Italy and the Suez Canal, from the Mid-nineteenth Century to the Cold War: A Mediterranean History

by Barbara Curli (Editor)

Overview

Conceived in the 1850s and opened to navigation in 1869, the Suez Canal’s construction coincided with Italy’s path to unification and its first foray into nineteenth-century globalization. Since then, the history of Italy and the Canal have intertwined in many ways, throughout in peace and war. This edited collection explores the fundamental technical, diplomatic and financial contributions that Italy made to the production of the Canal and to its subsequent development, from the mid-nineteenth century to the Cold War. Drawing from unpublished public and private archival sources, this book is the first comprehensive account of this long and multifaceted relationship, providing innovative perspectives on Italy’s diplomatic, economic, social, colonial and cultural history. An insightful read for those studying maritime, diplomatic or Italian history, this book contributes to a growing body of research on the Canal, which has largely emerged from international business, labour and social history, and offers new insights into the Euro-Mediterranean region.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9783030882556
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan
Publication date:	05/24/2022
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	13 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Barbara Curli is Professor of Contemporary History at the University of Turin, Italy. She is an editorial board member of Italia Contemporanea and is on the Scientific Board of the Fondazione Leonardo – Civiltà delle Macchine.

Table of Contents

1 Introduction: Italy and the Suez Canal: Historical and historiographical passages in the making of a Euro-Mediterranean region - Barbara Curli 
Part I. Modern infrastructures for a modern state: the Suez Canal and Italian unification2 Camillo Cavour, the Suez Canal and the path to Italian unification - Barbara Curli 3 Italian infrastructures and the opening of the Suez Canal - Andrea Giuntini 4 The Suez Canal and Italian port cities: local competition and global ambitions within a nation in the making (1850s-1890s) - Giovanni Cristina 5 The Suez Canal and the Italian sailing fleet: expectations, problems and alternatives routes (1869-1914) - Leonardo Scavino 6 A Venice of the Desert: The successes and failures of the Suez Canal in revitalizing Mediterranean trade - Kevin Tang
Part II. Italian cultures and the Canal project7 Luigi Negrelli (1799-1858): a Tyrolean engineer at the heart of the Suez Canal project - Andrea Leonardi and Alice Riegler 8 ‘Qui dell’avvenire si tratta dell’Italia’: The Suez Canal as an opportunity. Giuseppe Sapeto and his political pamphlet L'Italia ed il Canale di Suez - Filippo Gattai Tacchi 9 The Trieste-Suez connection: how businessman and explorers reshaped the Mediterranean in the 18th and 19th centuries - Giovanni Modaffari10 ‘Iddio si serve mirabilmente dell'uomo per adempire i suoi altissimi fini’: the Suez Canal in the Italian Catholic Press in the 19th Century - Carlo Bovolo
Part III. Colonial spaces, colonial encounters11 Assab and the Suez Canal: the root of Italian Imperialism in the Red Sea - Luca Castiglioni 12 Credit, debt and power: Italian foreign-policy making in the heavily-indebted Muslim-Mediterranean countries (1867-1914) - Giampaolo Conte 13 Sneaky neutrality: weapons smuggling in Egypt during the Italo-Ottoman war over Libya, 1911-1912 - Andreas Guidi 
Part IV. Imperial strategies in the Mediterranean, from the mid-1860s to the Second World War14 The Italian Navy and Suez: from opportunity to obsession (1861-1943) - Fabio De Ninno 15 Connecting the two seas: Italian and Ottoman diplomacies in the Suez-Red Sea area - Giorgio Ennas 16 When two worlds collide: Britain, Italy and the Suez Canal in the Fascist era - Steven Morewood 
Part V. Work and Migration17 The Suez Canal in conversations through time: Evangelical and Waldensian mobility in the Mediterranean - Paola Schellenbaum 18 ‘Their Parents are all Sailors and Blue-Collar Workers’: the schools of the Suez Canal in the late nineteenth century - Olga Verlato19 Ordinary People in Extraordinary Contexts: Italian and Greek Personnel of the Suez Canal Company in Moments of Crisis during the 20th century - Angelos Dalachanis
Part VI. Italy and Suez in times of Cold War20 Leaving Egypt: rethinking 1956 through Italian departures - Joseph John Viscomi 21 Italian Catholics and the Suez Crisis: between neo-Atlanticism, pacifism and third worldism - Massimo De Giuseppe 22 Italy and the closure of the Suez Canal (1967-1975) - Gaetano La Nave
Afterword - Fred Cooper

Editorial Reviews

This volume edited by Barbara Curli showcases a rich lineup of contributions and creates a space for Italian and non-Italian researchers to mingle and for those based in Italy and outside of it to come together. … Italy and the Suez Canal also succeeds in pointing out fresh ways to revisit the conventional geographic and chronological straits of Italian history.” (Lucia Carminati, H-Soz-Kult, hsozkult.de, November 24, 2023)​

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