"Great Official Portrait Signed And Dated Of Victor Emmanuel III - Last King Of Italy."
Great official portrait signed and dated by Victor Emmanuel III - last king of Italy. Canvas 85 cm by 65 cm Important frame of 119 cm by 99 cm The difficult reading of the signature does not allow us to know the name of the painter in all cases of talent. The portrait corresponds to the official photo of Victor-Emmanuel III in general's uniform bearing the insignia of the orders of Saint Maurice and Lazarus, the Annunciade and the Crown of Italy. Victor Emmanuel III, born in Naples on November 11, 1869 and died in exile in Alexandria on December 28, 1947, is King of Italy from July 29, 1900 after the assassination of his father, until May 9, 1946, shortly before proclamation of the Republic It takes again the colonial policy of Italy with the landing in Libya on September 29, 1911 and the occupation of the Dodecanese islands in the Aegean Sea in May 1912. For the peace of Lausanne of October 18, 1912, Turkey recognizes Italy the possessions of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica. During the First World War he supports the position of neutrality of Italy. The political irredentism concerning the provinces of Trentino, Istria and the city of Trieste decided to abandon the Triple Alliance to fight Austria-Hungary alongside the allies. He comes to France and accompanies Albert I, the King of the Belgians, in barracks and military bases. The victory of 1918 allows Italy to annex territories such as Trentino, Alto Adige, Trieste and Istria but not Dalmatia, which prevents it from becoming mistress of the Adriatic and makes peace unpopular . In the context of economic and political crisis between the wars, the country is experiencing a series of social unrest that the various governments can not stem, bringing the fascists to power. After the march on Rome of fascist troops of Mussolini on October 28, 1922, the king asks the latter, October 30, 1922, to form a new government. In April 1924, new elections were held, with many irregularities. Socialist MP Giacomo Matteotti, who denounced them, was assassinated the following June 10th. On January 3, 1925, the fascists claimed the assassination. This is the beginning of the fascist dictatorship. In 1927, the leader of the anti-fascist PPI, Alcide De Gasperi, was arrested in Florence station with his wife and sentenced to four years in prison. He will be released a few months later on the intervention of the king and the bishop of Trento. On October 3, 1935, Italian troops based in Eritrea and Somalia invaded Ethiopia. The war ended May 9, 1936 with the proclamation of the empire of East Africa Italian, which earned Victor Emmanuel III the title of emperor. In April 1939, Albania is occupied and Victor Emmanuel III accepts the title of King of Albania. The Rome-Berlin axis was signed in October 1936 and the Steel Pact on May 22, 1939. In May 1938, Hitler visited Italy. On June 10, 1940, Italy went to war with Nazi Germany while France was already defeated. The British offensive in Africa makes the Italians lose their possessions on this continent. With the multiple defeats, the democratic and military opposition to the dictatorship is organized. On July 25, 1943, the landing of the Allies in Sicily led to the fall of the fascist dictatorship: on July 26, 1943, the king arrested Benito Mussolini and replaced him by a man of confidence, the Marshal of Italy Pietro Badoglio. The ruler himself does not see his action as a coup d'etat. He claims that he acted by "a legal application of the Constitution". The armistice is signed on September 3 but a civil war situation is established in the north of the country from September 8, 1943 to April 25, 1945 (Republic of Salò). The king, who after September 8, 1943 had left Rome to retreat to the South occupied by the Allies, ceded the royal prerogatives to his son Humbert of Savoy on June 4, 1944, and retired from public life. He abdicates in favor of his son who takes the title of Humbert II May 9, 1946, but a referendum ends the monarchy on June 2, 1946 and replaces it with a republic. Victor Emmanuel III died in exile at Alexandria in Egypt (hosted by King Farouk) on December 28, 1947, between the promulgation of the Constitution of the Italian Republic and its entry into force; it provides that "entry and residence on the national territory are forbidden to the former kings of the House of Savoy, their wives and their male descendants". He is buried in St. Catherine's Cathedral in Alexandria, where he rests behind the high altar for seventy years. On December 17, 2017, his remains are finally repatriated aboard an aircraft of the Italian Air Force and buried in the sanctuary of Vicoforte, with those of his wife