Italy's king arrested

What's that, you say? You weren't aware that Italy had king? You'd be right, technically. I'm speaking of Vittorio Emanuele, one of the heirs to the house of Savoy, those imperialists who, along with their stooge Garibaldi, invaded the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, terrorized the natives suppressed the native tongues, pillaged Naples' manufacturing sector in order to relocate the machinery in Turin, and turned what was once the most beautiful city in the world — Vedi Napoli e muori, "See Naples and [then] you [can] die" — into a crime-ridden rat's nest of such abysmal poverty that more southern Italians live outside southern Italy now remain. All the while, the Savoys portrayed themselves to the world as the bearers of democracy and enlightened government to a region that was mired in foreign occupation.

What's that, you say? You naven't heard the history of Italy quite that way? Of course not; it's a conspiracy. :-)

As to the arrest, suffice to say that they deal with organized crime. This being Italy, one cannot be sure whether the prosecutor means the government in Rome or the Sicilian mafia; fortunately, the article clarifies that both are meant. Apparently Sig. Emanuele and the Christian Democrats (or what's left of them) were involved.

As for that history of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, a large number of southern Italians see the state of Italy as yet another occupation in a string of occupations that goes back centuries, or even millennia. Southern and northern Italians do not look at each other kindly. If you doubt me, I have evidence; short of visiting southern Italy and interviewing a large enough sample, you could simply watch the film Cristo si è fermato a Eboli ("Christ stopped at Eboli").

Some southerners have organized into groups that claim the history that I've summarized above. I'm not quite sure how reliable that history is. Crime, corruption, and crushing poverty almost certainly predated the Savoys, and there is abundant evidence that southern Italians were not happy with the house of Bourbon, even if they did build the first railroad on the Italian peninsula and adopt the Neapolitan tongue as the official language at court.

The heirs of Savoy were exiled from Italy after World War II and were prohibited from returning until recently. That ban was lifted in 2002. Of all the places the prince chose for a return to Italy, he chose Naples, perhaps because Vittorio Emanuele was born there, and because his father had named him prince of Naples rather than prince of Piedmont. Here was the welcome some Neapolitans gave them:

Those flags bear bear the arms of the house of Bourbon. Jatevenne in Neapolitan dialect means, "Get lost." It's similar to the Italian "Andatevene", but far less polite. Who knows? Now that he finds himself arrested, Sig. Emanuele may wish that he had taken their advice.

Actual quote!

I greatly regret having contributed to the return of Vittorio Emanuele to Italy after his long exile. I realize that we have unfortunately thereby placed him thereby into the hands of the Italian judicial system, that first arrests people, then takes 20 years to decide whether the motives for the arrest were justified or mistaken.

Carlo Giovanardi, UDC