It was based on the play La Bataille de Toulouse by Joseph Méry, later the co-librettist of Don Carlos.

Musicologist Roger Parker describes the première as "a clamorous success, with the entire final act encored"[1] and the audience wild with enthusiasm.

With his other obligations out of the way, he was hesitant in committing to anything that was not a genuinely patriotic subject, but he despaired that librettists were incapable to providing them until Salvadore Cammarano (who supplied the libretto for the 1845 Alzira) came up with the idea of adapting Joseph Méry's 1828 play La Bataille de Toulouse, a well-known and well-liked play in Italy at that time.

[6] "Conceived in the springtime of Italian hopes" [7](as Budden describes the initial enthusiasm for the work), by the time Cammarano produced a final libretto it was early 1849 and it was also clear that the Austrians had not been permanently routed from Lombardy.

The premiere was set for late January 1849, some last-minute adjustments were made, and Verdi traveled to Rome before the end of 1848.

Within days of Battaglia's totally sold-out premiere, Rome had become a republic, accelerated by the passions inflamed amongst its inhabitants by (amongst other things) the opera's final chorus of freedom: "Italia risorge vestita di Gloria, invitta e regina qual'era sarà" / "Italy rises again robed in glory!, Unconquered and a queen she shall be as once she was!".

[8] But, as writer John Black notes in his study of Cammarano, "For all its appeal to the spirit of the times – or perhaps because of it, as conditions of order were re-established – it was not widely revived during the ten years that followed" the premiere[9] since, after initial performances around Italy, the opera fell foul of the Austrian censors, as much as anything caused by what musicologist Roger Parker describes as "perhaps its too intense association with a particular historical period"[3] or, as Budden puts it, [it had] "the taint of a pièce d'occasion somewhat to the composer's mortification.

"[10] "Even before the premiere, Ricordi was in touch with Cammarano about an alternative version, with the action removed to the Flemish- Spanish wars, under the title, L'assedio di Arlem [with] Federico Barbarossa...to be replaced by the Duke of Alba, etc.

[12] In the 1880s it was re-styled in French as Pour la Patrie for a projected production at the Théâtre Château-d'Eau in Paris which did not happen.

[14] 20th century and beyond In Italy, the opera was seen in 1959 in Florence and Venice to commemorate the centenary of the Second Italian War of Independence, and in Trieste in 1963 (on each occasion starring Leyla Gencer).

[17] Battaglia was not performed in the United Kingdom until 31 October 1960 when it was given its UK première by the Welsh Opera Company in London at Sadler's Wells.

Two concert performances have been presented by the Opera Orchestra of New York; the first was in January 1987 with Matteo Manuguerra, Aprile Millo and Jerome Hines while the second was given on 19 November 2001.

Scene 2: Beside the ramparts of the city Rolando's wife Lida, who has lost her parents and brothers and who is downcast at the prospect of further war, also mourns the loss of her former love, Arrigo.

As Rolando returns home, bringing with him Arrigo, Lida is angry (A frenarti o cor nel petto / "My heart, no longer have I the power...").

Scene 2: Rolando's castle Lida has heard that Arrigo has joined the Knights of Death, and desperately tries to contact him via a note to be conveyed by her maid, Imelda.

Thinking that Arrigo has been ordered to remain to guard Milan, Rolando begs him to take care of his wife and son in the event of his death (Se al nuovo dì pugnando /"If when we fight on the morrow").

Just as Rolando is about to leave, Marcovaldo delays him, telling him that his honour has been betrayed and presents him with Lida's note to Arrigo, which he has intercepted.

Rolando is enraged and proclaims that he will obtain double vengeance on his wife and his friend (Mi scoppa il cor / "My heart is bursting").

As trumpets signal the beginning of the battle, Arrigo, in desperation, leaps from the tower into the moat, shouting "Long Live Italy!".

[30] A writer then working in England, Budden finds that the opera had "better press" in that country than in Italy and he quotes from supporting statements by Verdi biographers Toye (p. 290, 1931) and Osborne (p. 198, 1969).

Roger Parker is impressed by the opera's "inner working and its sheer scale [which] far outstrip any of Verdi's previous efforts",[3] largely agreeing with Budden in this account.