Episode 2
Italy and Il Canto degli Italiani
This podcast delves into the history of Italy's national anthem, "Il canto degli Italiani," exploring its origins and the turbulent political backdrop of 19th-century Italy. The anthem, composed by Michele Novaro and written by the poet Goffredo Mameli, emerged during a time of revolutionary fervor aimed at unifying a fragmented nation. It reflects themes of patriotism, sacrifice, and the longing for a cohesive identity, making it a poignant symbol of Italian nationalism. The episode highlights the passionate involvement of its creators in the Italian unification movement, as well as the anthem's complex journey through political upheaval, including its suppression under foreign rule and its resurgence during periods of conflict. Ultimately, the anthem's enduring popularity underscores its deep-rooted significance in the hearts of Italians, representing their struggle for unity and independence.
This podcast delves into the history of Italy's national anthem, "Il canto degli Italiani," exploring its origins and the turbulent political backdrop of 19th-century Italy. The anthem, composed by Michele Novaro and written by the poet Goffredo Mameli, emerged during a time of revolutionary fervor aimed at unifying a fragmented nation. It reflects themes of patriotism, sacrifice, and the longing for a cohesive identity, making it a poignant symbol of Italian nationalism. The episode highlights the passionate involvement of its creators in the Italian unification movement, as well as the anthem's complex journey through political upheaval, including its suppression under foreign rule and its resurgence during periods of conflict. Ultimately, the anthem's enduring popularity underscores its deep-rooted significance in the hearts of Italians, representing their struggle for unity and independence.
This episode tells the story of Il Canto Degli Italiani in the context of the Risorgimento and the general European madness that was 1848 CE. A tale of a passionate people fighting for a shared cultural identity.
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8-bit version!!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtLHjE_HbPQ
My sources, mostly in order of appearance:
- https://www.paesesera.toscana.it/inno-di-mameli-adottato-come-inno-nazionale/
- http://www.sbti.it/bibliotelematica/CataldoMoti48.pdf
- https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/goffredo-mameli_(Enciclopedia-Italiana)/
- Rinaldo Caddeo, War hymns and patriotic songs of the Italian people selected and annotated, 3rd ed., Milan, Casa Editrice Risorgimento, 1915.
- Adriano Bassi, Brothers of Italy: the great characters of the Risorgimento, music and unity , Milan, Paoline, 2011, ISBN 978-88-315-3994-4 .
- https://books.google.it/books?id=dybmY18nJ8wC&printsec=frontcover&hl=it#v=onepage&q&f=false
- Kertzer, D. I. (2018). The Pope who Would be King: The Exile of Pius IX and the Emergence of Modern Europe. United Kingdom: Oxford University Press.
- https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/goffredo-mameli_%28L%27Unificazione%29/
- https://web.archive.org/web/20090724025908/https://www.quirinale.it/qrnw/statico/simboli/inno/inno.htm
- https://web.archive.org/web/20170915204413/https://www.europeanasounds.eu/news/the-song-of-the-italians-brief-history-of-a-national-anthem
- Brody, Elaine; Brook, Claire (1975), Brody, Elaine; Brook, Claire (eds.), "Turin (Piedmont)", The Music Guide to Italy, London: Macmillan Education UK, pp. 109–114, doi:10.1007/978-1-349-05291-2_15, ISBN 978-1-349-05291-2, retrieved 2020-12-22
- Anton Giulio Barrili , Goffredo Mameli in life and in art, in New Anthology , vol. 99, no. 731, 1 June 1902, pp. 385-409.
- https://dbpedia.org/page/Michele_Novaro
- https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/michele-novaro_(Dizionario-Biografico)/
- Umberto Levra , Introduction , in History of Turin, VI, The city in the Risorgimento (1798-1864) ( PDF ), Turin, G. Einaudi, 2000, pp. CXV-CXVI, ISBN 88-06-15173-8 .
- Tarquinio Maiorino, Giuseppe Marchetti Tricamo and Piero Giordana, Brothers of Italy: the true story of the Mameli hymn, p. 18, Milan, Mondadori, 2001, ISBN 88-04-49985-0 .
- https://blog.lime.link/visualizing-crowd-sizes/
- Italy , year I, no. 28, Pisa, Tipografia Nistri, 18 December 1847, p. 113.
- Rinaldo Caddeo, War hymns and patriotic songs of the Italian people selected and annotated, 3rd ed., Milan, Casa Editrice Risorgimento, 1915. pp.37-38
- Hymn by Mameli, scholar: "Mazzini didn't like the first arrangement" www.adnkronos.com
- Carlo Belviglieri, History of Italy from 1814 to 1866, vol. 5-6, Corona and Caimi, 1868, p. 289.
- Stefano Pivato , Il Canto degli Italiani: the anthem of Mameli, the political anthems and the popular song, in Maurizio Ridolfi (edited by), Almanacco della Repubblica: history of Italy through the traditions, institutions and republican symbols , Milan, Bruno Mondadori, 2003, pp. 145-158
- Stefano Pivato , Il Canto degli Italiani: the anthem of Mameli, the political anthems and the popular song, in Maurizio Ridolfi (edited by), Almanacco della Repubblica: history of Italy through the traditions, institutions and republican symbols , Milan, Bruno Mondadori, 2003, pp. 145-158
- https://www.raiplay.it/dirette/raistoria/
- https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/marcia-su-roma_(Dizionario-di-Storia)
- Michele Calabrese, Il Canto degli Italiani: genesis and vicissitudes of a hymn, in Quaderni del Bobbio , n. 3, 2011, p. 105-140.
- https://www.gazzettaufficiale.it/eli/id/2017/12/15/17G00195/SG
- https://data.europa.eu/en
- https://studiamedievalis.wordpress.com/2013/12/30/federico-i-e-i-comuni/
- Dizionario Enciclopedico Italiano , V, Institute of the Italian Encyclopedia founded by Giovanni Treccani, 1970, p. 247.
- Serena Piazza (edited by), Brothers of Italy. The illustrated national anthem , illustrations by Paolo D'Altan, Milan, Rizzoli, 2010, ISBN 978-88-17-04408-0 .
- http://www.radiomarconi.com/Marconi/mameli.html
- Maurizio Benedetti (edited by), Il Canto degli Italiani: poetry by Goffredo Mameli, music by Michele Novaro for voice and piano ( PDF ), Critical Edition, Turin, Conservatory Editions, 2019
- Vulpone, Pasquale (2002). Il Canto degli Italiani. Inno d'Italia (in Italian). Pellegrini. ISBN 88-8101-140-9.
Transcript
Hello and welcome to the Anthems podcast.
Patrick:I'm Patrick, and today I'm going to try and tell you the story of a song that helps to tell the story of a nation.
Patrick:If you were entertained to come back again.
Patrick:It turns out I was right about how podcasting works.
Patrick:Anyway, this is episode two.
Patrick:Italy.
Patrick:Today's anthem is il canto degli Italiani, or the song of the Italians.
Patrick:It was chosen because I was frustrated while trying to find a coherent thread in the information tapestry of another anthem.
Patrick:And I was also thinking about my great grandfather Al and how he never quite got the hang of English.
Patrick:So Italy it is.
Patrick:It's probably a stereotype, but the passionate italian tracks with my family, because everybody on that side is a loud, gesticulating, smiling person.
Patrick:Similar nature is apparent in most of the people involved in the story.
Patrick:They are, after all, members of one of the many nascent revolutionary groups in the italian peninsula.
Patrick:This one is going to take us to the unification of that peninsula, the naming of a different anthem through the entire 21st century, and right on up to just a couple of years ago.
Patrick:But as you know, or you will from now on, the anthem gets played pretty early on in this show because it is about the song and you should hear the thing that I'm going to talk about.
Patrick:So have a listen, and then we'll have a little word about it before proceeding with the narrative.
Patrick:Just be prepared because some of these are long and this is one of them.
Guest:Open yaba Italia shake you holy Yamochi when you swallow nakiyo in your you want me sweet Sachiyama it won't Yandam Chako son Juno keeping his hungry all piegano it's father love it.
Guest:Yava Italia Chipotle.
Patrick:My initial impression of the song was that it felt like it was part of an opera.
Patrick:You know, like that part where somebody's standing there, sing, speaking about a thing.
Patrick:Maybe it's because it's italian and I have an existing association between opera and Italian.
Patrick:It's also like, it's fast.
Patrick:So I see how it could be a marching band song or something like I would normally associate with an anthem.
Patrick:You know, I'll talk about the whole song later on, and I'm not always going to read part of it right at the outset of the show, but I am this time because the.
Patrick:The chorus really sets the stage for the feeling of the story.
Patrick:It reads, let us join you in a cohort.
Patrick:We are ready for death.
Patrick:We are ready for death.
Patrick:Italy has called.
Patrick:Yes, death appears again and again in many of these songs and death is a part of the birth of national anthems.
Patrick:In many cases, il canto degli Italiani is one of those cases.
Patrick:Some of that death is the triumphant and patriotic kind, but most of it is not triumphant or patriotic, and it just is death.
Patrick:The timing of the song's birth makes it seem less odd that it's steeped in thoughts of patriotic death.
Patrick: September of: Patrick:Personally, I prefer the 8th as the date because it was during that year that the first genoese movements for reform began and the establishment of the civic guard started.
Patrick: pe on fire with revolution in: Patrick:So it's kind of fitting that that would be the day for the national anthem to have been born.
Patrick:Before we get into it, one more thing, I want to zoom out a bit, because since Europe was on the eve of exploding into revolution, we should discuss where Italy was, or rather, where the collection of things that was modern day Italy was at the time.
Patrick:Italy is kind of an interesting place to think about in a geographical sense, because it is a naturally defined territory.
Patrick:The country is a peninsula, has several islands, like Sicily and I.
Patrick:I have forgotten the other one, I apologize.
Patrick:It's on the northern coastline of the Mediterranean Sea and the bit that attaches to Europe proper is walled off by the Alps.
Patrick:When a peninsula comes back to land, it is apparently called delimited, which is sort of a cool word anyway.
Patrick:If you're unsure of where Italy is, just look at a globe and find the thing that looks like a boot kicking Sicily into the Mediterranean Sea.
Patrick:At 116,310 sq mi, Italy comes in as the 10th largest country in Europe and the 60 million or so people that live there make it the third most populous in the EU and the 6th most populous in Europe.
Patrick:The country is bordered by France, Switzerland, Austria and Slovenia on the coast, and technically it also borders San Marino and Vatican City.
Patrick:But they are both enclaved micro states, the cooler of the two new terms I heard reading about this, it means that they're completely bordered around by only one country.
Patrick:Now, from the geographical footprint standpoint, the region has always been fairly well defined.
Patrick: Back in: Patrick: p of the italian peninsula in: Patrick:That was the process of figuring Europe out again after Napoleon ran roughshod over the continent, I told you.
Patrick:We were going to see Napoleon again.
Patrick:That is, it was currently a collection of duchies, city states, republics and kingdoms.
Patrick:The largest of them were places like the kingdom of the two Sicilies, the kingdom of Tuscany, the papal states, the kingdom of Tuscany.
Patrick:I repeated that.
Patrick:And Sardinia also.
Patrick:This collection of ununified entities suited the larger powers in Europe just fine, particularly the habsburgs of the Austro Hungarian Empire.
Patrick:They had, as part of that empire acquired the kingdom of Lombardy, Venetia.
Patrick:So they had an interest in everyone else on the peninsula.
Patrick:Staying tiny and push aroundable Italy was one of the many things that the habsburg family lost control of in the next couple of years.
Patrick:And il Canto degli Italiani was right in the middle of it.
Patrick: swept across the peninsula in: Patrick:I will not discuss the specific details of that event, as none of the principal characters in the anthem story were present for it.
Patrick:However, the young man that wrote the patriotic hymn that became the national anthem of Italy was very much involved in italian revolutionary action in the pursuit of an independent state.
Patrick:That isn't to say that the composer had no part in the events of the next several years.
Patrick:They were both Genoese.
Patrick: The poet was born in: Patrick:They were both referred to in more than one source as convinced liberals, and were part of a cadre of similar people that was large enough to achieve their goal within the lifetimes of some of the participants.
Patrick:The respective paths of all participants and where they led were remarkably different and were really only interested in the paths of two of the guys, because theyre the only two that really matter for the narrative around ino di mamelli or Mamelli's hymn, another pseudonym for the anthem.
Patrick:And our story begins with a guy called Mameli, and the chronologically shorter of the two paths.
Patrick:The poet Momelli was born into a noble family.
Patrick:His father was an admiral in command of the fleet centered at Genoa, where he was born.
Patrick:He was initially schooled at home, but he was also a sick kid.
Patrick:And at the time in Genoa, if you were a sick kid, it meant that you might die of cholera.
Patrick: iterary education in March of: Patrick:He was in the process of doing exactly that with some success.
Patrick: cal club, and by September of: Patrick:And in addition to that, he dropped out of university and devoted himself full time to the effort to unify the italian peninsula.
Patrick:Feet first can of guy.
Patrick:And it sounds like something I would have done when I was 19 or 20, because I was also an idealistic fool.
Patrick:When the italian revolution, which is properly called the resorgiamento, which Google translates as resurrection, breaks out, Geoffredo went to liberty as a volunteer, and there he met Giuseppe Manzini, a Mandev responsible for much democratic european thinking and a spearhead of the unification movement in Italy.
Patrick:Momelli was part of the march on Rome when Pius was out of the country and was there for the declaration of the new Roman Republic.
Patrick:Granted, it was a really short lived republic, and it only lasted a couple of months, but the constitution did allow for freedom of religion, and it was the first one in the west to forbid capital punishment as a provision.
Patrick:So, pretty cool.
Patrick:Shortly after that, Jeffredo was in Rome fighting with the French because they were trying to reclaim control of the papal States for really complicated reasons that I chose not to read about.
Patrick: of: Patrick:The sources are all extremely insistent that it was a minor wound, and he developed gangrene due to substandard medical care and poor treatment from the people taking care of him.
Patrick:Whether that's simple hero worship or, in fact, an accurate account, I cannot say.
Patrick:Regardless, by the time the decision was made to amputate the leg, it was too late for the brorier poet Gefredo Mamelli.
Patrick:He died on July 6, and he never lived to see the completion of the risorgiamento that he helped.
Patrick:Get going.
Patrick: re going to time junk back to: Patrick:We need to catch the composer up in the timeline.
Patrick: of: Patrick:He was the oldest of five children.
Patrick: By: Patrick: ras and smaller shows, and by: Patrick:Fun fact.
Patrick: fact, it has been there since: Patrick:It is a very cool old building, and I encourage you to look it up again.
Patrick:It is the teatro regio.
Patrick:Anyway, during this time in Turin, Navarro's standing offer for composing music for patriotic hymns and Mamelli's desire for original music coincided.
Patrick:The poet knew that this was a particularly special patriotic hymn and rejected the idea of setting it to existing music.
Patrick:He knew of Navarro and had the manuscript sent to him.
Patrick:Michael was said to be struck by the lyrics.
Patrick:Anton Borelli gives an account of how the composer describes seeing the hymn for the first time.
Patrick:I placed myself at the harpsichord with Gefredos verses on the lectern I strummed, I murdered the poor instrument with convulsive fingers, always with my eyes on the hymn, putting down melodic phrases one on top of the other.
Patrick:But far from the thousand miles to the idea that they could fit those words, I got up, displeased with me.
Patrick:I stayed a little longer at the Valerio house, but always with those verses in my minds eye I saw there was no remedy.
Patrick:I took leave and hurried home.
Patrick:There, without even taking off my hat, I threw myself at the piano.
Patrick:The motif strummed in the Valerio house came back to me and I wrote it on a sheet of paper, the first that came to my hands.
Patrick:In my agitation, I turned the lamp over the harpsichord and consequently also onto the poor sheet.
Patrick:It was the original of the hymn brothers of Italy.
Patrick:See, I told you.
Patrick:Passionate described the origin of the anthem.
Patrick:Despite his clearly strong feelings for the Risorgimento effort, what several sources again have called a convinced liberalism, and his direct involvement in writing the national anthem, Michael remained a player on the sidelines.
Patrick:He never received, or in fact sought to receive any personal benefit at all from his involvement in revolutionary affairs.
Patrick:Navarro went on to work as an impresario to teach music, and he founded a school.
Patrick:He probably lived the kind of generally quiet, respectable life that I would be happy with right up until the end, when in part on his refusal to capitalize on the success of the revolution, he succumbed to poverty and the poor health that often accompanied.
Patrick: He died in: Patrick:Once more we will jump back in time and we're gonna go right back to the release of the anthem.
Patrick: December in: Patrick:The hymn was ready to make its debut as one of the several poems to celebrate the return of Charles Albert, who was the king of Sardinia.
Patrick:He was out in Genoa for something.
Patrick:A different song was officially sung there.
Patrick:But a report by journalist Giuseppe Mazzari shows that Mamelli's poem had made a very strong impression and it was already being called a national anthem by some people.
Patrick:But the poem, for the splendor of the images, for the truly original novelty of the concept, for the vigor of the feeling, and for the natural and spontaneous harmony of the rhythm, surpasses all others in comparison and will survive the ravages of time in oblivion of the centuries.
Patrick:It is the national anthem dictated by the young Genoese momelli, which will be made public in these days.
Patrick:It is a true national anthem, the italian anthem, it will be our piena.
Patrick:Momelli's verse found a worthy interpreter in the distinguished Genoese maestro Navarro, who knew how to dress them in a melodious and magical musical guise.
Patrick:A few evenings ago, we listened to the singing of the anthem by Mamelli with the music of Navarro and were proudly moved.
Patrick:The AI translates it a little bit clumsily, but again we see the strength of feeling that people have for this song in Italy.
Patrick:At the time, the anthem did have its public debut.
Patrick:Soon after, there was a ceremony on the 10th that commemorated a genoese revolt against the austrian occupiers.
Patrick:Here, the anthem was presented in front of something like 30,000 people, many of whom were veterans of the event that was being celebrated.
Patrick:Side note that got me thinking that how big is a crowd of 30,000 people?
Patrick:It turns out that it is almost exactly the amount of people that fit in Waldo Stadium in Kansas.
Patrick:Waldo stadium in Kansas is a decent sized college football stadium.
Patrick:It's a pretty big crowd.
Patrick:All of them, or at least much of them, were probably singing too, because they all had copies of Mamelli's hymn.
Patrick:The immediate reaction to il canto degli Italiani was fairly broad acclaim amongst many of the italian patriots.
Patrick:Almost exactly the opposite reaction was fairly immediate with the savoyed authorities and especially with the Austrians.
Patrick: anned the song until March of: Patrick:I found it interesting that the strongest voice outside of the authorities that resisted the song was Mazzini himself.
Patrick:He thought that the song was not a martial enough tune, so he commissioned another called suana la tromba, or the sound of the trumpet, should you want to look the thing up.
Patrick:The new song was not picked either, despite being far more explicit in invoking combat with the invaders.
Patrick:Oh.
Patrick:Mamelli's hymn won out as the anthem of choice.
Patrick: t forward through much of the: Patrick:But we should note that the catchiness of the canto and the fact that a law prohibiting gatherings of more than ten people had recently been appealed.
Patrick:Those two factors were able to team up and make it so that the anthem was sung at nearly every event that they had.
Patrick:The fifth verse was left off for a while because it was anti austrian.
Patrick:But that ban ended with the beginning of the first War of Independence.
Patrick:We're talking like six or seven months, so it was a pretty short ban then.
Patrick: he fight for unification from: Patrick:That is, right up until the actual reunification happened, because in a tale that you will have to read about in one of the books out there, the end result of the Risorgiamento is the proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy, where Vittorio Emanuel II assumed the title of king for himself and his successors.
Patrick:It is far less of a jarring transition from revolution to constitutional monarchy.
Patrick:If the entire story is followed for our purposes, suffice to say that a song about the republican and jacobin nature of italian independent thought was not the song that the king let become the national anthem.
Patrick:He picked the royal march that became the anthem.
Patrick: d after Rome was liberated in: Patrick:As with other anthems that pop up along the way, when I'm telling my story, maybe this one will get a story at another time.
Patrick:What happened to Il canto degli Italiani during the Kingdom of Italy and then further on through Mussolini's fascism.
Patrick:It actually remained really popular at certain times, and that carried it through whenever there was something that the Italians were patriotic about.
Patrick: an after the march on Rome in: Patrick:And the king said that he thought that would be an absolutely crackers idea.
Patrick:So he abdicated, put his son Umberto in power.
Patrick:Umberto came into power in May, and then in the middle of June, he transferred all executive power and authority to the prime minister, Benito Mussolini, and retreated into exile.
Patrick:As you may imagine, there were some restrictions on the music you were allowed to play or listen to during fascism.
Patrick:The Mamelli hymn, though, did not disappear completely due to its cultural saturation.
Patrick:It was actually occasionally granted special dispensation and allowed to be played at events through World War Two.
Patrick:The hymn was particularly popular among the many anti fascist groups that arose on the peninsula, with some historians even floating the idea that this was the deciding factor in the anthem being adopted at the end of the war.
Patrick: October: Patrick:Now we time jump forward through 60 something years of debate, criticism, failed attempts to replace, many efforts to elevate, and the failed forcing through of several bills.
Patrick:Honestly, it's not exciting and it does not do much to move the story along.
Patrick:So we're going to skip over it like a rock on a lake, and I will spare you with the bureaucratic drudgery that is the italian parliament.
Patrick: June: Patrick: of: Patrick:With that, we have El canto degli Italiani as the national anthem of Italy.
Patrick:It's very fitting that the story of an anthem is a memorable, if small, part of the union of a country that it is written for.
Patrick:The hymn only made it through this long stretch of time to be made official because of the shared passion of the italian people for the song.
Patrick:They sang it whenever they were fighting or striving for unity, independence, and freedom.
Patrick:Regardless of what their government looked like, it survived at least four serious challenges to its choice as the anthem.
Patrick:And you know, what kind of a song can inspire such fervor in people?
Patrick:It's got to be a national anthem, or perhaps something religious.
Patrick:Let's have a look at this one.
Patrick:In a refreshing change from the trend of things that I've been reading about lately, there was a great deal of analysis about this song, musically and poetically speaking, so I had a lot more to work with.
Patrick:This hymn is written as six double quatrains of senari, each of which is followed by a single quatrain of senari in ritornello.
Patrick:That means that each eight line stanza is constructed with a pair of four line verses that have a particular rhyming pattern.
Patrick:Further the scenari means that each of these rhyming patterns needs to be six syllables.
Patrick:The chorus is a single quatrain of six syllable lines that rhyme, and ritornello means refrain, which is essentially the chorus.
Patrick:The specifics of poetic meter don't seem to be terribly important in this one.
Patrick:It has kind of just an abab rhyming scheme.
Patrick:But if anybody has any thoughts or resources on some kind of poetry stuff that applies to this, as always, let me know.
Patrick:I'm open to being corrected.
Patrick:On to the verse.
Patrick:The first reads as brothers of Italy, Italy has awoken.
Patrick:Bound Scipio's helmet upon her head.
Patrick:Where is victory?
Patrick:Let her bow down, because as a slave of Rome, God created her.
Patrick:This first line is in a lot of resorgiamento poetry.
Patrick:Proponents of the movement wanted the italian people to be seen as one.
Patrick:The next two lines refer to the great roman general Scipio Africanus, that defeated Hannibal's army at Carthage and ended 17 years of bloodshed in Rome's african provinces.
Patrick:The rest of the verse assures the people that the goddess of victory will, in the more literal translation, tender her hair to Rome to be cut.
Patrick:And as being a student of the classics in roman history, in particular Washington and vogue at the time, an aristocrat like Mamelli would certainly know that a short haired roman girl was a slave.
Patrick:The refrain we met at the beginning of the show, but here it is again.
Patrick:Let us join in a cohort.
Patrick:We are ready for death.
Patrick:We are ready for death.
Patrick:Italy has called.
Patrick:Yes, pretty clear stuff.
Patrick:Although I will note that cohort is not just, hey, lets make a club.
Patrick:It is a specific roman unit, equal to one 10th of a legion.
Patrick:Here we are again, leaning on the assumption that Mamelli would have known about ancient Rome.
Patrick:So the refrain is a call from the country to band together into a unit to fight and die for the cause.
Patrick:In the original writing, there were only three lines.
Patrick:There is no repeated line, and the yes exclamation at the end was added in before final printing.
Patrick:It seems that the repeated line was edited for poetic circularity, you know, to make it into a quatrain.
Patrick:And maybe the yelly yes is in there for musical purposes, but that's not real clear to me.
Patrick:The second 1st says, we were for centuries downtrodden, derided, because we are not one people, because we are divided.
Patrick:Let one flag, one hope, gather us all.
Patrick:The hour has struck for us to unite.
Patrick:Here is another, I think, pretty straightforward but still stirring verse.
Patrick:I'm actually reminded a bit of Ben Franklin, when reading it reminds me of his join or die cartoon that was to inspire the colonies to join together.
Patrick:When Mellie is highlighting essentially the same thing and saying that Italy's problems arise from not sharing the hope for a united and strong italian nation.
Patrick:The third verse let us unite, let us love one another, union and love reveal to the peoples the ways of the Lord.
Patrick:Let us swear to set free the land of our birth, united by God who can overcome us.
Patrick:More clear and evocative lyricism from our poetical it is a very christian heavy verse because it was written by a guy that was probably pretty religious.
Patrick: He was born in Italy in: Patrick:Dude was almost certainly catholic.
Patrick:So there's like a lot of, well, of course, to seeing God referred to so fervently in this anthem.
Patrick:But Gefrado is able to stay on topic and calls for unity because God will only reveal his ways and protect Italy's triumph.
Patrick:If Italy is one country, it's clever and it would have been quite effective for a 19th century Catholic.
Patrick:The fourth verse from the alps to Sicily, Legnano is everywhere.
Patrick:Every man hath the heart and hand of Ferruccio, the children of Italy, they are all called Belilia.
Patrick:Every trumpet blast soundeth the vespers.
Patrick:This verse is a complicated series of historical references that took me forever to read through a bunch of sometimes very rough AI translations to be able to summarize the struggles against the invading forces that were faced by the descendants of Rome.
Patrick:So here we go.
Patrick: two lines are referring to an: Patrick:The next two lines refer to Francisco Ferrucci, a guy with a pretty wild story for himself.
Patrick:He was sort of a military commander, but also a castle administrator and kind of a knight and a frontline fighter and some other kind of a governor.
Patrick:But he was always in the service of Florence.
Patrick: unded and chained in the year: Patrick: lled Balila, who started in a: Patrick:Against, big surprise, the Habsburgs, he began the liberation of his city by hitting a cop with a rock.
Patrick: o the ringing of the bells in: Patrick:This began the war of the Vespers that resulted in the liberation of Sicily from the Angevins Mamelli evidently rid his history in school and he uses it to again stay laser focused on his point.
Patrick:All of the references are to the defense of Italy that resulted in the invaders being triumphantly repelled on two five the mercenary swords are feeble reeds.
Patrick:Already the eagle of Austria has lost its plumes.
Patrick:The blood of Italy, the polish blood it drank along with the cossack, but it burned its heart.
Patrick:This is the verse that was banned when the Austrians were in power and not being revolted against.
Patrick:It seemed weird to me at first to be singing about Russia and Poland in a patriotic italian song, but the polish were also being repressed by the Austrians in a team up with the Russians.
Patrick:What Momelli is saying here is that the mercenary soldiers are weaker than patriots and the habsburg empire was being undermined by the resistance of the Italians and the Polish at the same time.
Patrick:Again, he is right on message.
Patrick:We can win and fight against the Austrians because we are not alone.
Patrick:The 6th and final verse long live Italy.
Patrick:She has awoken from slumber bound Scipios helmet upon her head.
Patrick:Where is victory?
Patrick:Let her bow down, because as a slave of Rome, God created her.
Patrick:My understanding is that this verse is generally not performed.
Patrick:It is another odd one because its not in the very first draft of the poem.
Patrick:Then it appears in the second, then again in Navarros musical piece, but not in the first official printing of the anthem.
Patrick:It is a slight rewording of the first two lines of the stanza, followed by the same six preceding lines in this verse, though their first line anticipates a successful unity for Italy, making things poetically circular.
Patrick:All told, Mamelli is very, very clearly focused on making his point.
Patrick:In my reading, I've seen his writing referred to as heavily rhetorical and difficult to interpret by virtue of historical references that are far from apparently.
Patrick:They are both fair criticisms, but the intended audience for this song at the time would have gotten almost all of the references, and they clearly love the thing.
Patrick:Navarro's music played no small part in the popularity and power of the song.
Patrick:My initial first impression of Mamelli's hymn feeling operatic was actually not a terrible guess because the music is written as something called a cabaletta.
Patrick:It is in fact part two of a two part section favored for arias in mid 17th century italian opera, literally what Navarro did for a living at the time.
Patrick:So he's just kind of doing his job for the revolution.
Patrick:Melodically speaking, it is not a terribly complex four 4 March.
Patrick:That's mostly in BB major.
Patrick:Navarro took Momeli's six part syncopation and set it to a six part musical phrase in the twelve bars introduction to the piece.
Patrick:The first eight bars oscillate between Bb major and g minor, and then they settle into BB major for the rest of the song.
Patrick:Michael made a couple of unusual musical choices because I have no idea.
Patrick:Again, my amateurism is showing here.
Patrick:If you know what they're talking about when they say anacrusic rhythm, please send me an email and explain it.
Patrick:All told, it's not a really bad anthem.
Patrick:It's steeped in meaning.
Patrick:It's extremely patriotic.
Patrick:It's written by people involved in the early action that resulted in the state that it was chosen to represent.
Patrick:And it's actually not a bad song, if a little bit long in its full version.
Patrick:So we are going to wrap this up.
Patrick:The writing, recording and production for the show are done by me and I also wrote played the intro outro music.
Patrick:The music was used with my permission unless otherwise noted.
Patrick:The anthems I play are public domain stuff.
Patrick:Sources and other tasty bits I find are going to be in the show notes.
Patrick:The most direct way to get to those show notes is@anthemspodcast.com dot.
Patrick:You can find me on Facebook and Instagram as the anthemspodcast.
Patrick:Also, I think I'm on WhatsApp, but I don't know if I did that right, and I also don't know if I'll have the energy to get on the rest of the socials.
Patrick:You can email me corrections, comments, suggestions, ideas, instructions on how to do awesome things concerns and even ask me questions@anthemspodmail.com.
Patrick: le to leave me a voicemail at:
