Roman Republic (1798-1799)

The Roman Republic (Italian: Repubblica Romana) was a state created on February 15, 1798, and existed until September 30, 1799 (except during the Neapolitan occupation, from November 28 to December 14, 1798). It was one of many "sister republics", satellite states of the French Republic. But this in particular, with its creation, was the first time that the Papal States were dissolved and the temporal power of the popes was dismantled, albeit for a short time.

History

The Napoleonic invasion of Italy in 1796-1797 had led to some territories and states remaining under the control of the French Republic, which was endorsed in the Treaty of Campo Formio signed between the French and Austrians. The northern Papal States (Ferrara, Bologna, Ravenna) had remained under French control (these territories being integrated into the new Cisalpine Republic). In May 1796 Napoleon Bonaparte advanced into Lombardy to fight the Austrians, whom he defeated, and on the 15th of that month he entered Milan, announcing his intentions to enter Rome. However, it was not decided yet, but he annexed the Legations of Ravenna and Bologna, which were the closest part of the Papal States.

But the assassination of a general from the French Embassy, Mathurin-Léonard Duphot, by Vatican troops (during a riot that took place on December 28, 1797, provoked by Italian and French revolutionaries), motivated that the French Armies invaded the Papal States again. The following year, the French troops commanded by General Louis Alexandre Berthier seized Romagna and the port of Ancona. On February 17, a delegation of cardinals sent by the pope met with Napoleon in Tolentino to reach an agreement. Thus, on February 19, the Peace of Tolentino was signed, an agreement that forced the pope to pay 30 million escudos to avoid the military occupation of Rome. Pius VI accepted the agreement five days later.

Bonaparte explained in a letter to the Directory the reason why he had decided not to march on Rome:

Thirty million worth to us ten times more than Rome, where we hadn't gotten five million... That old machine will decompel herself.

Napoleon Bonaparte

Finally, in 1798 the Roman Republic was declared, civil marriage and divorce were legalized, monasteries were closed and Church property was confiscated; in Paris the papal representative was arrested.

General Berthier marched on the Papal States. French troops entered Rome on February 15, 1798, precisely the day on which the 23rd anniversary of Pius VI's pontificate was celebrated; the pope was arrested on the night of February 20, confined in a convent in Siena and then transferred to a Carthusian monastery on the outskirts of Florence. Later he was transferred as a prisoner to France, with which the Roman Republic was proclaimed. The flag of the new Republic, based on the French one, was granted by Napoleon and consisted of three vertical stripes: black, white and red. It was in use until the suppression of the Republic. Although the pope was treated with all honors, he was deprived of all political power as well as the escort of his Swiss Guard, which was replaced by soldiers of the Republic. A year later Pius VI would die, leaving the pontifical seat vacant.

This action marked the first attempt by a state to destroy the political power of the papacy, as Berthier himself testified, who declared at the time: "All temporal authority emanating from the former government of the Pope has to be suppressed and it must not exercise any similar function again". However, the brevity of the French presence in central Italy prevented the consolidation of all the revolutionary politics that the French Jacobins exported outside their borders.

On March 7, the Tiber Republic (proclaimed in Perugia on February 4) and the Anconitan Republic (proclaimed in Ancona on November 19, 1797) became part of the Roman Republic. However, a Neapolitan army under the command of the Austrian general Karl Mack took the city of Rome on November 28, being recaptured again by the French on December 14. Finally, on September 19, 1799, the French troops abandoned the city, which was taken by the Neapolitans on the 30th of the same month, this time definitively. With it, this Roman Republic disappeared.

Administrative division

The Roman Republic was divided into eight departments. The administrative division varied over time and reached its definitive deposition in the year 1799.

See also

• History of Italy
• Annex: Former States of Italy
• Pontifical States
• French revolutionary wars
• Roman Republic (1849)
• Tosca