Italian Unification Explained

Italy used to be a collection of city states. Then Italian unification happened in 1861, called Risorgimento. And in this video I will explain how Italy Will Be United. How Italy became one country.

Credits
- Research: Mrs Scope
- Audio: Seb. Soto
- Writing and Voice Over: Avery from History Scope

Social Media

Sources:
Sofia, F. – The promised land: biblical themes in the Risorgimento. Journal of Modern Italian Studies
Rao, A. M. (2012) Republicanism in Italy from the eighteenth century to the early Risorgimento, Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 17:2, 149-167
Gallo, F. (2019) The rise of the ethical state in Italy. Neapolitan Hegelians and Risorgimento political thought (1848–1871), Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 24:2, 244-265
The Italian Risorgimento: Transnational perspectives: Introduction. (2014). Modern Italy, 19(1), 1-4.
Forlenza, R; Thomassen, B. (2017) Resurrections and rebirths: how the Risorgimento shaped modern Italian politics, Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 22:3, 291-313
Battente, S (2000) Nation and state building in Italy: recent historiographical interpretations (1989–1997), I: Unification to Fascism, Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 5:3, 310-321
Basini, L. – Verdi and Sacred Revivalism in Post Unification Italy. 19th-Century Music, Vol. 28, No. 2 (Fall 2004), pp. 133-159
Ciccarelli, C.; Fenoaltea, S.; Proietti, T. – The effects of unification: markets, policy, and cyclical convergence in Italy, 1861–1913. Cliometrica (2010) 4:269–292
Davis, J. A. – The South and the Risorgimento: histories and counter-histories. Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 2014 Vol. 19, No. 1, 53–61
Barsotti, E. M. – Journal of Modern Italian Studies 2020, Vol. 25, No. 3, 273–294

Attributions:

[matteo-ciaramitaro]

Linguistically, they didn't create an italian language by combining the dialects of italy. Dante made a literary version of his dialect (tuscan) which was central to italy both geographically and culturally, and then popularized literature in that language which was continued by others. He did this not because of unification, but because he was in favor of literature being written in one's own romance dialect rather than latin. The ultimate result was that the language is based on older forms of the florentine dialect of romance and that literary tradition, which had spread to most of the peninsula hundreds of years prior to unification. The "dialects" did influence the italian language, but its very much florentine at its core.

[Corium]

I love how San Mariano manage to stay out of Italian Unification. It a interesting little country.

[Zestieee]

i should point out the fact that the so called "dialects" of Italy were not (and still are not) all varieties of one same language.
some of the "dialects" in the middle of the country (tuscany, lazio, umbria, partially marche) are more closely related to the tuscan language that became standardised as Italian.
other varieties are not in fact as closely related to Italian.
they all evolved concurrently and independently from Latin just like every romance language did.
you can take Spain as an example: they have galician and catalan as well as the standard castilian, they're different languages that came from Latin too, and they're treated as such even by the country's constitution.
in Italy this was never the case as regiona languages started to rapidly lose prestige with the unification, and many of them in the North are now at risk of disappearing.
they are called "dialects" to give the impression that they're just a variety of the main language and they're not as important, and so lots of people (young people mainly) nowadays don't even see the point in speaking them or learning them, and it's understandable as they don't have any kind of use in our modern society, which is extremely sad.
some regions that have more autonomy have special measures to preserve their languages (Friuli actually teaches their friulian language in schools i believe).
i hope that someday more action can be taken in preserving, standardising and documenting all the beautiful languages that we have on our territory that are so overlooked by everyone.

[quakquak]

to clarify about how different italian dialects are, we call them dialects but they are different languages, your average italian dialect is as close to italian as spanish is to romanian.

[mnlg_yt]

Italian here, I wanted to add one amusing tidbit about the conquest of Rome. As the Pope was being sieged, he declared that whoever would fire the first shot against Rome would be excommunicated. The Italian army asked a Jewish soldier to do that. Religious problem: ✔solved

[eamonnroma]

You stated that at the Church Council (Vatican I) proclaimed the Pope to be infallible. You stated that he was infallible and could do no wrong. That is not so. The infallibility proclamation is that the Pope is infallible when defining Faith and Morals (dogma). In anything else, he remains a fallible human being. The video suggests that he is completely infallible. However. The video is great. Thank you.

[rickyp]

Insane coincidence, I was just learning about the history of the Renaissance yesterday and wondering how all of the different republics that made up Italy were unified

[thomasjohnson]

“We have created Italy, now we must create Italians” - would have been interesting to explore how the process of creating Italians has gone post 1861, with all the regionalism in the country to this day. I am aware of how long it takes you to make a History Scope video, so maybe in the time in might have taken you to make a video that long, Giuseppe Garibaldi could have invaded Sicily twice in that time.

[BackgroundHistory]

Funny how two Dutch history YouTubers can create a video on the same topic within 2 months of each other and still have a very different approach!

Great video my guy, keep it up!

[oli_]

hi! italian and literature enthusiast here. i loved the video, only thing i'd correct you on is italy did kind of have a universal language before unification, in fact it was theorized many times since the renaissance. they came up with using florence's dialect (which is basically today's italian). saying there were many dialects is not incorrect tho, since this unified language was only used in art, therefore only known to the upper class until in the 1700's rulers began implementing obligatory primary education

[HermanosLuDi]

I have looked and fascinated a lot of modern history. Each of these events have shaped countries to what led of what is of them today. For the case of Italy, I visited Rome and other major cities in Italy, this year. I remember seeing in one of the parks that they have a Napoleon III's statue (which helped to make possible Italian unification), and I saw the Altare della Patria (where Victor Emmanuel II is commemorated). I saw the statue of him and it was fascinating.

I can see that some maps can be inaccurate, like for example: 17:41 the ottomans still owned most of the southern balkans and like Russia owned in part of the Caucasus. Also, it seems if France annexed belgium or like the 1848 map, but I understand that this video is mostly on explaining the unification of Italy, so I am fine.

Overall, it is nice to see someone to explain more deep.

[pablovelasquez]

That is not how the doctrine of papal infallibility works and its not the reason why it was declared. Papal Infallibility is the idea that the pope will not make mistakes in cases of proclaming doctrine, in what is called "Ex Cathedra". The reason they proclaimed it was to fight against the percieved "ideas of modernity" that were againts the conception of that time of the church and papal domains, that being a perfect society: "societas perfecta"

[pardop]

Very nice video as usual, keep up the great work! As an Italian, I hope you do not mind if I point out an oversimplification that I believe went a bit too far. CULTURE: while it is correct that the cultural movement of Risorgimento had an important role in pushing toward the Unification and creation of Italia as a nation, saying that Italian culture was kind of created right there and then is not correct. The idea of an Italian language goes all the way at least to the late medieval age with Dante Alighieri, Boccaccio and Petrarca. Basically, the dialect of Tuscany was considered the literary Italian and taken as lingua franca. While most people remained illiterate until the 20th century, those who went to school (nobles, upper bourgeois, priest ...) did learn Italian at least to a basic level. In sum, Italian literature was written in Italian language (Tuscan) everywhere at least starting from the Rinascimento (Renaissance) period.
Incidentally, references to the "Italian unification" issue can be found already in the Divina Commedia: Purgatorio, VI, 76: Ahimè, Italia schiava, sede del dolore, nave senza timoniere in una gran tempesta, non più signora delle province ma bordello! (translation:
ALAS, ENSLAVED ITALY, SEAT OF PAIN, SHIP WITHOUT A HELMSMAN IN A GREAT STORM, NO LONGER MISTRESS OF THE PROVINCES BUT A BROTHEL!).
Thanks again for your work, looking forward to the next video :)

[thomasjohnson]

German unification in 1871 would be a great video, especially done by you, talking about how Germany WILL, BE, UNITED (never gets old, saying that) - you rock History Scope!

[maxreebo]

Finally a good Italian unification video!

[Max-tsjx]

This was honestly one of the most thorough videos I've seen on Italian unification, superb job!

[babakush]

Thank you for this video and all your efforts!!! You make so great explanations and visualizations you deserve way much more attention, thank you for everything ❤️❤️❤️

[danumbert]

There definitely existed homogeneous Italian cultures.... These cultures are rooted in the history of each Italian region. Florence, Venice, Pisa and Genoa had their own well established cultures which influenced Europe for centuries.... Art, Music, Architecture, Cuisines of Russia, France, England, Austria were heavily impacted by Italians way before unification. 9:22

[gianb]

My last name is Italian and not that long ago, after wondering for years who my italian ancestor might have been I’m pretty sure I found him. My 3rd great grandfather was apparently born in 1838 in the Kingdom of Sardinia. It’s crazy to think these events were probably part of the reason he moved out across the ocean in search of a more peaceful life. But ultimately I just dont know…

[henzohewson]

26:09 “He conquered Sicily in less time than it takes me to make a History Scope video.” – possibly my favourite line in this amazingly-scripted documentary, thank you so much History Scope 😍