GEOGRAPHY
Italy borders France to the northwest, Austria and Switzerland to the north, and Slovenia to the northeast. The Italian Peninsula, making up more than half of Italy, is flanked by the Adriatic Sea to the east, the Ionian Sea and Mediterranean Sea to the south, and the Tyrrhenian Sea, the Ligurian Sea, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. The total area is 116,341 square miles. Elba, Sardinia, and Sicily, islands of the Mediterranean, also belong to Italy
The Alps form Italy’s northern border, where lies Italy’s highest elevation. The Apennine Mountains run southward from the Gulf of Genova, through the center of the peninsula, to the toe of Calabria. The Maritime Alps, part of the Northern Apennines, run along the northwest coast of the Gulf of Genova; Monte Corno (9,554 feet), the highest peak of the Apennines, is in the eastern mountain district.
About one-third of the country consists of plains, notably the Plain of Lombardy to the northeast, which is used for agriculture. The northeast coasts along the Adriatic Sea are sandy and low with shallow waters; venice is among the few commercial ports. Marshlands stretch south along the west coast, including Campagna di Roma, the Pontine Marshes, and the Maremma. Important commercial ports and cities are situated along the western coastline.
An active volcano, Mount Etna, measuring 10,902 feet, is found in Sicily and another on Stromboli, a Lipari Island. Principal rivers include the Po and the Adige in the north and the Arno and the Tiber along the peninsula.
INCEPTION AS A NATION
Before and after the final defeat of the Romans in 568 C. E.—and the end of the Western Roman Empire—Italy was invaded and divided time and again. The Holy Roman Empire, established in 962 and dissolved in 1806 by Napoleon I Bonaparte, along with various foreign powers, especially France, Spain, and Austria, played a part in the changing regimes and shifting borders. Numerous and often competing states were created. The unification of Italy as a constitutional monarchy under the constitution originally adopted by Sardinia in 1848, with Victor Emmanuel as king and an elected parliament, marked the beginning of modern Italy. Moderate political and social reforms were enacted over the next years.
Italy fought World War I (1914-18) on the side of the Allies. According to the terms of the Paris Peace Conference, Italy obtained south Tyrol, Trieste, Istria, part of Carniola, and the Dalmatian Islands. Italy under the Fascist dictatorship of Benito Mussolini (1922-43) formed an entente with Germany and sided with Nazi Germany in World War II (1939-45). In 1946 Italy voted to abolish its monarchy and establish a republic. The peace treaty of 1947 defined Italy’s present-day borders, with France, Yugoslavia, and Greece gaining former Italian territory. In 1948 a constitution officially established Italy as a democratic republic with a bicameral elected parliament, and a president elected by parliament.
CULTURAL IDENTITY
Until less than a century ago Italians lived in a highly traditional agricultural society The great geographical diversity of Italy, where the central mountain chain produces considerable climatic differences, as well as highly disparate cultural heritages derived from many different peoples, have led to strong regional diversity, evident in persistent local dialects, which until the 20th century were mutually unintelligible, and in holidays, festivals, songs, and regional cuisines.
Political unification of Italy occurred late, in 1861, and regional identity remains strong. It is something of an irony that the very concept of nationhood was born in the work of an “Italian”—the ancient Roman poet Virgil, whose depictions of the Italian landscape evoked a sense of belonging to the land as part of a nation beyond Rome or any one city For Virgil the land of Italia was patria, the fatherland of all those sharing a history and ancestry played out there.
The concept of Italian nationhood that informed political unification in the 19th century was to a large extent a self-conscious intellectual construct. Its ideal was the cultural and social fabric created by the Italian city-states of the Middle Ages and Renaissance, with their towering artistic achievements and the civic social and economic order, made possible in large part by the active participation of wealthy patrons. Florence of the Medicis was the model. This concept based on only one region of Italy placed other regions at a disadvantage, particularly southern Italy (the Mezzogiorno),which, because of its different society and economy came to be seen as backward. Northern Italians came to regard southerners with contempt. This “southern question” has plagued Italian economic, political, and cultural life from unification to the present, and southern Italians have accused northerners of falsification of history in ascribing the reasons for southern economic woes—frivolity, laziness, and even immorali-ty—and of neglect.
In a sense modern ideas of Italian nationhood, like those of ancient Romans, contain a strong element of coercion, imposition by a dominant people on all the rest. The experience of unification has become a controversial point of reference for 21st-century Italy The experience of the Fascist dictatorship (whose
Neapolitan peasants milk a goat in 1869. (Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division [LC-USZ62-122544])
Icon, the fasces, a bundle of sticks meant to symbolize how individuality with all its frailty when bound together in a union becomes strength) has also cast a shadow over the idea of a unified Italian nation.
In recent years the Italian government has made progress in developing the Italian economy and stabilizing society, in the south as well as the north, and resentments have lessened to some degree.
In spite of regional differences, Italians do share certain fundamental traits and a basic outlook. The latter places high value on what has been called la dolce vita—the good life—an insistence on the importance of achieving a balance in life, for example, between work and play, with both regarded as essential. Many Italians believe it is a mistake to take matters too seriously and often use irony and humor to deflect the unpleasant aspects of life. Although Italians are famous for their volatile emotional outbursts, the fact that these are usually brief and quickly followed by tranquility underscores a certain ironic self-consciousness in them. (This ironic detachment and control of powerful emotions are characteristic of Italian music. A composer such as Gioacchino Antonio Rossini of the 19th century in his comic operas will whip up emotions to the
1851-53 Three operas by Giuseppe Verdi, Rigoletto, II Trovatore, and La Traviata, receive public acclaim.
1859 Austria begins war with Kingdom of Sardinia; Sardinia and France drive Austrians from northern Italy, although not from Venice.
1860 Northern Italy, except Venice, becomes part of Kingdom of Sardinia; Giuseppe Garibaldi conquers Bourbon rulers in Sicily then captures Naples.
1860-61 The Kingdom of Italy including entire peninsula except Rome, Venice, and San Marino, is formed under Victor Emmanuel II.
1866 Italy annexes Venice.
1870 Italy occupies Rome.
1871 Rome becomes capital of Italy.
1876 National Central Library of Rome is founded.
1882 Italy joins Austria-Hungary and Germany in Triple Alliance.
1884 Giovanni Verga's stage version of his novel Cavalleria Rusticana is performed.
Giacomo Puccini writes his first opera, Le Villi (The Witches).
1906 Painter and sculptor Amedeo Modigliani settles in Paris; poet Giosue Carducci wins Nobel Prize in literature.
1911 Italy declares war on Ottoman Empire.
1912 Italy wins war against Ottoman Turks and acquires Libya and Dodecanese Islands.
1914 Despite Triple Alliance Italy sides with Allies when World War I begins.
1920 Painter Giorgi De Chirico cofounds magazine Pittura Metafisica.
1922 Benito Mussolini, Fascist leader, becomes prime minister of Italy.
1926 Novelist Grazia Deledda wins Nobel Prize in literature.
1929 Lateran Treaty establishes normal relations between Italian government and Vatican.
1934 Playwright Luigi Pirandello wins Nobel Prize in literature.
1936 Rome-Berlin Axis, agreement of common policy, is signed by Mussolini and Hitler; Mussolini conquers Ethiopia.
1937 Italy withdraws from League of Nations.
1939 Italy annexes Albania.
1940 Italy enters World War II, siding with Germany.
1943 Italy surrenders to invading Allies; government overthrows Mussolini; Italy declares war on Germany; in 1945 World War II ends.
1945 Roberto Rossellini films Citta Aperta (Open City) during Nazi evacuation of Rome.
1946 By free election Italians vote to abolish monarchy and establish republic.
1947 Vittorio De Sica's film Ladri Di Biciclette (The Bicycle Thief) helps bring world renown to neorealism in cinema.
Architect Pier Luigi Nervi becomes professor at University of Rome.
1950s Filmmakers Federico Fellini, Michelangelo Antonioni, Luchino Visconti, and Pier Paolo Pasolini gain international acclaim.
1955 Italy joins United Nations (UN).
1957 Italy joins European Economic Community (EEC), which evolves into European Community (EC).
1959 Poet Salvatore Quasimodo wins Nobel Prize in literature.
1975 Poet Eugenio Montale wins Nobel Prize in literature.
(continues)
Italians: nationality time line (continued)
1992 Political corruption begins period of arrests and investigations.
1993 Italy becomes one of original 12 members of European Union (EU).
1994 Freedom Alliance, enforcing neo-Fascist elements, is led by Silvio Berlusconi; coalition falls apart; Berlusconi resigns as prime minister.
1997 Playwright Dario Fo wins Nobel Prize in literature.
Brink of collapsing into chaos, then with a turn of phrase restore all to normal.) Italians will let their emotions loose temporarily in order to discharge them and restore balance. All this distinguishes Italians from Europeans in the north, particularly in Germany and Scandinavia, who tend to view work as an end in itself and to be reticent about expressing their emotions. A recent poll found that Italians spend roughly half their time in nonwork-related activities such as eating, cleaning, and grooming. Food especially is an important element of Italian life. Work patterns in the country revolve around the midday meal.
Belief in the importance of family, religion, and one’s homeland is also shared by most Italians. Central to Italian life is the tradition of the family as a guiding force, a focus of loyalty, and a bulwark when times are hard. The Catholic Church also has long been central to the life of Italians, and many attend Mass every day. The experience of emigration abroad has demonstrated that Italian emigres maintain closer ties with their homeland (especially the family) than do many other European immigrants.
Given the diversity of Italian society, it is not surprising that, unlike other European literatures, contemporary Italian literature lacks a major work of fiction representing the nation’s cultural identity. Rather, Italian literature consists of a kaleidoscope of brief narratives that express the complexity of Italian culture. In the variety of their forms and genres—realistic novels and philosophical short stories, memoirs, and literary essays—as well as in that of their subject matter such works provide a good entry into the multifaceted and contradictory identity of Italy as a nation.
Further Reading
Spencer Di Scala. Italy: From Revolution to Republic, 1700 to the Present (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1998).
Christopher Hibbert. Garibaldi and His Enemies: The Clash of Arms and Personalities in the Making of Italy (London: Viking, 1989).
George Holmes, ed. The Oxford Illustrated History of Italy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997).
Denis Mack-Smith. Modern Italy (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1997).
Frederic Spotts and Thedor Wieser. Italy, a Difficult Democracy: A Survey of Italian Politics
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990).
Italici See Villanovans.
World History
