Florence as its capital.

Cavour and Victor Emmanuel had the difficult task of integrating the rest of the kingdom and this caused many issues. 1 being that southern manufacturing couldn't compete with a more industrialized north and thus it was devastated. Furthermore, those in the south had to now help pay off Piedmont's debts from its wars with Austria. Taxes rose substantially and the government cracked down fiercely on any dissent. The government also had bad relations with the church who weren't happy that they'd lost a lot of authority and that the Pope had also lost territory.

To make matters worse, the Brigands War broke out in 1861 which saw Brigands, i.e. Bandits, roaming the south for 4 years. As a result of the turmoil, many turned to revolutionaries such as Garibaldi who led a few minor revolts but all of them failed. Garibaldi wasn't punished because he was basically a celebrity at this point and was well loved across much of Europe and North America. Garibaldi's marches against his own government wouldn't be his last fight though, since in 1866 the Brothers War between Austria and Prussia broke out.

Italy still didn't include either Venice or Rome and this was something Victor Emmanuel wanted to change. An agreement was reached with Prussia that in return for Italian help in the war, they would both seek Venetia for Italy. Long story short, Italy performed poorly but Prussia performed well and so Austria lost Venice to France because they didn't want to give territory to those who they felt didn't deserve it. France then gave it to Italy, thus making all of that a waste of time. It wasn't long before another major European war broke out that Italy could use to its advantage, the Franco-Prussian War of 1870.

Napoleon had to withdraw the French troops in Rome to fight the Prussians which meant that it was now an easy target. It wasn't long before the walls of Rome had been breached and Rome itself conquered. The Pope was offered a bunch of concessions and an annual allowance to win his approval but he refused. His approval didn't matter though since Italy was happening either way. In 1871 Rome was, after much arguing, declared the new capital of Italy.

This new kingdom of Italy was now a rising power on the world stage whose influence would extend across Europe, greatly changing the course of its history forevermore. I hope you enjoyed this episode and thank you for watching. There are some book recommendations in the description below if you'd like to learn more.

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Ten Minute History - The Unification of Italy (Short Documentary)