https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9214-5930
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ABSTRACT
When Italy surrendered to the Allies in 1943, Giacomo Matteotti’s memory burst back into public space after almost twenty years of clandestine commemoration. This article focuses on the uses of Matteotti’s memory during the Resistance and the transition to a new democratic Republic. It argues that Matteotti was both Italian and reformist, not revolutionary, and thus his memory appealed to partisans as a symbol of national anti-Fascism and to the Allies because he represented parliamentary democracy. The article begins by establishing the qualities of Matteotti’s commemoration after his death in 1924, before examining the daily uses of that memory by those involved in Italy’s fight for liberation from 1943. Finally, it identifies how representatives of Italy’s new democratic institutions transposed the language of sacrifice used to remember Matteotti onto the Italian people during the construction of the Republic, representing Italians as victims, rather than perpetrators, of Fascism.
Acknowledgments
This article is based on my doctoral research funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council through the South, West and Wales Doctoral Partnership. I am grateful to the three anonymous reviewers of this article for the depth and generosity of their feedback, which has helped me to improve this work. Thanks are also due to my friends and colleagues, Darius Wainwright and Lorenzo Costaguta, for commenting on a draft.
Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 ‘Nessuno dei figli di Matteotti ha partecipato all’esecuzione di Mussolini’, Corriere della Sera, 13 September 1945, p. 1.
2 Alessandro Portelli, The Order Has Been Carried Out: History, Memory, and Meaning of a Nazi Massacre in Rome (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), p. 169.
3 Claudio Pavone, A Civil War: A History of the Italian Resistance, trans. by Peter Levy (London: Verso, 2013), p. 11.
4 Lucy Riall, ‘Martyr Cults in Nineteenth-Century Italy’, Journal of Modern History, 82.2 (2010), 255–87; Roberto Mancini, Il martire necessario: guerra e sacrificio nell’Italia contemporanea (Ospedaletto, Pisa: Pacini editore, 2015).
5 Oliver Janz, ‘Lutto, famiglia e nazione nel culto dei caduti della prima guerra mondiale in Italia’, in La morte per la patria: la celebrazione dei caduti dal Risorgimento alla Repubblica, ed. by Lutz Klinkhammer, Roberto Balzani, and Oliver Janz (Rome: Donzelli, 2008), pp. 65–99.
6 Simonetta Falasca-Zamponi, ‘Of Storytellers and Master Narratives: Modernity, Memory, and History in Fascist Italy’, Social Science History, 22.4 (1998), 415–44; Amy King, ‘The Battle for Influence: Commemoration of Transnational Martyrs in the Italian Diaspora of the U.S. under Fascism’, Memory Studies, 2021 <https://doi.org/10.1177/1750698020988774>; Hannah Malone, ‘The Fallen Soldier as Fascist Exemplar: Military Cemeteries and Dead Heroes in Mussolini’s Italy’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 64.1 (2022), 34–62; Alessandra Staderini, ‘La “Marcia Dei Martiri”: la traslazione nella cripta di Santa Croce dei caduti fascisti’, Annali Di Storia Di Firenze, 3 (2008), 195–214; Roberta Suzzi Valli, ‘Il culto dei martiri fascisti’, in La morte per la patria, pp. 101–07.
7 Gian Enrico Rusconi, Patria e repubblica (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1997).
8 Guido Bartolini, The Italian Literature of the Axis War: Memories of Self-Absolution and the Quest for Responsibility (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021).
9 Stephen Gundle, ‘The “Civic Religion” of the Resistance in Post-War Italy’, Modern Italy, 5.2 (2000), 113–32; Guri Schwarz, Tu mi devi seppellir: riti funebri e culto nazionale alle origini della Repubblica (Turin: UTET libreria, 2010).
10 Mauro Canali, ‘The Matteotti Murder and the Origins of Mussolini’s Totalitarian Fascist Regime in Italy’, Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 14.2 (2009), 143–67 (p. 148).
11 Alexander J. De Grand, The Italian Left in the Twentieth Century: A History of the Socialist and Communist Parties (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989), p. 51.
12 Shortly after his assassination, the Partito Socialista Unitario published a collection of Matteotti’s journalism. The book sold 25,000 copies in a few days. See: Giacomo Matteotti, Il fascismo della prima ora (Rome: Tipografica Italiana, 1924).
13 Giacomo Matteotti, Un anno di dominazione fascista (Rome: Ufficio stampa del Partito Socialista Unitario, 1924).
14 Denis Mack Smith, Mussolini (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1981), p. 76.
15 On the murder, investigation, and trial, see Claudio Fracassi, Matteotti e Mussolini: 1924: Il delitto del Lungotevere (Milan: Mursia, 2004); Giuseppe Rossini, Il delitto Matteotti tra il Viminale e l’Aventino (Bologna: Il mulino, 1966). For the motive behind Matteotti’s murder, see: Mauro Canali, Il delitto Matteotti: affarismo e politica nel primo governo Mussolini (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1997).
16 ‘Matteotti Crime’, The Times, 18 June 1924, p. 16.
17 ‘The Saviour of Italy’, Daily Mail, 20 June 1924, p. 8.
18 For more on the regime’s response, see Giovanni Borgognone, Come nasce una dittatura: l’Italia del delitto Matteotti (Bari: Editori Laterza, 2013).
19 Stefano Caretti, Matteotti. Il mito (Pisa: Nistri-Lischi Editori, 1994), pp. 161–62.
20 Ibid.
21 ‘Garofani rossi al Martire’, Avanti!, 17 June 1924, p. 1.
22 Caretti, pp. 43–44.
23 London, The Women’s Library, London School of Economics and Political Science, Richard Pankhurst, ‘An Early Anti-Fascist Organisation: The Women’s International Matteotti Committee’ (c.2000) (Unpublished typescript), p. 45.
24 Ibid.
25 Caretti, p. 163; Valentino Zaghi, Giacomo Matteotti (Sommacampagna: Cierre, 2001).
26 ‘Unwanted Wreath’, Edinburgh Evening News, 13 December 1924, p. 11.
27 Caretti, p. 226.
28 Giuseppe Scalarini, ‘I nostri martiri’, Avanti!, 6 July 1924, p. 3.
29 For more on the charismatic power of his body, see Sergio Luzzatto, The Body of Il Duce: Mussolini’s Corpse and the Fortunes of Italy, trans. by Frederika Randall (New York: Metropolitan Books, 2006), p. 7.
30 ‘Le giornate di passione del giugno-agosto 1924’, Almanacco Socialista Italo-Americano 1925, 1925, pp. 22–25 (p. 24).
31 ‘Filippo Turati: la commemorazione di Giacomo Matteotti del 27 giugno 1924’, Tempo Presente, April 2014, pp. 31–36 (p. 32).
32 Filippo Turati and Anna Kuliscioff, La tragedia di Giacomo Matteotti nelle lettere scambiatesi fra l’11 e il 27 giugno 1924 (Forlì: Editrice Socialista Romagnola, 1945), p. 22.
33 Ibid.
34 ‘L’eroismo di Matteotti nella confessione del Volpi’, L’Unità, 16 June 1924, p. 1.
35 ‘L’eroica resistenza di Matteotti’, Il Mondo, 17 June 1924, p. 1.
36 Parla l’opposizione: la battaglia parlamentare dell’opposizione (Bologna: A. Forni, 1976), p. 61.
37 Michaela DeSoucey and others, ‘Memory and Sacrifice: An Embodied Theory of Martyrdom’, Cultural Sociology, 2.1 (2008), 99–121 (p. 102).
38 Amy King, ‘Italy’s Secular Martyrs: The Construction, Role and Maintenance of Secular Martyrdom in Italy from the Twentieth Century to the Present Day’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Bristol, 2019), pp. 154–81 <https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/studentTheses/6c811f79-7e86-46c8-827a-ae388d63d772> [accessed 31 March 2023].
39 New York University, Tamiment Library & Robert F. Wagner Labour Archives, Girolamo Valenti Papers, Velia Matteotti, ‘Letter to Girolamo Valenti’, 23 June 1925.
40 University of Minnesota, Immigration History Research Center Archives, Fred Celli Papers, Box 1, Matteotti postcard sent from Paris to New York in 1924.
41 Roberto Battaglia, Storia della Resistenza italiana: 8 settembre 1943–25 aprile 1945 (Turin: Giulio Einaudi editore, 1964), pp. 59–60.
42 ‘Giornata di entusiasmo patriottico’, Corriere Della Sera, 27 July 1943, p. 2.
43 Caretti, p. 72.
44 ‘Giornata di entusiasmo patriottico’.
45 ‘Avvenimenti della settimana’, L’Osservatore Romano, 18 June 1944, p. 3.
46 John Foot, Italy’s Divided Memory (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), p. 63.
47 ‘Strikers Call for Peace’, Daily Mail, 19 August 1943, p. 4.
48 Pavone, A Civil War, p. 223.
49 Associazione Nazionale Partigiani d’Italia, ‘Matteotti’, ANPI <https://www.anpi.it/libri/matteotti> [accessed 20 February 2023].
50 Documenti dei socialisti bolognesi sulla Resistenza: i diari delle 3 Brigate Matteotti, ed. by Nazario Sauro Onofri, La Resistenza in Emilia-Romagna, 3 (Bologna: La squilla, 1975), p. 230.
51 Onofri, p. 223.
52 ‘Matteotti Left an Army’, Daily Herald, 17 July 1944, p. 4.
53 Ibid.
54 Charles Morgan, ‘Soldiers’ Verses’, The Sunday Times, 9 December 1945, p. 3.
55 Diana McCurdy, ‘The Italian Files’, Dominion Post, 13 September 2003, p. 17.
56 Giacomo Matteotti, Ultimo discorso di G. Matteotti (tenuto alla Camera dei deputati nella seduta del 30 maggio 1924) (Padua: Guerrini, 1943).
57 Uno di allora, L’assassinio di Giacomo Matteotti (Zurich: Partito socialista svizzero, 1943).
58 Michele Parise, Il processo Matteotti (Naples: Masula, 1943).
59 Paul Ginsborg, A History of Contemporary Italy: Society and Politics, 1943–1988 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), p. 48.
60 Ibid., p. 57.
61 Ibid., p. 55.
62 Ibid., p. 65.
63 Battaglia, Storia della Resistenza italiana, pp. 539–40.
64 Quelli con Pescia nel Cuore, ‘Presentazione del restauro del monumento a Giacomo Matteotti’ (2012) <https://www.quelliconpescianelcuore.it/2012/12/22/restauro-del-monumento-a-giacomo-matteotti/> [accessed 22 February 2023].
65 Quelli con Pescia nel Cuore, p. 3.
66 ‘Lo scoprimento dei busti di Matteotti, Gramsci e Amendola’, Corriere d’Informazione, 12 June 1945, p. 1.
67 ‘Le celebrazioni nelle varie città’, Corriere d’Informazione, 11 June 1945, p. 1.
68 ‘Matteotti commemorato dal sindaco Greppi’, Corriere d’Informazione, 11 June 1945, p. 2.
69 Amerigo Dùmini, Diciassette colpi (Milan: Longanesi, 1951), p. 249.
70 ‘Commosso pellegrinaggio alla tomba di Giacomo Matteotti’, Corriere d’Informazione, 11 June 1945, p. 1.
71 Ibid., p. 2.
72 ‘21st Anniversary of Murder of Matteotti: Celebrations in His Own Village’, The Manchester Guardian, 13 June 1945, p. 8.
73 ‘21st Anniversary of Murder of Matteotti’, p. 8.
74 ‘Commosso pellegrinaggio alla tomba di Giacomo Matteotti’, p. 2.
75 For more on conceptions of violence, see Claudio Pavone, ‘Violence’, in A Civil War, pp. 495–613.
76 ‘21st Anniversary of Murder of Matteotti’.
77 ‘Il discorso di Nenni a Firenze’, Avanti!, 11 June 1945, p. 1.
78 ‘Commosso pellegrinaggio alla tomba di Giacomo Matteotti’, p.2.
79 ‘The Birth of the Republic’, The Manchester Guardian, 11 June 1946, p. 5.
80 Archivio Storico Luce, La repubblica nelle dichiarazioni di De Gasperi, Sforza, Nenni, Giannini e Orlando, La Settimana Incom, vol. 2554, XVI (Cinecittà, 1946), <http://camera.archivioluce.com/camera-storico/scheda/video/i_tempi_della_politica/00044/IL5000008859/2/La-repubblica-nelle-dichiarazioni-di-De-Gasperi-Sforza-Nenni-Giannini-e-Orlando-27-06-1946.html> [accessed 23 February 2023].
81 Assemblea Costituente, Seduta di martedì 4 marzo 1947 (Montecitorio, Rome, 1947), 1723–55 (p. 1755) <http://www.camera.it/_dati/Costituente/Lavori/Assemblea/sed049/sed049.pdf> [accessed 23 February 2023].
82 This elaborate oratorical style was typical of speeches relating to the Republic. Cooke has identified the ‘common language, a kind of Resistance koiné’ in the years after Italy’s liberation, of which ‘Calamandrei was […] the master practitioner’. See Philip Cooke, The Legacy of the Italian Resistance (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), p. 42.
83 Assemblea Costituente, Seduta pomeridiana di martedì 10 giungo 1947 (Montecitorio, Rome, 1947), 4599–40 (p. 4603) <http://www.camera.it/_dati/Costituente/Lavori/Assemblea/sed056/sed056.pdf> [accessed 23 February 2023].
84 Ibid., p. 4601.
85 Ibid., p. 4604.
86 Riall, p. 255.
87 Roberto Balzani, ‘Alla ricerca della morte “utile”. Il sacrificio patriottico nel Risorgimento’, in La morte per la patria, pp. 3–21 (p. 9).
88 Ibid., p. 18.
89 ‘10 agosto 1944, Una data segnata col sangue di quindici martiri per la libertà’, Corriere della Sera, 11 August 1946, p. 2.
90 Rosario Forlenza and Bjørn Thomassen, Italian Modernities: Competing Narratives of Nationhood (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016), p. 180.
91 Philip Cooke, ‘La resistenza come secondo risorgimento – un topos retorico senza fine?’ Passato e presente: rivista di storia contemporanea, 86 (2012), 62–81.
92 Rosario Forlenza, ‘Democracy and the Power of Memory’, in On the Edge of Democracy: Italy, 1943–1948 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), pp. 139–77 (p. 144).
93 Francesca Biondi, ‘Pietro Nenni e la nascita della repubblica italiana’, Revista Europea de Historia de Las Ideas Políticas y de las Instituciones Públicas, 6 (2013), 79–84.
94 Seduta pomeridiana di martedì 10 giungo 1947, p. 4603.
95 Ibid., p. 4607.
96 Tamiment Library and Robert F. Wagner Labour Archives, Radicalism Photograph Collection, Box 6, Folder 296, Vota Matteotti, 1947.
97 Dùmini, Diciassette Colpi; Cesare Rossi, Il tribunale speciale: storia documentata (Milan: Ceschina, 1952); Mauro del Giudice, Cronistoria del processo Matteotti (Paris: Lo Monaco, 1954).
98 Amerigo Dùmini, Matteotti: ‘coups et blessures ayant entraîné la mort’ (Paris: Julliard, 1973), p. 121.
99 ‘Giornata socialista in tutta Italia’, Avanti!, 9 June 1964, p. 1.
100 ‘Matteotti ricordato al Parlamento per la cui libertà diede la vita’, La Stampa, 11 June 1964, p. 1.
101 Vittorio Statera, ‘Il sacrificio di Matteotti ricordato ieri da Saragat a Roma’, La Stampa, 15 June 1964, p. 7.
102 Cooke, The Legacy of the Italian Resistance, p. 94.
103 John Dickie, ‘Imagined Italies’, in Italian Cultural Studies: An Introduction, ed. by David Forgacs and Robert Lumley (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. 19–33; Benedict R. O’G Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London, New York: Verso, 2006).