Page 70 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Italy

68  INTRODUCING IT AL Y

Modern Italy

Fascism under Mussolini (1922–43) promised the Italians
greatness, but delivered only humiliation. In spite of
this, Italy has become one of Europe’s leading economies,
with a standard of living that could not have been
imagined at the turn of the 20th century. This has been
achieved in the face of great obstacles. Since 1946, the
Republic has passed through many crises: a series of
unstable coalitions, the terrorist outrages in the 1970s 1936 Fiat produces first “Topolino” car
and, in the 1990s, corruption scandals involving
numerous government ministers and officials. 1960 La Dolce Vita,
Federico Fellini’s film
satire on Rome’s
decadent café
society, is released
1922 Fascists
march on Rome; 1940 Italy
Mussolini invited to enters World
form government War II
1918 Austrian
advance halted
1900 Assassination at the river Piave, 1943 Allies land in Sicily; Italy
of King Umberto I just north of signs armistice and new
1911–12 Italy Venice Badoglio government
conquers Libya declares war on Germany
1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960
1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960
1908 Earthquake
destroys many 1943 1946 Referendum
towns and villages Mussolini in which Italy votes
in Calabria and 1915 1936 Italy conquers Abyssinia; imprisoned, to become a
eastern Sicily; Italy enters pact with Germany, forming then freed by republic; Christian
Messina almost World War I anti-Communist “Axis” Germans Democrat party
completely razed forms first of a long
to the ground; 1920s Postwar years see continued series of coalition
over 150,000 die emigration to the United States. governments
Here, emigrants cheer as they reach
New York aboard the Giulio Cesare

1957 Treaty of Rome;
Italy one of the six founder
members of the European
Economic Community

1960 Olympic Games and first official
1917 Defeat at Paralympic Games held in Rome
Caporetto on Italy’s
northeastern border;
Italian troops, such as
these Alpini, retreat to
defensive positions
1909 In his Futurist
Manifesto, Filippo Marinetti
condemns all traditional art as
too static. His idea of a new
dynamic art is expressed in
works such as Umberto
Boccioni’s bronze Unique
Forms of Continuity in Space

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