‘The Garibaldi of the sixteenth century’. Francesco Ferrucci and the heroes of the Risorgimento

Abstract

The enthusiastic search for mythical hero figures became an almost universal phenomenon in the nineteenth century, a fundamental element of what is known as the ‘politics of the past’. The Risorgimento is no exception. Hero cults enabled the socialization of Italians to the new language of politics and the religion of the nation. Particularly well suited to representations across a variety of media, and often romanticized in historical narratives, stylized and sanctified, national heroes are also attractive to the information and entertainment industries. The invention of a pantheon of national heroes both intersected and, in some ways, anticipated the process of peopolization of contemporary public figures which would fully impose itself beginning in 1848. An authentic nineteenth-century invention, the representation of Francesco Ferrucci (aka Ferruccio, 1489–1530) as the ‘last Italian’ appeared not only in historiography and literary novels, and the picture galleries of collectors, but also in popular magazines and illustrated journals. Participant in a larger nineteenth-century European cultural trend that saw many battlegrounds converted into tourist destinations, also Gavinana (seat of the battle in which Ferruccio died) became such a destination. The cult of the hero and the media construction of Gavinana as a national memorial were adapted to suit a shifting political and social environment.