"Italians, the good people" (Italian : Italiani brava gente) is a phrase adopted by historians to refer to Italian popular beliefs about the allegedly limited, even non-existent, participation of Fascist Italy and the Royal Italian Army in the Holocaust and war crimes committed by Axis soldiers during World War II. The phenomenon is also known as the myth of the good Italian. [1] [2]
A form of historical revisionism which emerged under the post-war republic, it was argued that Italian soldiers had been "good" or "decent people" (brava gente) who had acted with humanity and compassion, supposedly inherent Italian values, in contrast to their ideologically motivated and brutal German allies. [3] In particular, it argued that the Italians had not participated in, or even had opposed, the Nazi persecution of Jews in occupied parts of Eastern Europe. [4] [5] By extension, the term is sometimes applied to describe popular beliefs about the Italo-Ethiopian War (1935–36) or non-Jewish responses to the Holocaust in Italy. [6] Hannah Arendt supports the myth by maintaining that Italian Jews had been protected by the "general, spontaneous humanity of a people of ancient civilization". [7]
The concept is based on the benevolent characteristics of the Italian people, such as to make them potentially immune from inhumanity towards the enemy in war or towards colonized nations, and capable of guaranteeing Italians special indulgence in return from other peoples. Pierluigi Battista defines it as:
A shield of good-naturedness, joviality, a natural inclination towards meekness and cordial sociability which should have protected [the Italians] from brutal hostility, a comfortable cushion capable of cushioning the dramatic impact of history and cruelty. [8]
In contrast with Battista and others, who trace the rise of the myth to the post-World War II period, [8] [9] Angelo Del Boca points out that its origins are older and date back to the beginning of Italian colonial expansion (1885), in which the country, the last to start it among the European powers, programmatically attempted to show itself different, more human, a bringer of civilization, strong as it was in its history. [10] This led to the affirmation of the phrase, distorted by the Eritrean population, of bono italiano ('good Italian'). [11]
Notable examples of the phenomenon in popular culture are the film Mediterraneo (1991) directed by Gabriele Salvatores and the novel Captain Corelli's Mandolin (1994) by Louis de Bernières which was also adapted into a film in 2001. [4] The myth avoided "a public debate on collective responsibility, guilt and denial, repentance and pardon" but has recently been challenged by historians. [4] The myth parallels the popular beliefs about the "Clean Wehrmacht" popular in post-war West Germany or the "victim theory" in Austria.
"Il Canto degli Italiani" is a patriotic song written by Goffredo Mameli and set to music by Michele Novaro in 1847, currently used as the national anthem of Italy. It is best known among Italians as the "Inno di Mameli", after the author of the lyrics, or "Fratelli d'Italia", from its opening line. The piece, in 4/4 time signature and B-flat major key, has six strophes, and a refrain sung after each. The sixth group of verses, almost never performed, recalls the first strophe's text.
Italian war crimes have mainly been associated with the Kingdom of Italy, Fascist Italy and the Italian Social Republic starting from the Italo-Turkish War then to Pacification of Libya, the Second Italo-Ethiopian War, the Spanish Civil War, and World War II.
Mediterraneo is a 1991 Italian war comedy-drama film directed by Gabriele Salvatores and written by Enzo Monteleone. The film is set during World War II and concerns a group of Italian soldiers who become stranded on an island of the Italian Dodecanese in the Aegean Sea, and are left behind by the war. It won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1992.
The Italian racial laws, otherwise referred to as the Racial Laws, were a series of laws promulgated by the government of Benito Mussolini in Fascist Italy from 1938 to 1944 in order to enforce racial discrimination and segregation in the Kingdom of Italy. The main victims of the Racial Laws were Italian Jews and the African inhabitants of the Italian Empire.
Cavalier Angelo Donati was an Italian banker and philanthropist, and a diplomat of the San Marino Republic in Paris.
Angelo Del Boca was an Italian journalist and historian. He specialized in the study of the Italian Colonial Empire, and the involvement in Libya, Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Somalia during the first part of 20th century. Del Boca was the first post-WWII Italian scholar to devote himself extensively to the study of Fascist Italy's expansion in Africa, and to publish information on the crimes committed by the Italian army in Ethiopia and Libya during its period of Fascism and World War II.
The Acqui Award of History is an Italian prize. The prize was founded in 1968 for remembering the victims of the Acqui Military Division who died in Cefalonia fighting against the Nazis. The jury is composed of seven members: six full professors of history and a group of sixty (60) ordinary readers who have just one representative in the jury. The Acqui Award Prize is divided into three sections: history, popular history, and historical novels. A special prize entitled “Witness to the Times,” given to individual personalities known for their cultural contributions and who have distinguished themselves in describing historical events and contemporary society, may also be conferred. Beginning in 2003 special recognition for work in multimedia and iconography--”History through Images”—was instituted.
Yekatit 12, also known in Italy as the Addis Ababa massacre, is a date in the Ge'ez calendar which refers to the massacre and imprisonment of Ethiopians by the Italian occupation forces following an attempted assassination of Marshal Rodolfo Graziani, Marquis of Negele, Viceroy of Italian East Africa, on 19 February 1937. Graziani had led the Italian forces to victory over the Ethiopians in the Second Italo-Ethiopian War and was supreme governor of Italian East Africa. It has been described as the worst massacre in Ethiopian history.
Italians of Ethiopia are Ethiopian-born citizens who are fully or partially of Italian descent, whose ancestors were Italians who emigrated to Ethiopia starting in the 19th century during the Italian diaspora, or Italian-born people in Ethiopia.
The Fasci d'Azione Rivoluzionaria was an Italian political movement founded in 1914 by Benito Mussolini, and active mainly in 1915. Sponsored by Alceste De Ambris, Mussolini, and Angelo Oliviero Olivetti, it was a pro-war movement aiming to promote Italian entry into World War I. It was connected to the world of revolutionary interventionists and inspired by the programmatic manifesto of the Fascio Rivoluzionario d'Azione Internazionalista, dated 5 October 1914.
The Holocaust in Italy was the persecution, deportation, and murder of Jews between 1943 and 1945 in the Italian Social Republic, the part of the Kingdom of Italy occupied by Nazi Germany after the Italian surrender on 8 September 1943, during World War II.
The Scioa Governorate, also known as the Shewa Governorate, was one of the six governorates of Italian East Africa. It was formed in 1936 from parts of the conquered Ethiopian Empire following the Second Italo-Ethiopian War with its administrative capital being Addis Abeba.
Pietro Pintor was an Italian general during World War II. Pintor was the uncle of the antifascist journalist Giaime Pintor.
Gustavo Pesenti was an Italian general. He was Italian colonial governor of Somaliland.
Good Germans is an ironic term — usually placed between single quotes such as 'Good Germans' — referring to German citizens during and after World War II who claimed not to have supported the Nazi regime, but remained silent and did not resist in a meaningful way. The term is further used to describe those who claimed ignorance of the Holocaust and German war crimes.
Giorgio Pisanò was an Italian journalist, essayist and fascist politician.
Antonio Gianettini was an Italian organist, concertmaster and composer.
Agenore Frangipani was an Italian general and colonial official, and the last Italian governor of Addis Ababa and Scioa.
Mario Bernasconi was an Italian Air Force general during World War II. He commanded the Reparto Speciale Alta Velocità during the interwar period, the Aviazione Legionaria during the Spanish Civil War, and the 5th Air Fleet in North Africa during World War II.
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