From Napoleon's first invasion of 1796 and the fall of Venice through the sister republics, the Restoration, the Carbonari and Mazzini, the revolutions of 1848 and the wars of independence, to Garibaldi's Thousand, the proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy, and the making of Rome its capital in 1871. Slide across the years to read the major events that turned a 'geographical expression' into a nation.
A young General Bonaparte sweeps into northern Italy, routing the Austrians and Piedmontese and overturning the old order of the peninsula in a single dazzling campaign.
From Napoleon's first invasion of 1796 and the fall of Venice through the sister republics, the Restoration, the Carbonari and Mazzini, the revolutions of 1848 and the wars of independence, to Garibaldi's Thousand, the proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy, and the making of Rome its capital in 1871. Slide across the years to read the major events that turned a 'geographical expression' into a nation.
A young General Bonaparte sweeps into northern Italy, routing the Austrians and Piedmontese and overturning the old order of the peninsula in a single dazzling campaign.
Napoleon extinguishes the thousand-year-old Republic of Venice and hands it to Austria, while founding the Cisalpine Republic in Lombardy as a French satellite.
Neapolitan revolutionaries proclaim a short-lived republic that is crushed within months, its leading intellectuals executed in a royalist reaction.
In Milan Cathedral, Napoleon places the ancient Iron Crown of Lombardy on his own head as King of Italy, binding the peninsula's north to his new empire.
Joachim Murat, Napoleon's cavalry marshal, takes the throne of Naples and abolishes feudalism, modernising the administration of the Mezzogiorno.
With Napoleon defeated, the great powers restore the old dynasties and give Austria mastery of a fragmented Italy of restored kingdoms and duchies.
Secret societies rise in Naples and Piedmont demanding constitutions, only to be crushed by Austrian arms — the first stirrings of the Risorgimento.
From exile, Giuseppe Mazzini founds Giovine Italia, preaching a democratic, republican, and united Italy made by the will of its own people.
Revolution sweeps the peninsula: Milan expels the Austrians in the Five Days, Piedmont declares war, and rulers grant constitutions, including the lasting Statuto Albertino.
Mazzini and Garibaldi defend a republic in Rome against French arms, while Piedmont's defeat at Novara brings the young Victor Emmanuel II to the throne.
Cavour's Piedmont, allied with Napoleon III, defeats Austria at Magenta and Solferino and wins Lombardy, setting off a chain of annexations across central Italy.
Garibaldi lands in Sicily with a thousand red-shirted volunteers, topples the Bourbon kingdom, and hands the conquered south to Victor Emmanuel II.
The first Italian parliament meets in Turin and proclaims Victor Emmanuel II King of Italy, uniting most of the peninsula under one crown for the first time since antiquity.
Allied with Prussia against Austria, Italy gains Venetia despite battlefield setbacks at Custoza and Lissa, adding the north-east to the kingdom.
With the French garrison withdrawn, Italian troops breach the walls of Rome at Porta Pia, ending more than a thousand years of papal temporal rule.
The government moves from Florence to Rome, which becomes the capital of the united kingdom and the symbolic culmination of the Risorgimento.