The Flag And History Of Italy

Possibly no nation has had it's history shaped by it's flag as much as Italy. We saw in the posting "The Would-Have-Been Spanish Revolution", February 2024, how Spain was affected by the French Revolution, which opened the modern political era, but rearranged the pieces of the revolution in it's own way. The same applies to Italy. We see the pieces of the French Revolution but rearranged in a different way.

Italy became a united country in 1871. The following illustration is from the Wikipedia article "Flag of Italy". The design in the center represents the House of Savoy and was removed from the flag when the monarchy was abolished by referendum in 1946.

Italy was greatly affected by Napoleon. He was from an Italian family on Corsica, and was born when the island had only very recently come under French control. Napoleon had emerged from the French Revolution to conquer most of Europe, although he had nothing to do with starting the revolution. Napoleon spread the ideals of the French Revolution across Europe. 

The basis of these ideals are the overthrow of monarchy in favor of a republic where everyone had rights. The Revolution was represented by the tricolor flag, which is the flag of France today, and which is the same as the Italian flag except with blue instead of green. Italians generally shared the values of the French Revolution and the Italian flag is their version of the tricolor.

But, as with Spain, Italy would have it's own way of implementing the modern revolutionary ideals. Modern Italy had actually been put together by the House of Savoy, which was the royal family of Piedmont and Sardinia. Upon unification the Savoy king became the king of all of Italy. The first king was Victor Emmanuel II. The following image from Google Street View shows the monument that was dedicated to him in Rome, adjacent to the Forum from ancient Rome.

So what made Italy's implementation so different from that of France is that while the central event of the French Revolution was the overthrow and public execution of the king and queen, by guillotine, Italy had the revolutionary ideals while ruled by a king.

What I think of as the "Tomato Connection" is that Christopher Columbus was actually Italian, from Genoa. Tomatoes, which are so important in Italian cuisine today in the form of paste and sauce, are from the western hemisphere and were brought to Europe as part of the "Columbian Exchange". Then Napoleon, from an Italian family, brought the revolutionary ideals of the tricolor flag to Italy and the Italian version of the tricolor ended up with the same red and green as the tomato plant. The following image is from the Wikipedia article "Tomato".

There is also a religious side to the Tomato Connection. "Tomato" is actually from an Aztec word and we saw in the compound posting "The Aztec Prophecy", April 2018, how Our Lady of Guadalupe became the most visited Catholic site in the world.

The figure most associated with the French Revolution is Napoleon. Even though he had nothing to do with starting the revolution and executing the king and queen, and was actually what brought the revolution to a conclusion, he was the one who spread it's ideals across Europe. The French revolutionaries were obsessed with the number ten. They implemented a day with ten hours, a week with ten days, and a year with ten months. The one thing that lasted was their measurement system based on ten and water, the Metric System, and Napoleon's enthusiasm for it is why we are using it today.

But Italy having it's own version of the tricolor meant that, according to the forces of history, it had to have it's own version of Napoleon that could not be a king. The figure that emerged was Benito Mussolini. Although Napoleon spread the ideals of the French Revolution he was also the prototype of the modern dictator. The son of Victor Emmanuel II, Umberto I, had been assassinated and his son, Victor Emmanuel III, appointed Mussolini as Prime Minister. 

But Mussolini managed to consolidate enough power to be the Italian version of Napoleon. This had to happen because the tricolor flag demanded a Napoleonic figure. Mussolini portrayed himself as a modern Roman Emperor, and lived adjacent to the Forum, although I see him as being in the mode of Napoleon, who had also proclaimed himself as a Roman Emperor.

Napoleon had been involved in Spain, as in Italy, and Spain also had to have it's version of Napoleon, in the form of Francisco Franco. But the monarchy in Spain, actually the same House of Bourbon that Napoleon had replaced, was abolished to make way for Franco, although it was later restored and remains today. In Italy the monarchy and the Napoleonic figure existed together.

What happened in Italy is that the monarchy and the Napoleonic figure fatally weakened each other, because they were two opposing strands of history and, during the 1940s, both were eliminated. The monarchy was abolished by referendum but the end of Mussolini was more violent.

A characteristic of the French Revolution, and the many revolutions that have reenacted it, have been some kind of "storming" of something representing the authority of the old order. The signature event of the French Revolution was the Storming of the Bastille. In the October Revolution it was the Storming of the Winter Palace. In the Iranian Revolution it was the U.S. Embassy. In the movement supporting Donald Trump it was the Capitol Building. In Spain it was the Storming of the Congress of Deputies. In India it was the mosque in Ayodha.

So if Italy had implemented it's own version of Napoleon and the French Revolution, according to the history of it's tricolor flag, then there must have been some kind of "storming" of something representing the authority of the old order. There was Mussolini's "March on Rome" but that doesn't quite fit because the storming has to be a somewhat spontaneous uprising by the populace, not something organized by an authority figure. 

Just as Spain had reenacted the historical spectacle of the French Revolution and Napoleon, but with the pieces rearranged, so did Italy. What happened in Italy is that the Napoleon came first, in the form of Mussolini. The "storming" was a repudiation of Mussolini by the beating of his suspended body, after he had been shot, by a crowd of people in Milan. The hanging of his body, in a public square, is a reenactment of the execution of the French king and queen in Place Concorde.

So the Italian version of the French Revolution was for the Napoleon to come first and then the storming and the public execution to be directed against him, rather than against the monarchy. But the monarchy had been fatally wounded by it's association with Mussolini, and was abolished by referendum not long afterward. The design on the flag representing the House of Savoy has been removed.