History of early modern Italy
The history of early modern Italy roughly corresponds to the period from the Italian Renaissance to the Congress of Vienna in 1814. The following period was characterized by political and social unrest which then led to the unification of Italy, which culminated in 1861 with the proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy.
Overview
The Italian Renaissance covered the 15th and 16th centuries of Italian history and brought about considerable economic and cultural development of the country. After 1600, however, Italy experienced an economic decline. In 1600 Northern and Central Italy comprised one of the most advanced industrial areas of Europe. There was an exceptionally high standard of living. By 1814 Italy was an economically backward and depressed area; its industrial structure had almost collapsed, its population was too high for its resources, its economy had become primarily agricultural. Wars, political fractionalization, limited fiscal capacity and the shift of world trade to north-western Europe and the Americas were key factors.Following the Peace of Cateau Cambrésis, France renounced its claims in Italy. Some of the Italian states were under the rule of powerful dynasties: the Medici in Tuscany, the Farnese in Parma, the Este in Modena, and the Savoy in Piedmont. Nearly half of Italy, the kingdoms of Naples, Sicily and Sardinia and the Duchy of Milan were under the rule of the Spanish Empire.
Piedmont returned to the Savoy from France due to the role played by the duke Emmanuel Philibert in the battle of St Quentin during the Italian War of 1551–1559. The House of Savoy was "Italianized" at the end of the Italian wars, as Emmanuel Philibert made Turin the capital of the savoyard state and Italian the official language. The House of Medici kept ruling Florence, thanks to an agreement signed between the Pope and Charles V in 1530, and was later recognized as the ruling family of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany by Pope Pius V. The same Pope arranged the Holy League, a coalition of Venice and other maritime states that defeated the invading Ottoman forces at the naval battle of Lepanto.
The Papal States launched the Counter-Reformation, which lasted from the Council of Trent to the Peace of Westphalia in 1648. This period coincides with the European wars of religion and saw numerous Italians active in other Catholic nations, including de facto rulers of France and military generals serving under the auspices of the Holy Roman Empire or Spain.
Despite the victory at Lepanto, the Venetians gradually lost its Eastern Mediterranean possessions to the Ottomans. Venice captured the Peloponnese during the Great Turkish War, but the land was ceded back after the last of the Venetian-Ottoman Wars. When the Seven Years' War broke out, Venice was left out of the concert of great powers: the same, however, was true for the Venetian Mediterranean rivals such as the Ottoman Empire and the Genoese who had lost its possessions in the Aegean Sea, in Tunisia, and, later, Corsica. The crisis of Genoa led to the crisis of Spain, as the Republic of Genoa was a key ally of the Spanish Empire since the 16th century, providing credit and economic support for the Habsburgs in what has been described as the age of the Genoese.
The War of the Spanish Succession and the War of the Quadruple Alliance established the Habsburg monarchy as the dominant power in most of the present day Lombardy and Southern Italy. In this context Victor Amadeus II of Savoy, along with Eugene of Savoy, defeated the Franco-Spanish forces during the Siege of Turin and later formed the kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia, predecessor state of Italy. The House of Habsburg-Lorraine succeeded the Medici of Florence in 1737 and Venice also became part of Austria with the treaty of Campo Formio in 1797.
The Napoleonic era is the link between the Habsburg domination and the Risorgimento. Napoleon's first military successes took place in Italy, at the head of the Armée d'Italie, and he later styled himself as President of Italy and King of Italy. Italy became part of the French sphere of influence but Napoleon, given his Italian ethnicity, was appreciated by most Italian intellectuals, among them the writer Alessandro Manzoni. The Restoration that followed the French defeat wasn't able to erase the political and legislative innovations brought to Italy by Napoleon. French historian Hippolyte Taine stated:
Napoleon, far more Italian than French, Italian by race, by instinct, imagination, and souvenir, considers in his plan the future of Italy, and, on casting up the final accounts of his reign, we find that the net loss is for France and the net profit is for Italy.
Frederick Artz emphasizes the benefits the Italians gained:
16th to 18th centuries
The Italian Wars saw 65 years of French attacks on the Italian states, starting with Charles VIII's invasion of Naples in 1494. However the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis saw about half of Italy fall under the rule of the Spanish Habsburgs. They would be replaced by the Austrian Habsburgs with the War of the Spanish Succession in 1700. The Council of Italy in Madrid controlled the Spanish viceroyalties in Italy, while a special section of the Aulic council in Vienna was sovereign over the Imperial fiefs in Italy. Italian troops served throughout Europe for the catholic side in the age of the European Wars of Religion. They fought in Germany, in France, in Italy, the Spanish Netherlands, in North Africa, on the fleet—on the Invincible Armada, too—and in Central and South America, with very good results. The War of the Spanish Succession saw control of much of Naples and Sicily pass from Spain to Austria, with the Treaty of Utrecht of 1713. However, the Spaniards regained Naples and Sicily following the Battle of Bitonto in 1738.Spanish and Austrian hegemony was not always based on direct rule; states such as Venice, Genoa, the Papal States, the duchies of Este, and Duchy of Savoy, were the only independent states, while a large part of the rest of Italy relied on the protection of Spain or Austria against external aggression. Furthermore, those areas under direct Spanish and Austrian control were theoretically independent principalities bound to Spain and Austria through personal unions alone.
Italy began to experience an economic and social decline as the 16th century progressed. The Age of Discovery had shifted the center of trade in Europe from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic, and so the Italian states lost much of their previous importance. Venice continued to fight bitterly with the Ottoman Empire for control of outposts in the eastern Mediterranean. It participated in the great naval Battle of Lepanto in 1571, and in the following century battled the Turks in the Cretan War, when it gained control of the Peloponnese in Greece but lost Crete, Venice's largest and richest overseas possession. Venice experienced one last great martial triumph by helping to defeat the Ottoman Empire in the war of 1683–1699. By the 18th century, economic activity dwindled as the city withdrew in on itself and fell into stagnation, becoming easy pickings for the French revolutionary armies in 1796.
The Papal States also lost much of their former power as the Protestant Reformation divided Europe into two camps. The remaining Catholic princes increasingly sought to be the masters in their own houses and often clashed with the papacy over jurdistrictional matters. During the unceasing rivalry between France and Spain, Europe's two great Catholic powers, the popes often acted as mediators. Relations with Paris deteriorated sharply during the reign of Louis XIV, until he and the papacy found common ground in suppressing Jansenism. Even in Italy itself, the political importance of the Papal States declined. The Counter-Reformation popes largely concerned themselves with religious matters and church reform, and so had little time for politics. They worked to fight brigandage, long endemic in the Papal States, reformed the court system, and embellished Rome with many buildings. Gregory XIII introduced the calendar that bears his name, and the papal fleet participated in the Battle of Lepanto. In addition to its loss of political power, the Church came under increasing attack during the Age of Enlightenment in the 18th century.
As Spain declined in the 16th century, so did its Italian possessions in Naples, Sicily, Sardinia, and Milan. Southern Italy was impoverished, stagnant, and cut off from the mainstream of events in Europe. Naples was one of the continent's most overcrowded and unsanitary cities, with a crime-ridden and volatile populace. The Neapolitan aristocracy long resented Spanish rule and welcomed the arrival of the Austrians in 1707. However, they were disappointed as Vienna continued the practice of not allowing any autonomy to Naples. While the war raged, Austria imposed huge tax burdens on the city and did not begin to provide it with any adequate administration until peace returned. Graf von Daun attempted several reforms, but came into dispute with the church over jurisdictional matters. He largely succeeded in making peace with Rome, but international strife caused the Austrian emperors to impose more taxes on Naples and neglect all but the city's traditional feudal lords. Cardinal Michael Friedrich von Althann next became viceroy, but upset the nobility and the middle class with his pro-clerical stance. Althann's downfall came by attempting to establish a state bank with the intention of acquiring crown lands for the Austrian emperor. He infuriated both the nobility and middle class with this ill-conceived campaign, and after his expulsion Naples suffered several tumultuous years of famine and social unrest, with international problems preventing any attempt at administrative reform. It was with relief that the Spanish born Don Carlos ascended the throne of a reborn Kingdom of Naples in 1734. In 1759, he left to become King Charles III of Spain and was succeeded by his son Ferdinand, who was underage and so government was left to the regent Bernardo Tanucci. In the spirit of the Enlightenment, Tanucci attempted to establish a benevolent despotism by a series of reforms and weakening the power of traditional Neapolitan institutions. Ferdinand came of age in 1767, but had little interest in government and was largely dominated by his wife the Archduchess Maria Carolina, who disliked Tanucci's pro-Spanish stance and managed to replace him with Sir John Acton, an English emigre. When the French Revolution erupted, they allied with Austria and Britain against France.
Sicily on the other hand experienced peaceful relations with Madrid, as the Spanish largely allowed the island to manage its own affairs. Since it was an important outpost in the Mediterranean as well as a significant trading partner of Spain, friendly ties were valued. After Sicily passed under Austrian rule in 1720, trouble erupted as Vienna stationed permanent garrisons of German-born troops on the island, provoking frequent and violent confrontations with the local populace. The corruption and backwardness of Sicilian society made it difficult to establish a working government, and much like Naples Sicily was forced to pay massive taxes and tribute to Vienna.
However, Emperor Charles VI attempted to build up Sicily's economy by turning Messina and other locations into important ports so as to attract foreign commerce, as well as shore up the island's failing grain and silk industries. But the emperor could not offset an economic downturn that was beyond his control, and many of his projects proved unfeasible, ultimately causing a near-total economic meltdown.
Charles had a tricky religious situation in Sicily where the king traditionally served as apostolic legate, which he sought to maintain at all costs while also promising to defend the Catholic faith. He and his ministers successfully debated the legateship with the popes and made peace with the Vatican. In the end however, Austrian rule made little lasting impact on Sicily and Spanish troops took possession of the island in 1734.
Sardinia also was left to itself and many Spaniards settled on the island, which had an economy mostly based on sheepherding and which had little contact with the rest of Italy. Corsica passed from the Republic of Genoa to France in 1769 after the Treaty of Versailles. Italian was the official language of Corsica until 1859.