Alto Adige — Not ‘South Tyrol’: A Historically Italian Territory

Written by Giovanni dalle Bande Nere

The so-called “Südtiroler Heimatbund” (“South Tyrolean Homeland Federation”) has announced that in November a thousand posters bearing the words “South Tyrol is not Italy” will be posted in Rome, in order to reiterate that most of the German-speakers of Alto Adige want self-determination and want Alto Adige to secede from Italy.

Apart from the oddity of the statement, it must be noted that the term “South Tyrol”, which is now used to define the territory between the alpine ridge and Salorno, is unhistorical, because historically there has never been any such territory with its own political or administrative autonomy prior to 1927, when Italy created the Province of Bolzano and separated it from Province of Trento. In fact, the term “South Tyrol” was previously used to define the region of Trentino in order to reaffirm its “belonging to Tyrol” after the inhabitants of Trentino, led by their urban bourgeoisie, proclaimed the “Away From Innsbruck” movement in 1848 and attempted to break away from Tyrol and join Lombardy-Venetia.

For the sake of our pro-Austrian readers, let's take a step back and briefly mention the history of Alto Adige or “South Tyrol”, which since ancient times has been called “the land along the Adige and between the mountains”.

Initially, today's Alto Adige was inhabited by the Rhaetians, a population of Etruscan origin, who were first Romanized by the Romans and then Germanized by the Bavarians. Later, the territory was divided between the bishops of Trento, Bressanone and Chur. The counts of Tyrol, who were in a true sense pirates, initiated a whole series of usurpations and illegally appropriated the territories of the bishops. In 1363, a document was issued which the Austrians vulgarly call the “donation of Tyrol” by Countess Margaret to the Habsburgs. Nothing could be more false. It was Johann von Lenzburg of Platzheim, councilor of Rudolf IV of Habsburg, who forged the document in Margeret's name. And thus it was that Tyrol passed to the Habsburgs. Not to the Habsburg Empire, mind you; rather it became a private fief of the Habsburg family. It was not until 1814 that it became a dependency of the Empire.

As to the question then, why should Alto Adige (not Tyrol, because the historical Tyrol stretches from Kufstein to Borghetto, near Verona) be Italian, the answer is simple: because it is Italian, because first it was Rhaeto-Etruscan, then Latin, then was conquered by the Bavarians, then belonged to the episcopal principalities, then to Tyrol, then became a private possession of the Habsburgs, then belonged to the Austro-Hungarian Empire and finally passed to Italy. Every time it passed from hand to hand, the conquerors brought their culture and their language. If we want to talk about more recent situations and the presence of the Italian population in South Tyrol, i.e. if we want to search for the famous linguistic border between the so-called German Tyrol and the Italian Tyrol, we must look toward the division of Tyrol in 1811, when the Italic Kingdom was created by Napoleon. Bavarian and Italian diplomacy drew the border based exclusively on linguistic criteria. Thus the border was placed about eighty kilometers further north of where the Austrians claimed it from 1866 onwards (i.e. at Salorno). The original border was placed above Merano, Bressanone and Pusteria. Certainly, up to these places the prevailing population was German-speaking, but in the south, including Bolzano and the Lower Atesina, the majority of the population was Italian-speaking. In Salorno there is a narrow, funnel-like area that makes the territory defensible. It is a natural boundary of sorts. The Austrians, by means of forced Germanization, tried to shift the linguistic border so that it would match the natural one, so that it could be claimed by a sort of natural right in case Austria had to give up any new territories. Let's not forget that in 1866 Austria lost Venice, and their last remaining wedge of penetration into Italy was the current region of Trentino-Alto Adige. Thus they attempted to move the linguistic border further south, to try to at least maintain control over today's Alto Adige.

Trentino was transformed into a sort of entrenched camp, in which the Italian linguistic group was increasingly obstructed and opposed. Even in Alto Adige, where the Italian presence was becoming more and more massive, Austria undertook a Germanizing action, especially in Bolzano and in that area between the villages of Laives and Salorno known as the Lower Atesina (Bassa Atesina). This is because Vienna, as we have just noted, fearing the possibility of having to retreat further north, decided at all costs to transform the natural boundary near Chiusa into a linguistic border and extend it towards the village of Cadino.

Numerous German writers also provide proof of the massive Italian presence in Bolzano and in the Lower Atesina, including Christian Schneller, who lived in Rovereto for about twelve years and who, in his 1866 essay “Die Wälchtirolische Frage”, wrote:

“It is not necessary to repeat here what has been said several times and that is that the Italian element proceeds irresistibly in the Adige Valley; it has already flooded Bolzano and now reaches the gates of Merano.”

An example of the Germanization of Bolzano is Via Cassa di Risparmio, a street built in an eclectic style with strong neoclassical, neo-gothic and neo-baroque elements. The strong immigration of German-speakers from the north of Alto Adige caused the Savings Bank (Cassa di Risparmio) to purchase the Hurlach residence (today's Civic Museum) with all its extensive vineyards towards the end of the 1800's, and then to build a long road of over four hundred meters, connecting the hospital with Vanga Street (via dei Vanga). If we consider that in 1842 the population of Bolzano amounted to just 8,000 inhabitants, while about half a century later, in the area around Via Cassa di Risparmio alone (which was inaugurated on December 2, 1892 on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the Emperor's regency), there were well over 6,000 people, we have a very clear perception of the vast proportions of the Germanizing policy implemented by the Habsburg monarchy.

Two other symbols of the forced Germanization of Bolzano are the creation of the statue of Walther von der Vogelweide, erected in 1889 to demonstrate the “Germanness” of Bolzano during a period in which the city saw an increasing presence of Italians, and the monument to King Laurino, today located in Piazza Magnago, the open space overlooking the palazzo of the provincial government of Alto Adige. This monument depicts King Theodoric in the act of subduing King Laurino, the ruler of the small Latin people of the Dolomites. It was erected in 1907, and represents Teutonic force humiliating the timid Italians.

In this regard it should be emphasized that the South Tyrolean People's Party (SVP), together with some self-styled Italian politicians of little importance, have waged war against so-called “Fascist relics” (such as the Victory Monument, the bas-relief in Piazza del Tribunale, etc.), yet they forget that the other monuments mentioned above are true “Habsburg relics” that were built as an affront to Italy and the Italians. These artifacts represent an even greater provocation than the supposed “Fascist relics”. In fact, if the Italian monuments represent a historical testimony, as they are contextual to the time they were built, the German ones are a real offense, since they were built in an age that directly preceded the historical facts described above; in other words, they were erected in order to promote an action of pro-Habsburg propaganda and to exclusively demonstrate the superiority of the Germanic race.

Beginning in the early twentieth century, the policy of de-nationalization in the Lower Atesina by the Habsburg Government was supported by the “Tiroler Volksbund”, which was founded in 1905.

The “Tiroler Volksbund” developed a policy so intolerant that in 1906 the newspaper of the “South Tyrolean” Catholics, “Neue Tiroler Stimmen”, condemned these methods, stating that they certainly:

“Fail to promote the unity of the Province and therefore the multinational State that is Austria, where nations are now more than ever in need of mutual tolerance.”

This association immediately launched an offensive against the Italian presence between Bolzano and Salorno, cemented especially by the creation of German kindergartens and German schools in this genuinely Italian area. Its own organ, the monthly “Tiroler Wehr” (“Tyrolean Defense”), quickly became famous for its irate and virulent language which they used to attack the Italian newspapers of Trentino, which they defined as:

“Lurid rags of paper, directed by people who reek of nationalism and who are traitors to the Empire.”

In the Lower Atesina, Germanization was also carried out by the manipulation of censuses. In Vadena, for example, the 1910 census claimed that the German-speakers (278) surpassed the Italians (254). Following strong protests from the Trentine deputies in Parliament, the Captain of Bolzano sent a note of strong rebuke to Mayor Zelger who, through various tricks, had wrongly listed numerous Italian-speakers of Vadena as “Germans”. A correction was made, revealing that the true numbers were 311 Italians and 221 Germans.

It was, however, at the outbreak of the “Great War” that Germanization turned into a true and proper persecution against Italians. Italian irredentists were sent to internment camps and those who managed to escape to the Kingdom of Italy had all their properties confiscated by the German authorities. Among the internees we remember Marta Cimadon, the teacher Armida Angelini, and Carlo Lorenzini who died of starvation in the “Lager” of Mitterndorf an der Fischa in Lower Austria.

To argue, therefore, that “South Tyrol is not Italy”, in the sense that it is not ethnically Italian, makes no sense, because according to this reasoning the only ones who could claim Alto Adige would be the Rhaeto-Etruscans.