Luogotenente

In 1812, Ferdinand refused to grant a constitution to the Sicilian parliament and, in 1813, he practically abdicated his throne, fleeing to Ficuzza and appointing his son Francesco (Francis, Duke of Calabria) to serve as luogotenente generale.

Its equivalents in other official languages of Austria-Hungary were namjesnik (in Croatian), místodržitel (in Czech), Statthalter (in German), helytartó (in Hungarian), namiestnik (in Polish), and namesnik (in Slovenian).

In the Kingdom of Sardinia, which the House of Savoy ruled prior to the unification of Italy, it was customary to appoint a lieutenant general of the kingdom (Italian: luogotenente generale del regno), chosen from among members of the Savoy royal family to carry out some of the king's duties as viceroy while the king was away from his office to follow the army on the battlefield during war.

Montezemolo led a Council of Lieutenancy in Sicily which held he powers of the central government of the Kingdom of Italy except for those of Foreign Affairs, War, and the Navy.

Montezemolo was followed by Alessandro Della Rovere and then Ignazio De Genova di Pettinengo before the lieutenancy ceased in January 1862.

In the Neapolitan provinces of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, which included most of Southern Italy (Italian: Mezzogiorno), Victor Emmanuel II appointed Luigi Carlo Farini as lieutenant general of the king on 6 November 1860.

[6] Italy conquered the Albanian Kingdom in April 1939, establishing the Italian protectorate of Albania with Victor Emmanuel III as its king.

The Kingdom of Italy's support for Italian fascism before the surrender and its choices thereafter had made the House of Savoy unpopular in Italy by the spring of 1944, leading to growing sentiment for King Victor Emmanuel III's abdication and even for the replacement of the monarchy with a republic; in fact, the leaders of anti-fascist Italian political parties desired the abdication of Victor Emmanuel, the renunciation of the throne by his son Crown prince Umberto, former Prince of Piedmont, and the immediate appointment of a civil regent.

After his appointment, Umberto split his role between lieutenant and crown prince: As lieutenant general he ruled Italy like a provisional head of state, while as crown prince he served as pretender to a throne now removed from automatic dynastic succession, pending resolution of the question of the institutional form of the future Italian state.

In 1944 he signed Lieutenant Decree-Law Number 151/1944, which established that "after the liberation of the national territory" of Italy from the Axis powers and the Italian Social Republic "the institutional forms" of government would be "chosen by the Italian people, who for this purpose" would elect "by universal, direct, and secret suffrage, a Constituent Assembly to decide on the new Constitution of the State," extending the vote to women for the first time.

As lieutenant, Umberto soon earned the trust of the Allies thanks to his choice of orienting the policies of the Italian monarchy toward pro-Western positions.

Umberto's lieutenancy lasted until 9 May 1946, when the result of post-World War II elections led Vittorio Emanuele III's advisors to induce him to abdicate in advance of the referendum on the future governance of the Italian state scheduled for 2 and 3 June 1946.

The advisors hoped that his abdication would further distance the House of Savoy from Victor Emmanuel, who had favored the advent of the fascist Mussolini government, and increase the chance that the referendum would result in the preservation of the monarchy.