Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
When the French Revolution broke out in 1789 Maria Carolina was initially sympathet-
ic to the movement, but after her sister, Marie Antoinette, was beheaded by the revolu-
tionaries she became a fanatic Francophobe. The following French invasion of Italy in
1799, and the crowning of Napoleon as king in 1800, jolted the south out of its Bourbon
slumbers. Although Napoleonic rule was to last only 14 years, this brief flirtation with re-
publicanism awakened hopes of an independent Italian nation. Returning to his beloved
Naples in 1815, Ferdinand, who was once so at ease with his subjects, was now terrified
of popular revolution and became determined to exert his absolute authority. Changes that
had been made by the Bonapartist regime were reversed, causing widespread discontent.
Revolutionary agitators sprang up everywhere, and the countryside, now full of dis-
charged soldiers, became more lawless than ever.
Yet there was no putting the genie back in the box. The heavy-handed tactics of Ferdin-
and II only exacerbated the situation, and in 1848 Sicily experienced a violent revolt that
saw the expulsion of the Bourbons from the island. Although the revolt was crushed,
Ferdinand's response was so heavy-handed that he earned himself the nickname 'Re
Bomba' (King Bomb) after his army mercilessly shelled Messina. From such a promising
beginning, the last decades of Bourbon rule were so oppressive that they were almost uni-
versally hated throughout liberal Europe. The seeds had well and truly been sown for the
Risorgimento (Resurgence), which would finally see the whole peninsula united into a
modern nation state.
History of the Italian People,
by Giuliano Procacci, is one of the best general histories of the country in any
language. It covers the period from the early Middle Ages until 1948.
