Go Republic!

Today in Italy it is Festa della Repubblica because 80 years ago, just after WWII, they held a plebiscite [ballot-paper] to determine whether to continue with a monarchy (but without Mussolini, he dead) or go full-metal Republic. It wasn't a slam-dunk, but a 54% majority voted for Republic. This iconic picture by photo-journalist Federico Patellani came to symbolise the optimism that people felt for a new system of governance. The woman in the picture wasn't named as Anna Iberti, from Milano, until decades later. Patellani blasted off an entire roll of film on that shoot and other images are available on the internet. But everyone likes the ragged hole torn in the newspaper of record: it's a metaphor of the shaky start to the Republic: so many parties, so many elections.

The referendum was not held in some provinces of Italy which were a) still occupied by the allies in 1946 and b) diplomatically incertae sedis: 

• The Julian March = Venezia Giulia consisting of Trieste and Fiume which was eventually split between Italy and Yugoslavia.
• Bolzano =  Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol up in the Alps, fell to Italy, although it took a generation for Austria to finally quieten its aspirations for sovereignty there.
• Zara a Italian enclave city deep in Dalmatia, which administratively included two archipelagos out in the Adriatic: Lagosta and Pelegosa. All these are now part of Croatia

Pelagosa was the site of a battle between two submarines during WWI. On 5th Aug 1915, the Italian sub Nereide was sunk by SM-5 of the Austro-Hungarian navy, with the loss of all hands. The Captain of SM-5? Linienschiffsleutnant Georg Ritter von Trapp . . . as in Sound of Music, Anschluß, Christopher Plummer.  Phew! that's today's rabbit-hole: coming up for air and breakfast.