Corsica and Italy

Written by Luca Cancelliere


Part I – Corsica and Italy until 1729.

Since prehistoric times Corsica, the fourth largest island in the Mediterranean after Sicily, Sardinia and Cyprus, was linked on one side to the Italian peninsula, and other the other side to the neighboring island of Sardinia. The first great Corsican civilization was that of the megalithic, which appeared in the fourth millennium BC and which, according to Giovanni Lilliu, was related to the contemporary Sardinian “Ozieri culture”. During the Bronze Age “Torrean civilization” spread throughout Corsica. The name derives from truncated conical constructions known as “torri”, similar to the Sardinian Nuraghe. Once again, the link with the contemporary Sardinian-Nuragic civilization is obvious. Inhabited by Ligurian peoples since the second millennium BC, Corsica entered the sphere of Etruscan influence after the Battle of Aleria in 535 BC and was later occupied by the Romans during the First Punic War (264-241 BC).

Since then and for two millennia, notwithstanding the brief 65-year occupation by the Vandals between the fifth and sixth centuries AD, Corsica was continuously linked to the Italian peninsula. It was part of the medieval Kingdom of Italy, governed by the Longobards until 774, and then was part of the Kingdom of Italy within the Holy Roman Empire. In this period there was a strong presence of Italian noble families in Corsica: the Obertenghi, the Pallavicino and the Malaspina. After the year one thousand Corsica became a subject of the maritime Republic of Pisa (1073-1284). Finally, after the famous Battle of Meloria (1284), the long rule of the Republic of Genoa began (1284-1768). Genoa established permanent rule only after 1374, following the elimination of the Aragonese claims arising from the Bull of Investiture of Boniface VIII.

Already in Roman times the island had undergone profound romanization, especially owing to the distribution of land to Roman legionaries from Sicily and Calabria, and the creation of the two Roman colonies of Mariana and Aleria. But above all, the Pisan period was instrumental in constructing Corsican identity as we know it today. The Tuscan vernacular prevailed unchallenged in place names, in onomastics (still today Corsican surnames are predominantly of Tuscan origin), in popular songs and in the use of Italian as the official language of administration and the Church. The Corsican idiom which formed in the Middle Ages was defined by Niccolò Tommaseo as “a powerful language, and the most Italian dialect of Italy” and “the least corrupt Italian dialect”. Pisan influence was also crucial in art and architecture: Pisan Romanesque became the typical architectural style of the island.

From the thirteenth until the nineteenth century, the primary school where young Corsicans attended for higher education – even after the French conquest – was the University of Pisa. From the fourteenth century onwards the “Corsican Guard”, a papal military body composed of Corsicans, enjoyed considerable importance until it was abolished in 1662. The island's government, since the end of the fifteenth century, was outsourced by the Republic of Genoa to the “Bank of Saint George”, which subdued the island's unruly aristocracy and gave Corsica a definitive administrative order with the “civil and military Statutes” of 1571, which entrusted the island to the “Magistrate of Corsica” headquartered in Genoa and to a resident governor assisted by the “Council of Twelve”. The territories were governed by lieutenants and the villages by local assemblies which appointed the “Fathers of the Commune”.

Another factor which contributed to strengthening the links between Corsica and the Italian mainland was the steady influx of Italians from Tuscany and especially from Lunigiana and Lucchesia, which lasted for centuries until the beginning of the twentieth century. Even until a few decades ago, the Corsicans used the term "Lucchesi" to refer to the whole Italian mainland. The establishment of new colonies by the Genoese, populated by Ligurian colonists, such as Bonifacio and Calvi, did not override the supreme influence of Tuscany on the Corsican idiom.

On the other hand, a large part of the population in northern Sardinia is of Corsican origin. In the Middle Ages the city of Sassari was the recipient of Corsican and Tuscan demographic flows. This is reflected in the Sassarese dialect, which has a Corsican-Tuscan base (with Logudorese-Sardinian contributions and, to a lesser extent, Ligurian). Regarding Gallura, it is known that after the Sardinian-Aragonese wars of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the area was largely repopulated by Corsicans, who planted the current Gallurese dialect, which can be considered a Corsican-Tuscan dialect akin to Southern Corsican. Many Gallurians later did the reverse of their ancestors, emigrating to Corsica from Sardinia. This was the linguistic, cultural and political status of the island on the eve of the Corsican Revolution of 1729.

Part II – The Corsican Revolution (1729-1769).

The rural Corsican nobility, which had developed a significant political experience in the local assemblies during the Genoese period, and had become a class with its own proud self-consciousness, was the protagonist of the long Corsican Revolution, which broke out in 1729. Historiography generally ignores this important historical event, which constituted the first of the “bourgeois revolutions” of the eighteenth century and which anticipated the Enlightenment era. The armed insurrection against the Genoese in 1735 began with the declaration of the Constitutional Court, in which they proclaimed the independence of the “Kingdom of Corsica”. It was at this time that Corsica adopted its current hymn “Dio ti salvi Regina”, written in the Italian language by Francesco De Geronimo of Puglia.

After the French intervention, requested by the Republic of Genoa, which was unable to quell the revolt, and after the assassination of the head of the insurrection Gian Piero Gaffori (1753), the Corsican Revolution found a new leader in Pasquale Paoli (1725-1807), a Corsican noble who was reared in the environment of the Neapolitan Enlightenment of Antonio Genovesi and Gaetano Filangieri. In 1755 he was proclaimed the “General of the Corsican Nation” and promulgated the “Corsican Constitution”, written in Italian. The Italian character of Corsica was obvious to Pasquale Paoli. He said:

“We are Italians by birth and by sentiment, but above all we are Italians by language, customs and traditions (…). And all the Italians are brothers and sisters united by history and united before God (…). As Corsicans we wish to be neither servants nor “rebels”, and as Italians we want the right to be treated as equal to other Italians (...). Either we will be free or we will be nothing (...) Either we will win with honor or we will die with our weapons in our hands (…). Our war of liberation is holy and just, as holy and just as the name of God, and here, in our mountains, the sun of freedom will be won for all Italy.”

The important link between Corsica and Italy was also underlined by Pasquale Paoli in his last will of 1804:

“I leave fifty lire a year for the maintenance of a skilled teacher, who in the village of Morosaglia, home of the church of Rostino, can teach and write Italian well, according to the approved standard style, as well as arithmetic to the youth of that church, and to any others who may take advantage of the opportunity to learn (…). I want the government to reopen a public school in Corte, a middle place for most of the island's population. I leave two hundred lire a year for the salary of four professors: the first to teach natural theology and the natural principles of divinity of the Christian religion; the second to teach ethnics and the rights of the people; the third to teach the principles of natural philosophy; and the fourth to tech the elements of mathematics. And I desire that the pupils be taught in the Italian language, the mother language of my people. (…) In the case that this school in Corte is not opened, then, in order to contribute to the education of my country, I leave one hundred and fifty lire a year for five students to attend any of the best universities of the Italian mainland. Two will be selected in the department of Golo, two in Liamone (…), and the fifth will be selected from the church of Rostino.”

Pasquale Paoli, after many vicissitudes which saw him also as a protagonist of the revolutionary events of 1789, died in exile in London in 1807 and was buried in Westminster Abbey. When his remains were brought to the family tomb at Stretta di Morosaglia in 1889, the plaque was written in Italian.

But let's return back to the Corsican Revolution before 1769. Initially, the fortune of arms and the Corsican people's desire for independence managed to get the better of French military power. More Frenchmen were killed in that war than in the Algerian War. However, after several years, during which Pasquale Paoli had wisely and successfully established the administrative and military foundations of an independent Corsica, the island was transferred from Genoa to France with the Treaty of Versailles of 1768. It put the Corsicans in a difficult situation. They were finally defeated by the French in the famous and unfortunate Battle of Ponte Nuovo on May 7, 1769.

Part III – Corsica under French occupation (1769-1918).

After the very brief period of the so-called “Anglo-Corsican Kingdom” of 1794-1796, which gave another constitution to Corsica, once again written in Italian, the nineteenth century saw the final demise of the traditional assembly institutions of the Corsican villages and a growing centralization of administrative functions by the government of Paris, exerted through the two departmental prefects of the island. The “Fiumorbo War” of 1815-1816 was the last major Corsican insurrection. During the nineteenth century, as evidenced by a decree on March 10, 1805 instituting the compulsory use of the French language on the island, Italian was still the official language of administration, the Church and culture in Corsica. The pure use of the Italian language was typical of the Corsican nobility, while the people generally spoke the Corsican vernacular. The first significant text in the Corsican dialect appeared within the work “Dionomachia”, written in the Italian language in 1817 by the magistrate Salvatore Viale:

“O Spechiu d’e zitelle di la pieve
O La miò chiara stella matuttina
Più bianca di lubrocciu e di la neve
Più rossa d’una rosa damaschina
Più aspra d’a cipolla, e d’u stuppone
Più dura d’una teppa, e d’un pentone…”

The author described Corsican as belonging to the Italian language:

“From the reading of these songs it can be clearly seen that the Corsicans do not have, nor can they have, any poetry or literature other than Italian. The source and material of a people's poetry lies in its history, its traditions, its customs, its way of life and its feeling: all things which define Corsican people differs substantially from that of the continental Frenchman, especially considering that the prototypical Frenchman is someone from Paris. (...) And the Corsican language is pure Italian; indeed, it has hitherto been known as one of the purest dialects of Italy.”

Mazzini, who arrived from Marseilles in 1831, described his arrival in Corsica this way:

“There I felt once again, with the joy of those repatriates, like I was back on Italian soil... From Bastia to Ajaccio and beyond...everyone spoke of Italy...and longed to rejoin the great motherland”.

On February 18, 1831, reflecting the unanimous reputation of Corsica as Italian land, the Parisian revolutionary General La Fayette reached an agreement with the Italian revolutionaries to exchange Corsica for Savoy. Many Corsicans participated in the Italian Risorgimento, such as Leonetto Cipriani, who fought in the First War of Italian Independence in 1848-1849 and joined the Expedition of the Thousand in 1860. The Italian language was banned beginning with a judgement of the Supreme Court of Paris on August 4, 1859, which reaffirmed that the only official language in Corsica was the French language. Already in 1852 the French government decided that all the acts of civil status should be drawn up only in French.

In the aftermath of the Second War of Italian Independence, it was feared that the newly formed Kingdom of Italy might make claims on Corsica. In 1870, several Italian politicians suggested to Vittorio Emanuele II (who, however, did not welcome the suggestion) that Italy should take advantage of the French defeat in Sedan by recovering Corsica, in addition to annexing Rome. In March 1871, the young radical deputy Georges Clemenceau proposed to the National Assembly that they should consider selling the island of Corsica to Italy. This proposal was justified in light of the support that Corsica, and particularly Ajaccio, had given to the person of the Emperor, and in light of the ensuing wave of discriminatory measures against the Corsicans following the proclamation of the Third French Republic. On May 19, 1882, just days before his death, Garibaldi said that:

“Corsica and Nice must not belong to France; and there will be a day when Italy, conscious of its value, will reclaim its eastern and western provinces which which shamefully languish under foreign domination.”

In those years Emmanuel Aréne of Ajaccio, a moderate Republican, imposed the corrupt and nepotistic methods of his “clique” onto the social and political life of Corsica. France's isolationist tariff policy was discriminatory toward the island. Until 1912, a 15% tax was imposed on goods exported to France, but only 2% for goods imported from France. This severed the historical economic links between Corsica and the Italian mainland, causing serious damage to the island's economy. Meanwhile, the establishment of a number of elementary schools on the island, and the recruitment of many young Corsicans into the French Army during World War I (with nearly 20,000 killed), accelerated the frenchification the island.

Part IV – Corsican Awakening and Pro-Italian Irredentism (1918-1945).

Between the end of the nineteenth century and the interwar period, Corsica witnessed a cultural rediscovery of its identity with the foundation of many magazines, the first of which was “A Tramuntana” (1896) founded by Santu Casanova. The recovery of the Corsican language and identity was combined with the recognition that Corsica belonged to the Italian cultural and linguistic sphere, according to the old Corsican adage: “Da Capi Corsu à Bonifaziu, aria di Roma è mare di u Laziu.” (“From Capo Corso to Bonifacio, the wind blows from Rome and the sea of Lazio.”)

The same Santu Casanova, founder of the Corsican awakening in 1896, joined the pro-Italian irredentist movement and forty years later sent a telegram to Mussolini on October 29, 1936:

“On this day of October 29, 1936, the same in which I leave my native Corsica forever and disembark at Livorno, the beloved homeland of Costanzo and Galeazzo Ciano and so many heroes, I feel like I am born again and reinvigorated with strength like Antaeus, returning to the Land of my ancestors which still remains the true Fatherland for us Corsicans. Therefore, on this bright and beautiful day, I offer you my fraternal greetings, O immortal Duce, with love and respect. Please accept it as an homage of our Corsica, a most pure Italian sister. A noi!”

In 1919 the newspaper “A Muvra” was founded by Petru Rocca. He would go on to create the Corsican Action Party (“Partitu Corsu d’Azione”) in 1922, following the example of the contemporary Sardinian Action Party (“Partito Sardo D’Azione”). In this period there was a flowering of poetic and literary works in Corsican, including the first Corsican novel “Terra Corsa”, written in 1924 by Marco Angeli. In 1927 the party transformed into the Corsican Autonomist Party (“Partitu Autonomista Corsu”) and was dissolved in 1939 due to its collaboration with the Italian Fascist regime. Indeed, simultaneous to the rise of Fascism in Italy, Corsica had developed an explicitly pro-Italian irredentist current. In 1933 the Groups of Corsican Culture (“Gruppi di Cultura Corsa” or GCC) was founded at Pavia by the Corsican student Petru Giovacchini, who previously founded a pro-Italian magazine “Primavera” in 1927. The GCC was later transformed into the Groups of Corsican Irredentist Action (“Gruppi di Azione Irredentista Corsa” or GAIC).

Many Corsican patriots and intellectuals (Petru Giovacchini, Marco Angeli, Bertino Poli, Domenico Carlotti, Petru Rocca, Pier Luigi Marchetti) chose to emigrate to Fascist Italy, where many magazines and publications dedicated to Corsica were established: “Atlante Linguistico Etnografico Italiano della Corsica”, “Archivio Storico di Corsica”, “Corsica Antica e Moderna”. Gioacchino Volpe, one of the leading Italian historians of the twentieth century and founder of the aforementioned “Archivio storico di Corsica”, published the “History of Italian Corsica” (“Storia della Corsica italiana”) in Milan in 1939, which is still one of the most important historiographical works dedicated to the island. Already by 1923 the Livorno newspaper “Il Telegrafo” published an edition for Corsica.

The Italian military occupation during World War II, which took place in November 1942 as part of “Operation Anton” (an Italo-German occupation of territories subject to the Vichy government) was peacefully accepted by the Corsicans who greeted the Italians as liberators. The Groups of Corsican Irredentist Action openly supported the occupation and asked for the union of Corsica to the Kingdom of Italy. After September 8, 1943, the Corsican resistance was supported by many Italian soldiers who played a crucial role, losing 700 men among their ranks, and contributing to the expulsion of German troops from the island. After the war, France condemned seven pro-Italian irredentists to death, including Petru Giovacchini, who escaped execution by staying in Italy. Petru Rocca was sentenced to 15 years' hard labor. Simon Cristofini was executed in Algiers in 1944 and his wife Marta Renucci, the first Corsican female journalist, was sentenced to 15 years' imprisonment.

Part V – Corsican Regionalism after 1945.

After World War II the French authorities in Corsica unfurled a strong propaganda against any form of pro-Italian irredentism, against Corsican autonomism, against the use of Italian and Corsican on the island, and adamantly denied the linguistic and cultural links between Corsica and Italy. Such intellectual dishonesty, coupled with anti-Fascist propaganda, led to the death of pro-Italian irredentism and the rise of left-wing Corsican regionalism.

The events that happened in the 1960's assured that the the project of frenchification of the island was a complete failure. In 1957 two statal and private joint-stock companies were created: SOMIVAC (“Société d’économie mixte pour la mise en valeur de la Corse”) and SETCO (“Société pour l’équipement touristique de la Corse”). The latter was a substantial failure. SOMIVAC, however, took 90% of Corsica's own agricultural land devoted to wine-growing, which was originally promised to the Corsicans, and gave it to the so-called “Pieds-Noirs” (French refugees returning from independent Algeria). The arrival of about 15,000 “Pieds-Noirs” in Corsica – often accompanied by North African immigrants – was seen by the Corsicans as a colonization of their island by France. This, together with the detrimental discrimination perpetrated against Corsicans by SOMIVAC, generated a strong negative reaction among the local population.

As a reaction to all this, the FRC (“Fronte regionalista corso”) and the ARC (“Azione Regionalista Corsa”, later “Azione per la rinascita della Corsica”) were founded in 1968. On August 18, 1975 Edmondu Simeoni (ARC) and 21 other people occupied one of the farms given to a “Pied-Noir” (French refugee), leading to the intervention of French special forces, the dissolution of ARC on August 29, 1975, and serious incidents in Bastia, such as the murder of a policeman and tanks in the streets. In 1976 the “Fronte Paesanu Corsu di Liberazione” and “Ghjustizia Paolina” merged to form the FNLC (“Fronte di Liberazione Naziunale Corsu”, dedicated to acts of armed resistance against the French government for many years. Since 1987 it has its own legal political arm, the “Cuncolta Nazionalista”. In 1977 Edmondu Simeoni founded the “Unione di u Populu Corsu”.

The Corsican Regionalists in the meantime presented a series of demands including recognition of the Corsican language and the introduction of bilingualism, environmental protection, defense against reckless overbuilding, and the reopening of the University of Corte originally founded by Pasquale Paoli, which was closed by the French when they conquered of Corsica. Already in 1972 the French Government, in response to Corsican demands, arranged the creation of the Regional Natural Park of Corsica (which covers about 40% of the island), and in 1981 the University of Corte was finally reopened. In 1975 Corsica, which hitherto belonging to the Region of “Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur”, was eleveated into its own region within the French Republic. Also in 1975 the only Corsican department was divided into the two current departments of Ajaccio and Bastia, corresponding to the historical regions of “Pumonte” and “Cismonte”, as it was in the period from 1793-1811.

In 1982 Corsica was granted the new Regional Statute. Since the 1990's, despite sporadic events of armed struggle (such as the murder of the French prefect Claude Erignac on February 6, 1998 in Ajaccio), the Corsican regionalists began to reap a considerable amount of electoral success. In 1992 the “Corsica nazione” party led by Jen-Guy Talamoni, which was established in 1992 through the merger of various Corsican regional movements, won 20% of the vote during the elections for the Corsican Assembly. “Corsica Libera”, founded on February 1, 2009 with the merger of “Corsica Nazione” and “Accolta naziunale corsa” (founded by the former regional councilor Pierre Poggioli), under the leadership of Jen-Guy Talamoni, supports a radical regionalist agenda (i.e. independence) and obtained 9.85% of the vote in 2010 and four seats in the second round of elections for the Corsican Assembly.

“Femu a Corsica”, a “moderate regionalist” coalition (i.e. autonomists), led by Gilles Simeoni (son of Edmondu, lawyer and mayor of Bastia in 2014) and Jean-Christophe Angelini (secretary of the “Partitu di a Nazione Corsa”, founded in 2002 through the merger of the “Unione di u Populu Corsu” with two other movements) obtained 25.89 % of the vote in 2010 and 11 seats in the second round of elections for the Corsican Assembly. Greater autonomy was granted to the region in 1991 when it was elevated to a “Territorial Collectivity of the French Republic” (“Collectivité territoriale de la Republique”), with its own Executive Council and President, and an Assembly, both based in Ajaccio, in addition to the Corsican Laws of 2002.

A referendum for the expansion of regional autonomy, including the suppression of the two departments and the transfer of its functions to the "Territorial Collectivity", was rejected in 2003 due to opposition by the Gaullists who support traditional French centralism, and some opposition by certain segments of the Corsican regionalists who were fearful that such a partial and unsatisfactory concession would weaken the instances of self-government of the island.

Part VI – Corsica in the 21st Century.

Corsica today is sparsely populated with a total population of little more than 300,000 (equivelant to 35 people per sq km), of which 26,000 are foreign nationals (who form 8% of the population, more than half of them being North Africans). The island suffers from strong economic, territorial and cultural marginality compared to the rest of France, to which Corsica has belonged for nearly 250 years. From the economic point of view, Corsica is last in France for both total GDP for the average GDP per capita (less than one-fifth – only 20,000 euros compared to the French average of almost 26,000 euros). The unemployment rate is also far higher than the national average (16% versus 12%). The prevailing economic sectors are agriculture, livestock and tourism, while the only export industries are beer and aircraft components. The roads and rail links of the interior are bad (the Porto Vecchio-Bastia railroad was completely suppressed, so the only rail links now are between Ajaccio, Bastia and Calvi), while flight (six civil airports) and naval connections (mainly from Ajaccio, Bastia, Bonifacio and Isola Rossa to the French ports of Marseille, Nice and Toulon, and to the Italian ports of Savona, Porto Torres, Livorno and Santa Teresa di Gallura) are used mainly during tourist season. In Corsica there is also the military airport of Solenzara, strategically a very important base for French Air Force fighter-bombers, as well as numerous exercise polygons on the rest of the island.

The main difference between Corsica and France, however, remains the deep linguistic and cultural otherness of the former compared to the latter; the gap has only partially been filled despite nearly 250 years of forced frenchification. Regional autonomy, which despite many difficulties was laboriously and gradually expanded by the reforms of 1975, 1982, 1991 and 2002, is the necessary framework for the recovery of Corsican identity, which necessarily requires the official recognition of the island's native language.

Corsican regionalism is now a remarkable political force. Since 2010 the Corsican regionalists control some 15 seats (including 4 by the radicals of “Corsica Libera” and 11 by the moderates of “Femu a Corsica”) out of 51 in the Corsican Assembly, whose centre-left majority represents the Executive Council of Corsica, chaired by Paul Giacobbi of the “Parti radical de gauche”. The mayor of Bastia, Gilles Simeoni, is also a Corsican regionalist. On the other hand Laurent Marcangeli, mayor the other great city, Ajaccio, is a member of the centre-right “Union pour la Majorité Presidentielle” (UMR). On May 17, 2013, the Corsican Assembly voted the Corsican language as co-official with French, although the French Prime Minister Manuel Valls was quick to declare this resolution as unconstitutional.

Over the past 25 years, however, different voices in Corsica have been in favor of a reassessment of the Italian language as a cultured language of the island and a recovery of the historic cultural and linguistic ties between Corsica and the Italian mainland. Among the supporters of these initiatives is the magazine “A Viva Voce”, which describes itself as “the only magazine in Italian written by Corsicans”, animated by a group of Corsican scholars who propose the adoption of the Italian language either in place of Corsican, or as a learned language in support of Corsican:

“Some men and women of Corsica, mindful of the learned language of our ancestors, have decided to publish this magazine in Italian. This is our heritage and also a means to keep the Corsican language alive.”

A joint collaboration has also been launched between the University of Corte and the University of Pisa, who organize conferences and cultural activities together, designed to renew the ancient bond between the two shores of the Tyrrhenian Sea. Even more recently there appeared a website called “Corsica Oggi”, dedicated to Corsican news and current affairs entirely in the Italian language, which is “seizing the opportunity to resume the ties that have aways linked Corsica and Italian culture.”

As the website says:

“It makes no sense for Corsican to distance itself from Italian. The real danger has always been unnatural frenchification. Already today, words such as “u tuvagliolu” (il tovagliolo) are often replaced by a word borrowed from French, in this case “a servietta”. We believe that the study and use of the Italian language alongside Corsican and French will be of great benefit, and will allow our language to survive and flourish. By using the Italian language, you will see how similar it is to Italian. Not only can it help us preserve our identity, but it can also be an occasion for cultural enrichment and economic opportunities, given our geographical proximity to Italy and the importance of tourism in our island.”

It is desirable that the Corsican people, who are waging a commendable battle through its political representatives to defend and preserve its indigenous language, will soon be reunited also with the Italian language, which inseparably belongs to its history, and recover it as a traditional language of culture on the island, to be used alongside Corsican in schools, on television, in the press, in theater and in literature, as an indispensable instrument for the preservation of Corsican identity.