The history of the Vittoriano, an Italian national monument complex located in Rome's Piazza Venezia on the northern slope of the Capitoline Hill, began in 1878 when it was decided to erect in the capital a permanent monument named after Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy, the first king of Italy in the modern era, who brought the process of Italian unification to fruition, so much so that he is referred to by historiography as the “Father of the Fatherland.”

In 1880, a first international competition was announced for the construction of the monument, won by Frenchman Henri-Paul Nénot, but this was not followed by an implementation phase of the project. This first attempt was followed in 1882 by a second competition, won by Giuseppe Sacconi, who later became the architect who designed the Vittoriano. The foundation stone of the monument was solemnly laid by King Umberto I of Savoy in 1885. To erect it it was necessary to proceed, between 1885 and 1888, with numerous expropriations and demolitions of pre-existing buildings in the area adjacent to the Capitol, carried out thanks to a precise program established by the government led by Agostino Depretis.

The monumental complex was inaugurated by King Victor Emmanuel III of Savoy on June 4, 1911, on the occasion of the events connected with the National Exhibition, during the celebrations of the 50th anniversary of the Unification of Italy. In 1921 part of the monument, the Altar of the Fatherland, originally an altar of the goddess Roma, was chosen to house the remains of the Unknown Soldier, whose body was buried on November 4 in a ceremony attended by a huge crowd. The last completion works took place in 1935, with the construction of the Central Museum of the Risorgimento, which was inaugurated and opened to the public decades later, in 1970.

With the advent of fascism (1922) the Vittoriano became one of the stages of the regime led by Benito Mussolini. With the fall of Fascism (July 25, 1943) and the end of World War II (September 2, 1945), from which resulted the referendum of June 2, 1946, after which the Italian Republic was proclaimed, the Vittoriano, emptied of the military content that was associated with it by Fascism, returned to its previous function, becoming again - through the evocation of the figure of Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy and the realization of the Altar of the Fatherland - a secular temple metaphorically dedicated to free and united Italy and celebrating - by virtue of the burial of the Unknown Soldier - the sacrifice for the fatherland and for the ideals connected to it. In the 1960s a slow disinterest of Italians in the Vittoriano began: the latter was in fact no longer seen as one of the symbols of national identity, but as a cumbersome monument representing an Italy outdated by history.

It was the President of the Italian Republic Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, at the beginning of the 21st century, who began a work of valorization and revitalization of Italy's patriotic symbols, including the Vittoriano. Thanks to Ciampi, the Vittoriano once again became the most important place where the most symbolically rich national events are organized. Ciampi's initiative was continued by his successors.

Background

After the death of Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy on January 9, 1878, there were many initiatives intended to erect a permanent monument celebrating the first king of united Italy, that is, to the one who brought to fruition the process of Italian unification and liberation from foreign domination, so much so that he is referred to by historiography as the “Father of the Fatherland,” partly due to the political work of the Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Sardinia Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour and the military contribution of Giuseppe Garibaldi.. The goal was thus to commemorate the entire Risorgimento period through one of its protagonists.

The first official act intended for the construction of a monument dedicated to Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy was a resolution of the Rome city council dated January 10, 1878... In this act it was decided to allocate one hundred thousand liras and to set up a national fund-raising campaign whose objective would be to raise funds destined to erect a permanent monument dedicated to Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy to be built in Rome.

This initiative was followed, on March 26, 1878, by a bill filed in the Chamber of Deputies of the Kingdom of Italy by MP Francesco Perroni Paladini with the same objective. On April 4, the government took up this indication represented by Giuseppe Zanardelli, Minister of the Interior of the Kingdom of Italy, who filed a similar bill in the Council of Ministers.

Zanardelli's bill was approved by the Parliament of the Kingdom of Italy on May 16, 1878. with 211 votes in favor and 10 votes against. An excerpt from this legislative act, which was the first formal step addressed to the erection of the monument, reads:

The bill did not specify the type of monument, nor did it specify the place in Rome where it would be erected, since it delegated the decision on these matters to a special commission that would be chaired by the president of the Council of Ministers and made up of nine senators, nine deputies, the mayor of Rome as well as the minister of public education and the minister of public works..

The work of this commission led the president of the Council of Ministers to present the executive project of the monument to the Chamber of Deputies on June 14, 1879. The latter specified the details of the initiative: an international public competition would be announced; the public funds earmarked for the work would amount to eight million liras (to which would then be added the money raised by a public fundraising campaign open to all Italians, including those who had moved abroad during the Italian migration of the late 19th and early 20th centuries); the monument would be erected in the square of the Baths of Diocletian; the type of construction would be a triumphal arch; the allegorical meanings it was to convey would be “independence,” “unity,” and “freedom”; it was to depict, through architectural and artistic works, the history of the Risorgimento..

All of the commission's important decisions were contested: those concerning the method decided for the call for entries (the international significance of the competition, which would have given the possibility of victory to foreign artists: this was, according to some, incompatible with the national character of the monument being erected), the type of monument chosen and the place where it would be erected.. The fall of Agostino Depretis' government on July 14, 1879, caused the temporary postponement of the project; it was resumed in March 1880 after the general elections in May of that year..

A new commission was set up, which decided to remove all constraints from the notice, which would still be international: the latter, in fact, no longer specified either the place where the monument would be erected (the possible choices were: Piazza di Termini (the modern “Piazza dei Cinquecento”), Piazza Vittorio Emanuele II, the Pincian Hill, the Prati district or the Capitoline Hill) nor the type of construction to be built (the possibilities were: statues, triumphal arches, pantheons, simple arches and/or monumental squares). This proposal was later approved by parliament.

The first competition

On September 13, 1880, the “Royal Commission for the Monument to Victor Emmanuel II” was established,. which announced on September 23 of the same month an international competition in which three hundred and eleven competitors then participated.. All the designs were exhibited to the public on December 15, 1881 at the Santa Susanna Agricultural Museum.

The competition was won by Frenchman Henri-Paul Nénot, but this was not followed by an implementation phase of the project.. Nénot's idea was to build a triumphal arch with three fornixes along Via Nazionale at the entrance to Piazza di Termini (Nénot chose this location because it was one of the busiest “entrances” to Rome, given the proximity of the Termini train station): a flight of steps surrounded by eight statues was to be erected there, in the center of which was a statue of Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy, portrayed standing and with his arm raised.. Four fountains were also to be placed in the square.

It was decided not to go ahead with the project for various reasons. The heated controversy over the fact that the winner was, for a monument representing a prominent figure in Italian history, a foreigner; the fact that Nénot's idea was, as discovered only later, a slightly updated version of an earlier design for a French university that he carried out in 1877.. Added to this was the tension due to the so-called “slap of Tunis,” or the occupation of Tunisia by France, Nénot's nation of origin...

Another reason for the failure to implement Nénot's project was the excessive freedom given to the artists in choosing the place of construction and the type of monument to be built, guidelines that had led to a flourishing of architectural proposals that were too different from each other (in total there were 293 projects filed). They ranged from very simple monuments formed by monumental columns and equestrian statues, to complex and large buildings.

The runners-up were Ettore Ferrari and Pio Piacentini, who produced a collaboratively drafted proposal that was much liked, which envisaged the construction of a monument on the northern slope of the Capitoline hill, namely that on which the basilica of Santa Maria in Aracoeli stands.. Ferrari-Piacentini's project envisaged a monument to be built alongside the aforementioned basilica in the form of an imposing marble construction marked by ascending tiers of steps, with a majestic colonnade on its summit and with a statue of Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy seated on a throne, which would be the centerpiece of the architectural complex.. This design was the one later realized with the construction of the Vittoriano, which has precisely such features, with the appropriate variations (the pose of the king would later be on horseback and not on a throne)..

The second competition

The preparatory phase

Since the excessive freedom granted by the notice had led to the failure of the first competition, it was decided to hold a second one that would establish, this time, both the place of construction and the precise characteristics of the building.

The debate prior to the holding of the second competition was dominated by the choice of the place where the monument would be erected: the Capitoline Hill, the preferred solution from the beginning of the discussion; the Piazza di Termini, which was on the border between the historic district of Rome and more recent buildings (“between the old and the new Rome,” as it is stated on the minutes of the commission); or the enlargement and modification of the Pantheon and the adjacent Piazza della Rotonda with the construction of new monumental buildings. In the debate it was also proposed, in case the Vittoriano was to be built on the Capitoline Hill, the demolition of the pre-existing Palazzo Senatorio to the ground level of the underlying Tabularium, which would serve as the foundation for the monument dedicated to Victor Emmanuel II: the latter would thus dominate the Imperial Fora.