Prisoner of the Vatican: The Popes' Secret Plot to Capture Rome from the New Italian State

by David I. Kertzer

Book Overview

Praise for David Kertzer and Prisoner of the Vatican: Kertzer once again proves himself a truly compelling historian. -- Andr? Aciman Prisoner of the Vatican reads like exciting fiction. And it has... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0618224424
• ISBN13: 9780618224425
• Release Date: January 2004
• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
• Length: 357 Pages
• Weight: 1.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.3" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Excellent Historical & Scholarly Work -- Answers Why Church & State Should Be Separate

Italian history other than the Roman Empire is almost unknown in the US and what is known is mostly taught in Catholic schools by adherents of the Roman Catholic faith. This book is an eye-opener concerning how Italy came to be unified literally over the dead body of Pius IX who stated that his temporal dominion of the Papal States was absolutely necessary for him to be secure in his position and to provide vital funds to the Roman Catholic Church. The author continues into the 20th century and Pius IX's successors made major efforts to split Italy into three parts, a southern Kingdom like the former Kingdom of Naples or the Kingdom of Two Sicilies, a northern Kingdom for the Piedmontese, and the Papal Sates in between and including Rome with the Pope holding on the central and dominant power in Italy. Although this might seem medieval today to readers in the English-speaking world, one must remember that the critical events took place from 1859 to 1914. Italian reunification was by no means a foregone conclusion in the face of Papal opposition. Italian was not an universal language on the peninsula, and heart of Italy was the last part to be brought into the Kingdom of Italy under Victor Emmanuel, King of Sardinia. The primary force for the creation of a modern Italian States came from the Freemasons, most notably the Freemason Garibaldi who already had been a prime actor in South American revolutions. (One tends to forget or minimize the Freemason influence in the construction of democracies starting with the US as not being politically correct.) For some reason Garibaldi and the Freemasons are treated lightly by the author, perhaps because he desires to focus on the Papacy instead, although he does record that the plebisites were solidly for unification. Nonetheless, the dictotomy should be emphasized: to be a Freemason requires the belief in a separation of church and state (but not strictly a secular state in which religion plays no part), while the Popes to the present day oppose such separation. The author also makes the point abundantly clear that Pius IX ruled like an autocrat in his Papal States, suppressing individual liberties, freedom of speech and of the press, and opposed democracy in any form. Even today Italian schoolbooks and Church propaganda mention the liberation of Rome by Italian troops, thus uniting the country and setting the stage for Rome to be the capital, but do not mention what forces the Italians fought against. The answer, of course, is the Pope's troops. Pius also sought the assistance of France, Spain, Belgium, Austria and Germany to fight against the Italians, but by 1870 France was embroiled in the Franco-Prussian War, Austria had already been humbled by Prussia, Spain was barely hanging on as a power, and Germany under Bismarck was polite but not friendly. The days of the Papacy obtaining large armies from foreign nations to do its fighting for it were over. A key initiative by Piu

Excellent History

David Kertzer provides a detailed account of the Vatican's attempts to return the Pope to his temporal throne, reigning over the former Papal States, for many years following the successful unification of Italy. Exercising one of the very freedoms that the Vatican had vowed to suppress if returned to temporal power, Kertzer uses his freedom of expression to give us a fair, honest, and balanced treatment of events. His history does not come off as being anti-Catholic, but it deals (factually) with issues that others might wish to avoid in order not to appear being so. It is, therefore, a rich source, taking us behind the scenes to experience the very human side of the Vatican. If it is a rule that all governments engage in disinformation and spin, then David Kertzer shows us that the Vatican is no exception. He also reveals the tightrope that the new nation of Italy straddled in its first years, governing a people who were, for the most part, faithful Catholics who did not always know how to make distinctions between loyalty to faith and nation while also working with the rulers of other European nations whose citizens were struggling with those distinctions. One comes away we a new respect for those early leaders of Italy who held on when challenged from within and from without to their newfound freedom and newly founded republic. I highly recommend this and Kertzer's other books.

From documents buried in Vatican archives

Documents buried in Vatican archives have only recently been made available to some historians, and David Kertzer's access to some of these records lend a lively touch to his political and religious history PRISONER OF THE VATICAN: THE POPES, THE KINGS, AND GARIBALDI'S REBELS IN THE STRUGGLE TO RULE MODERN ITALY. In 1870 Pope Pius IX and his successor decided to go into exile secretly to attract support among the faithful for the papal cause: to conspire against Garibaldi and the king of Italy to control the Italian state. It was a brilliant move: popes became prisoners of the Vatican for sixty years and even considered moving it outside Italy. A riveting true story of religion and a political scheme which changed the world.

Untold history

The subtitle of this book is a bit misleading: there didn't appear to be a "secret plan" to recapture Rome from the new Italian state. Most of what happened was rather straightforward, and done by diplomatic means. In any event, this is an extremely interesting book about a little-known subject. Of course, everyone knows the basic story of the taking of Rome from the Pope by the new Italian state, but after that, nothing. This book very well fills in the knowledge gap by showing how the new state "bent over backwards" to try and mollify the Papal folks, only to be rebuffed at every turn. From the vantage of more than 125 years of Italian sovereignty over Rome, we can see how foolish the fears of the Pope actually were, but hindsight is the best sight. At the time, the Pope felt he was protecting the sovereignty and independence of the Papacy by having a temporal land under his control. This is fascinating history at its best, and I strongly recommend it!

A Little Known Incident that Shaped the World

Hidden here and there within the history of the Roman Catholic church must be dozens, even hundreds of stories that would surpass the best fictional writing. Here is one of them. We view Italy (and Germany for that matter) as countries, countries with a history going back for thousands of years. But this isn't true. These two countries came together as countries in the middle 1800's. Before that they were a loose collection of city states, small kingdoms I'd guess you call them. This is one such story. Victor Emmanuel II, the king of an Italy finally united wanted to make Rome/The Vatican a part of Italy. The pope, at that time Pius IX, didn't recognize Emmanuel or for that matter Italy. Thus began this story. The Pope retreated into the walls of the Vatican, and they remained at impasse until Mussolini finally came to an agreement that stands today where the church recognizes Italy, and Italy agreed that the Vatican was a soverign state. This is a fascinating and little known story based on recently opened archives. Now if the author could go back to the Vatican and get the archives on Galileo.