2016-12-28 Wed

"A republican form of government is not suited to the Italian people. They are not prepared for it either temperamentally or historically. In a republic, every Italian would insist upon being President, and the result would be chaos. The only people who would profit would be the Communists".
-HM King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy

Victor Emmanuel III the last king of Italy saw both world wars and rise and fall of Benito Mussolini’s fascism and Adolf Hitler’s Nazism. The throne of Italy was passed to Victor after the assassination of his father Umberto I in 1900. He ruled the unified Italy but Italy was also a deeply fragmented society which was steep in poverty and corruption.

During World War I Italy adopted to be neutral despite having an alliance with Germany and Austrian-Hungarian Empire. King Victor favoured participation in the war to improve the image and state of Italy and entered in the war on 1915 in Triple entente allies-France, Russia, and Great Britain.

Victor Emmanuel III was a coin collector. This two silver lire coin was issued in his reign and was minted in Rome. Its obverse depicts the uniformed bust of Victor Emanuel III facing right with a legend “VITTORIO. EMANUELLE. III. RE. D’ITALIA” meaning “Victor Emmanuel II of Italy” and it also consists engravers initial on the truncation.

The reverse of this silver coin depicts an Italia (personification of Italy) standing on a quadriga wearing a helmet and holding a shield and an olive branch. In exergue the date, mint initials of Rome ‘R’ and denomination ‘L.2’ are inscribed.

The after-effect of World War I on Italy was demobilization, unemployment, and inflation. Socialists, communists, anarchists and the newly-formed fascists fought on the streets. King opposed Italy’s entry in World War II but was unable to prevent Mussolini from declaring war on France and Great Britain in 1940. After three years Italy faced defeat and a vote was held to remove Mussolini from power. On King’s order, Mussolini was arrested and held in captivity.

After the end of World War II, Victor Emmanuel III was forced to abdicate the throne of Italy. He named his son his successor but three weeks after this event a vote was held to decide the faith of Italy’s monarchy and the nation voted 54.3 percent in the favour of a Republic Italy and so monarchy ended in Italy.

Today on 28th December 1947 Victor Emmanuel III died in exile in Egypt.