Is history the strongest weapon? Corsica in the Fascist mare nostrum

Abstract

During the 1930s, historiography in the sector of studies on Corsica grew considerably owing to the efforts of Gioacchino Volpe and his students at the Scuola di Storia Moderna e Contemporanea. Corsica was situated within the Mediterranean political space, and it acquired a geopolitical importance that shifted it outside its circumscribed regional context to the centre of the Mediterranean interests of the great European powers. This article analyses how Gioacchino Volpe and his students at the Scuola configured the question of the ‘Mediterranean political space’ as a matter of historical interest by analysing the case of Corsica. Rather than restricting themselves to a regionalist approach in their research on Corsica, Volpe and his students framed the island's history in the more general context of European and Mediterranean history.

Keywords::

• Corsica
• Mediterranean history
• regionalism
• Fascism
• intellectuals
• Gioacchino Volpe

Notes

¹ The reference is to the notorious expression used by Galeazzo Ciano in the Chamber of Deputies on 30 November 1938, which provoked violent anti-Italian reactions in the territories subject to the regime's expansionist aims in the Mediterranean.

² Archivio Natio Corsa, Corrispondenza della Presidenza e della Segreteria generale, b. 1, Letter from Ersilio Michel to Petru Giovacchini, 21 September 1936.

³ Archives Départementales de l'Haute Corse, b. 1 J 44, Letter from Gioacchino Volpe to Ersilio Michel, 25 July 1928.

⁴ Archivio Storico Diplomatico del Ministero degli Affari Esteri, Gabinetto del Ministro 1923–1943, b. 1074, Letter from Guido Romano to the Cabinet of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 23 March 1937.

⁵ Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Presidenza del Consiglio dei Ministri, 1940-1941, b. 3.2.6 1372, Letter from Gioacchino Volpe to the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, 10 July 1940.

⁶ The historical memory of Corsica was constructed around the figure of Pasquale Paoli, the general who brought independence to Corsica and fought heroically against the French troops in the famous Battle of Pontenuovo of 9 May 1769 that decreed the end of the Paolinan government and the beginning of French domination of the island.

⁷A Muvra – literally ‘The Moufflon’ – was founded in Paris in 1920 by the brothers Petru and Matteo Rocca. Edited by Petru Rocca with the assistance of former combatants decorated for military valour, A Muvra was the periodical of the Partitu Corsu d'Azione action, which fought to assert Corsica's demands.

⁸ Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Presidenza del Consiglio dei Ministri, 1940–1941, b. 3.2.6 1372, Letter from Gioacchino Volpe to the Cabinet of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, 26 July 1941.

⁹ Archives Départementales de la Corse du Sud, b. 1 M 289, Publications tendancieuses, interdites ou non, autres que ‘A Muvra’ et ‘Il Telegrafo’ 1928–29.