12. GLORY

THE LAST DAYS OF THE GILDED AGE

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ITALY

Poverty Italy was a poor country, with a high mountain range running north and south through the middle of the country.  Industry was still in its infant stages ... and agriculture was the economic mainstay of the country ... though even here productivity was very low.  Much of the population lived near the starvation level and disease was rampant.  Nonetheless even in the face of these problems, the rate of population growth was extremely high ... pinching Italy even more.  As a result, sadly one of Italy’s major “exports” was its population, which went abroad in the hopes of finding a better life elsewhere.  Expatriates did indeed help finance life in Italy, sending money back home to their families.  Many would also return to retire in their homeland where their savings would carry them further in life. Illiteracy Literacy was very low, especially in the south where even as late as 1870 only about one tenth of the population could read and write.  Even in the somewhat more prosperous north hardly half of the population could read and write at that time.  But efforts to improve Italian education in the early years of the twentieth century would begin to have an impact on this problem... though even as late as 1914 over a third of the population was still illiterate. Political corruption Italian politicians tended to look only to their own political careers ... not being vitally interested in issues larger than their own personal success.  Political parties were numerous and actually only small groupings centered around key individuals, the groupings held together by the favors these individuals drew from their political office and were able to pass on to their personal following. This in turn produced terrible political instability as governments in Rome rose and fell simply on the basis of personal politics.   Taxes were very heavy on the tightly stretched Italian population ... and governments were not inclined to keep expenses in line with Italy’s actual ability to afford the projects produced by the government.  Thus for many Italians, the state seemed to be no less an oppressor than had been the earlier governments, whether local or foreign.  In the south of Italy people continued to look to the local Mafia organization to supervise local life rather than to the distant Italian government in Rome. Real growth And yet ... Italy did begin to register real growth as the 1800s closed out and the twentieth century opened up.  Coming from so far behind economically it was of course easy to register high rates of growth ... but in fact Italy was definitely moving ahead in terms of industrial production (despite Italy’s own lack of coal and iron deposits), railroad mileage, new port facilities, drainage of swampland and improvement of agricultural yield.

Victor Emmanuel II, who had led the risorgimento to its victory, died in 1878 ... not long into the life of the new state.  His place was taken by his son Umberto I, who reigned over Italy until his death in 1900 when he was killed by an anarchist’s bullet (he had escaped two previous assassination attempts).  His 22-year reign however had been much less illustrious than that of his father.  Umberto was a very passive king who preferred to let the politicians do the heavy lifting while he mostly watched from the sidelines.  Sadly he did little to pull Italy together as it slid into a political lethargy that threatened even more the thin unity holding the country together. His place was taken by his son Victor Emmanuel III (reigned 1900-1946).  Despite the high hopes the country had that this energetic young prince would be able to pull Italy back together the passing of time proved that he really did not have the strength to discipline the chaos of the various party bosses ... including his prime minister Giolitti, who was in and out of office five times in the period 1892-1921, and who also followed the political trend of using his office simply for his own personal political good.

King Umberto is killed in Monza by Gaetano Bresci - July 29, 1900 - by Achille Beltrame

Victor Emanuel III (reigned 1900-1946)

Giovanni Giolitti - at the outset of his political career

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ITALIAN IMPERIALISM

One of the keys to successful nationalism seemed at the time to be the securing of an overseas empire.  Thus Italian nationalists put in place an imperial strategy ... but found the pickings overseas for Italian colonial territory to be quite slim.  Most of the prime territory in Asia and Africa had been grabbed.  This left only the sandy wastes of North Africa and the horn of East Africa available for seizure.  The Italians were most desirous of Tunisia, just opposite the Italian island of Sicily.  But to the immense distress of Italy, the French grabbed that territory in 1881 ... which by way of bitter reaction drove Italy in 1882 to join with Germany and Austria-Hungary in forming the Triple Alliance.   This would mark the beginning of diplomatic troubles that would not only divide Europe into two contending camps ... but would ultimately lead Europe into the "Great War" (World War One). Things at this point did not get much better for Italy in the imperial realm.  An attempt to seize the Christian kingdom of Abyssinia (Ethiopia) resulted only in the humiliating defeat of Italian troops in 1896 by local Ethiopian troops, ending that venture (for a while anyway).  Italy then moved its focus to the North African lands of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica ... bombing from their new airplanes (the Italians proved to be much better at aerial combat) Bedouin troops ... and occupying in 1912 the few towns of a region they would unite and then assign to this new piece of imperial territory the ancient Roman name "Libya."  ITALY ... AROUND THE YEAR 1900 Venice - Piazza San Marco A courtyard in Venice Verona - Piazza delle Erbe Rome - Via XX Septembre Rome - Via Nazionale Rome - "Great Palace" Rome - Piazza Barberini Naples - Via Roma Naples Go on to the next section:  Spain   Miles H. Hodges