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Entry: D'Annunzio, Mussolini, and the Fate of Empires Link: http://www.takimag.com/site/article/dannunzio_mussolini_and_the_fate_of_empires#5394 Post contents: I wonder what would have happened if the "Stresa Front" with England and Italy in alliance, had lasted beyond Mussolinis's foolhardy (but understandable) Ethiopian venture? Indeed, my understanding is that Churchill's correspondence with "Il Duce" has been sealed (and apparently wrote to him up to almost the last; in many letters he apparently praised him). Alas, I've never forgiven the Savoyards for destroying the Kingdom of Due Sicilie (1861)and seizing the Papal States (1870). Naples, prior to the forced union with Piedmont, was a thriving kingdom with a rich cultural and artistic life (e.g., Rossini, Donizetti, Mercadante, and many others). Absorption by the new "liberal" state of Italy ended that. During the 1860s the peasants of the Puglia and Calabria rose up in rebellion against enforced 19th c. liberalism and in favor of the deposed Bourbons (King Francesco II and his gallant Queen Sofia)--the bringadaccio {sp?}. Southern Italy--the Kindgom of the Two Sicilies-- has suffered ever since. Sir Harold Acton's delightful; volumes, THE BOURBONS OF NAPLES and THE LAST BOURBONS OF NAPLES are superb histories of that epoch. Viva il Re de Due Sicilia! Sent at: 2008 07 08