Inspired by the rebellions in the 1820s and 1830s against the outcome of the Congress of Vienna, the unification process was precipitated by the Revolutions of 1848, and reached completion in 1870 after the capture of Rome and its designation as the capital of the Kingdom of Italy.

Some of the states that had been envisaged as part of the unification process (terre irredente) did not join the Kingdom until after Italy defeated Austria-Hungary in World War I, culminating in the Treaty of Rapallo in 1920.

As Napoleon's reign began to fail, the rulers he had installed tried to keep their thrones (among them Eugène de Beauharnais, Viceroy of Italy, and Joachim Murat, King of Naples) further feeding nationalistic sentiments.

He escaped to South America, although, spending fourteen years in exile, taking part in several wars, and learning the art of guerrilla warfare before his return to Italy in 1848.

They wanted good government, not self-government, and had welcomed Napoleon and the French as more equitable and efficient than their native dynasties,[40] many of which had died out in the 18th century.After 1830, revolutionary sentiment in favour of a unified Italy began to experience a resurgence, and a series of insurrections laid the groundwork for the creation of one nation along the Italian peninsula.

In 1844, two brothers from Venice, Attilio and Emilio Bandiera, members of Young Italy, planned to make a raid on the Calabrian coast against the Kingdom of Two Sicilies in support of Italian unification.

On 5 January 1848, the revolutionary disturbances began with a civil disobedience strike in Lombardy, as citizens stopped smoking cigars and playing the lottery, which denied Austria the associated tax revenue.

[51] In fact, Napoleon III and Cavour were mutually indebted: the first because he had withdrawn from the Second Italian War of Independence before the expected conquest of Venice, the second because he had allowed the uprisings to spread to the territories of central-northern Italy, thus going beyond what was agreed with the Plombières Agreement.

On 6 May 1860, Garibaldi and his cadre of about a thousand Italian volunteers (called I Mille), steamed from Quarto near Genoa, and, after a stop in Talamone on 11 May, landed near Marsala on the west coast of Sicily.

Doubt, confusion, and dismay overtook the Neapolitan court—the king hastily summoned his ministry and offered to restore an earlier constitution, but these efforts failed to rebuild the people's trust in Bourbon governance.

Napoleon, however, may have arranged with Cavour to let the King of Sardinia free to take possession of Naples, Umbria and the other provinces, provided that Rome and the "Patrimony of Saint Peter" were left intact.

The recognition of the Netherlands and Belgium occurred in two phases: they recognized the new title of Victor Emmanuel II in July, then the kingdom in November, after a long clash between conservatives and liberals in the Belgian parliament over the latter.

[81]The Royal Italian Army, commanded by General Raffaele Cadorna, crossed the Papal frontier on 11 September and advanced slowly toward Rome, hoping that a peaceful entry could be negotiated.

[82] Historian Raffaele de Cesare made the following observations about Italian unification: The Roman question was the stone tied to Napoleon's feet – that dragged him into the abyss.

He never forgot, even in August 1870, a month before Sedan, that he was a sovereign of a Catholic country, that he had been made Emperor, and was supported by the votes of the Conservatives and the influence of the clergy; and that it was his supreme duty not to abandon the Pontiff.

[88] From the spring of 1860 to the summer of 1861, a major challenge that the Piedmontese parliament faced on national unification was how they should govern and control the southern regions of the country that were frequently represented and described by northern Italian correspondents as "corrupt", "barbaric", and "uncivilized".

[90] The dominance of letters sent from the northern Italian correspondents that deemed southern Italy to be "so far from the ideas of progress and civilization" ultimately induced the Piedmontese parliament to choose the latter course of action, which effectively illustrated the intimate connection between representation and rule.

Reviews of the historical facts concerning Italian unification's successes and failures continue to be undertaken by domestic and foreign academic authors, including Denis Mack Smith, Christopher Duggan, and Lucy Riall.

There is contention on its actual impact in Italy, some Scholars arguing it was a liberalizing time for 19th century Italian culture, while others speculate that although it was a patriotic revolution, it only tangibly aided the upper-class and bourgeois publics without actively benefitting the lower classes.

During World War One the main "irredent lands" (terre irredente) were considered to be the provinces of Trento and Trieste and, in a narrow sense, irredentists referred to the Italian patriots living in these two areas.

[102] However, after the Third Italian War of Independence (1866), when the Veneto and Friuli regions were ceded by the Austrians to the newly formed Kingdom Italy, Istria and Dalmatia remained part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, together with other Italian-speaking areas on the eastern Adriatic.

[103] During the meeting of the Council of Ministers of 12 November 1866, Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria outlined a wide-ranging project aimed at the Germanization or Slavization of the areas of the empire with an Italian presence:[104] His Majesty expressed the precise order that action be taken decisively against the influence of the Italian elements still present in some regions of the Crown and, appropriately occupying the posts of public, judicial, masters employees as well as with the influence of the press, work in South Tyrol, Dalmatia and Littoral for the Germanization and Slavization of these territories according to the circumstances, with energy and without any regard.

With the Treaty of London, signed in April 1915, Italy agreed to declare war against the Central Powers in exchange for the irredent territories of Friuli, Trentino, and Dalmatia (see Italia irredenta).

Italian irredentism obtained an important result after the First World War, when Italy gained Trieste, Gorizia, Istria, and the cities of Zara and Pola after the Treaty of Rapallo in 1920.

Historians regard "mutilated victory" as a "political myth", used by fascists to fuel Italian imperialism and obscure the successes of liberal Italy in the aftermath of World War I.

The Irredentists took language as the test of the alleged Italian nationality of the countries they proposed to emancipate, which were Trentino, Trieste, Dalmatia, Istria, Gorizia, Ticino, Nice (Nizza), Corsica, and Malta.

Ugo Foscolo describes in his works the passion and love for the fatherland and the glorious history of the Italian people; these two concepts are respectively well expressed in two masterpieces, The Last Letters of Jacopo Ortis and Dei Sepolcri.

Giovanni Berchet wrote a poetry characterized by a high moral, popular and social content; he also contributed to Il Conciliatore, a progressive bi-weekly scientific and literary journal, influential in the early Risorgimento that was published in Milan from September 1818 until October 1819 when it was closed by the Austrian censors; its writers included also Ludovico di Breme, Giuseppe Nicolini, and Silvio Pellico.

The Risorgimento was also depicted in famous novels: The Leopard written by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, Heart by Edmondo De Amicis, and The Little World of the Past by Antonio Fogazzaro.

Verdi's main works of 1842–49 were especially relevant to the struggle for independence, including Nabucco (1842), I Lombardi alla prima crociata (1843), Ernani (1844), Attila (1846), Macbeth (1847), and La battaglia di Legnano (1848).