The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies

Auth: (treccani.it)

The facts that led to the proclamation of the Neapolitan Republic n. (Jan. 22, 1799) belong to the context of the Napoleonic campaign in Italy and the enthusiasm it generated in the democratic circles of the peninsula, which led to the Jacobin republics which were established between 1797 and 1799 in central-northern Italy and in Rome. 

The French occupation of Rome (1798) is to be placed at the origin of the Neapolitan events. The Bourbon of Naples reacted to it: the court of Naples stipulated an alliance with Austria in 1798 and the Austrian general K. von Mack, who arrived in the capital at the request of Ferdinand IV, crossed the border of the kingdom with the Bourbon troops. 23 nov. 1798 and already on the 27th he was in Rome, where the king of Naples arrived two days later. But the French soon resumed the initiative and in mid-December they were again masters of Rome. The military reverse sowed panic among the Bourbons; on 21 Dec the king fled the city aboard an English ship that would take him to Sicily. In Naples remained a defeated army and a vicar of the king of limited capacity, Prince F. Pignatelli. 

Since the early nineties of the eighteenth century, democratic circles of Jacobin and revolutionary inspiration were active in Naples; in agreement with these elements, the French general J.-E. Championnet prepared the coup d'état to take over Castel Sant’Elmo and thus facilitate the entry of his troops into the city. On 11 January, at the news of the truce stipulated by Pignatelli with the French, the bands of commoners who after the king's flight effectively controlled the city rose up in praise of the Holy Faith and St. Gennaro, and swearing death to the Jacobins. But Championnet was not intimidated; having secured control of Castel Sant’Elmo, where the patriots had penetrated on January 20, he shelled the city from the battlements of the fortress. The price of repression was very high: 3,000 commoners were killed. On the 23rd the French took control of the city, on the 24th they recognized the Republic and accepted its provisional government. At the head of the revolutionary junta was the most chosen component of the southern intelligentsia. The Constitution was drafted by Mario Pagano; the provisional government included, among others, V. Russo, C. Lauberg, G.M. Galanti, M. Delfico. Among his first acts there was the abolition of fidecommessi and primogeniture, while the problem of feudal property remained largely unanswered. 

The Neapolitan Republic had a short life and struggled between financial difficulties and insurrectional outbreaks. Cardinal F. Ruffo, organized a popular army in Calabria, called the Holy Faith, spread the outbreaks of the anti-French insurrection throughout the Republic. The British, for their part, attempted an offensive from the sea, briefly occupying the island of Procida. In April, the worsening of the military situation in northern Italy following the Austro-Russian offensive forced the French to disengage from the southern regions. The Neapolitan patriots were left alone to face the enemy forces and on 13 June the Sanfedist army took over the city again, putting an end to the republican government. The repression was very severe: Eleonora Pimentel Fonseca (1752-99) was among the victims.