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The Southern Italian states, including Sicily and Naples, were more open to influences

from the south and east, from Africa, Greece and the Middle East, including Islam,
whose later decline affected the region. Further, across central Italy the Popes ruled
Rome and the extensive Papal States and exercised a conservative, clerical influence,
further complicating Italian politics. But despite this long historical legacy, the rise of
th
Italian nationalism in the 19 century, triggered by Napoleon’s invasion and
reorganisation of the peninsular, and taken up by Mazzini, challenged the
assumption that Italy’s destiny was disunity and foreign interference.

The map of Italy was about to be completely transformed.

The American South was based on slavery, which held back enterprise and
immigration, both drivers of economic growth in the North. Thus, the South was
agrarian, aristocratic, and conservative. Slavery also created racial fears – the South
had 4m black slaves and 5m whites - and an embattled, defensive attitude towards
the North. Northern society by contrast was enterprising, capitalistic and

industrialising. This would be of crucial importance in the Civil War; the North could
manufacture replacement iron railroad parts and arms, the South couldn’t. They
even ran short of paper, essential for communicating with their own people in
wartime.