She was the fourth and final member of the Etna class, which included three sister ships of slightly smaller dimensions.

Ettore Fieramosca had a relatively uneventful career; her first decade in service was confined to the normal peacetime routine of training with the Italian fleet.

She thereafter spent most of her career abroad, including a deployment to China to help suppress the Boxer Uprising in 1900 and tours in African and North American waters in the mid-1900s.

The four ships of the Etna class were designed in Italy as domestically produced versions of the British-built cruiser Giovanni Bausan.

These cruisers were intended to serve as "battleship destroyers",[1][2] and represented a temporary embrace of the Jeune École doctrine by the Italian naval command.

Ettore Fieramosca was the fastest ship in her class and reached a maximum speed of 18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph) from 7,000 ihp (5,200 kW) during her sea trials.

[4] The main armament of the ships consisted of two Armstrong 254 mm (10 in), 30-caliber breech-loading guns mounted in barbettes fore and aft.

Later that month, she visited Philadelphia, where several of her officers, including Cali, attended a celebration for Admiral George Dewey of the US Navy on 30 November.