HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

In the early 1800's nationalist movements swept across Europe, awakening patriotic feelings among vast populaces under the dominion of foreign rulers. These movements helped fuel the Italian cultural consciousness and sparked a unification crusade across the peninsula, known as Risorgimento, or resurgence. Risorgimento was primarily waged against the empirical rule of the Austrian Empire and directly threatened long-standing political and ecomonic ties throughout the region. As such, the Austrian Empire, and others directly benefitting from the existing divisions, forcibly opposed the movement. 

Over an approximate 50-year period, Italians fought three wars for independence culminating in the 1861 formation of the Kingdom of Italy. Despite the victory, however, many people of Italian culture and language remained outside the offical borders of the state. This included the people of Trentino, Gorizia, Istria, Trieste, Ticino, Nice, Corsica, and Malta. As with the Risorgimento movement, a grass-roots crusade began to swell within the newly formed Kingdom to emancipate the "unredeemed" lands and its Italian people. The movement, known as Italia Irredenta, or unredeemed Italy, was supported by various patriots inside the affected areas, as well as the Kingdom itself.

In approximately 1866, the irredentist movement within the Trentino officially began. It appears the movement was sparked by the annexation of the Veneto Region to the Kingdom of Italy, with the exclusion of the Trentino. Although this event appears to mark the official beginning of the movement, the actual seeds of Trentini irredentism were sewn as as early as 1810. In that year, Napoleon began his formation of the Italian Kingdom, which included the Trentino as one region of the newly formed state. This was short-lived, however, as Napoleon was defeated and his land acquisitions ceded to other powers. During this time, the vast regions of Napoleon's Italy (minus the Trentino) strived to free itself and form an independent state, while the Trentino area was reconquered by Austrian troops and again ceded to the Austrian Empire. Despite its short-lived unity to the Italian Kingdom, many believe the seed of Italian unity within the Trentino was planted and fed subsequent revolutionary events. This includes the 1848 revolt aimed at seperating Trentino from Tyrol, the 1862 attempt to unite the region with the Veneto Region, and the 1866 liberation attempts of Garibaldi.

Over the course of time, many Trentini entered the fray to free itself from Austrian control. The most prominent figures in the struggle were Cesare Battisti, Damiano Chiesa, and Fabio Filzi. These men, based on their public martyrdom, have come to symbolize the movement and remain legendary figures throughout the region. There stories, along with New York Times articles from the era, have been linked above for further reading.