The Italian Unknown Soldier

The Italian Unknown Soldier is a who died during World War I and he has not been identified. His body is buried inside of the “Altare della Patria” in Rome.

The idea to commemorate an Italian Unknown Soldier brought to major general Giulio Douhet in 1920. Douhet proposed to Italian Governament to edify a monument, in Rome, in order to thank and commemorate Italian fallen soldiers of WWI. So, he presented to the Parliament a new law called “Regio Decreto“ and the Parliament approved it in 1921. Now, the Ministery of War created a commition that had to find eleven unknown soldiers’s corpses. One of that would be buried into “Altare della Patria” in Rome and it would be become the body of the Italian Unknown Soldier.

The corpses’s choice wasn’t be casual, indeed each one came from a precise area of Italian Front of WWI. The areas were Rovereto, the Dolomites, the highlands, the Monte Grappa, Montello, the Lower Piave, Cadore, Gorizia, the Isonzo Low, Mount St. Michael and Castagnevizza Karst. All the corpses were transferted in Aquileia, a country of Friuli Venezia Giulia, in North – East of Italy.

The person who had to choose the body of the future Italian Unknown Soldier was Maria Bergamas who lived in Gradisca d’Isonzo. She was the mother of Antonio Bergamas who deserted the call of Austro Hungarian Army in order to enlist himself in Italian Army; he died on battlefield and his body was never find.

The body was chosen on the 28^th of October 1921 in Aquileia’s Church. The eleven coffins were aligned in front of the altar, Maria Bergamas passed in front of them and when she arrived in front of the tenth one screamed the name of his lost son and started to cry. After that the coffin was place on a cannon base and carried on a railway hearse, which had to bring the coffin in Rome. The other ten corpses remained were buried in the cemetery of war that surrounds the Roman Temple, in Aquileia, called “the Tomb of the ten unknown soldiers”.

The train passed for Udine, Treviso, Venezia, Padova, Rovigo, Ferrara, Bologna, Pistoia, Prato, Firenze, Arezzo, Chiusi, Orvieto’s stations very low in order to permit the citizens to commemorate the Unknown Soldier. At the end of the journey, the train arrived in Rome, where the regiments of the Italian armed forces and representatives of the combatants, widows and mothers of the fallen, with King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy on his head, welcomed the arrival of the coffin of the Unknown Soldier.

The coffin was buried with a solemn ceremony at the “Altare della Patria” on the 4^th of November 1921, on the occasion of National Unity Day and Armed Forces, with the epigraphs: "Ignoto militi", "XXIV May MCMXV" (24 May 1915) and "IV November MCMXVIII" (4 November 1918), that are the dates of the  beginning and the end of World War I.

Some days before the celebration Italian Government assigned to the Unknown Soldier the gold medal for military valor, which is the highest Italian military decoration, with the motivation:

« Degno figlio di una stirpe prode e di una millenaria civiltà, resistette inflessibile nelle trincee più contese, prodigò il suo coraggio nelle più cruente battaglie e cadde combattendo senz'altro premio sperare che la vittoria e la grandezza della patria »

COMPARISON BETWEEN THE ITALIAN UNKNOWN SOLDIER AND THE BRITISH UNKNOWN SOLDIER

In both cases the bodies of unknown soldiers took a physical and symbolic trip because both ones were escorted, by the army, and were welcomed in the cities by lots of people. So in both countries the cult of the Unknown soldier was strongly felt.

But there are also differences. For example, in Italy the body was buried in a godless place, but it recalls the sense of belonging to the Nation, indeed the place is called the Altar of the Fatherland. On the contrary, in England, the body was buried in a religious place that is Westmister Abbey.

An other difference was the person who ought to choose the body that would be become the Unknown Soldier. In Italy, the person who chose the Unknown Soldier, from eleven coffins, was a mother, called Maria Bergamas who lost her son on battlefield; instead, in England, an English general, called J. L. Wyatt, chose the Unknown Soldier between four coffins.