ENLIGHTENMENT AND REVOLUTION: NAPLES 1799

Abstract

TWO hundred years ago today, on 22 January 1799, French troops forced their way into the city of Naples. In doing so, they confirmed the authority of the Neapolitan Republic which had been proclaimed, one and indivisible, the day before by a group of patriots who had taken control of the Castel Sant'Elmo, the fortress on the hill immediately above the centre of the city. Thus began the last of the revolutions which can be regarded as the offspring of the great French Revolution of 1789. There is no denying that the Neapolitan Revolution, like its predecessors in northern Italy and elsewhere, depended on French military intervention. The patriots were not in control of the city before 22 January, and needed the French to quell the popular violence and disorder which had swept the city for the previous week. And when, after three months, the French withdrew their forces, the republicans' hold on the city was too precarious to last more than a few weeks.