Father of the Nation, Victor Emmanuel II, on a Coin

I had resolved to write more often. But in the end, I'm glad I can keep up the pace of at least one article a week. We'll see what happens next. In any case, I'm writing articles again where I don't refuse payment.

I keep writing about coins from the Latin Monetary Union, which formally existed from 1865 to 1927. However, coins were minted according to its standards from the end of the 18th century onwards.

The twenty-lire (franc) coin weighed approximately 6.45 g, 90% pure gold, 5.81 g of fine gold. It had a diameter of 21 mm and a thickness of approximately 1.3 mm.

This time I will write about Victor Emmanuel II, who lived from 1820 to 1878 and ruled from 1849. Until 1861, his coins bore the title of King of Sardinia, Cyprus, and Jerusalem. In 1861, he became King of Italy. He played a significant role in the founding of this state.

I don't know if you know who the Fates are. They appear quite often in Slavic fairy tales. When little Victor was born, they probably predicted that he would unite Italy and become its first king. But he would pay for it with one lost war and three other won wars. Actually, four.

Victor Emanuel had already participated in his father's war against Austria. His father, Charles Albert, lost the war and abdicated in favor of his son. That is how Victor Emanuel came to power.

Four years later, he went to war on his own. Against Russia. In the so-called Crimean War. On the surface, this military campaign made no sense for the Kingdom of Sardinia.

However, Victor understood that he could not defeat Austria on his own. So he literally paid for an ally: the French emperor Napoleon III. He paid him with his participation in the Crimean War and the cession of Savoy and Nice. In return, Napoleon was to conquer Veneto and Lombardy for him.

Napoleon and Victor went to war against Austria. The Austrian troops were commanded personally by the emperor, Franz Joseph II, and the French and Italians by Napoleon III. Both commanders proved to be completely incompetent. And so, without the Italians' knowledge, they decided to make peace.

Napoleon took Nice and Savoy, but only fulfilled half of the agreement. Victor Emmanuel gained only Lombardy. The Italians saw this as Napoleon's betrayal, and Italian anarchist patriots repeatedly attempted to assassinate Napoleon.

However, Giuseppe Garibaldi carried out a revolution in southern Italy, which was joined by other smaller Italian states. The Kingdom of Italy was established. But the Papal States and Veneto were not part of this state. Florence became the capital. For about 10 years.

Prussia sought to unify Germany. Austria stood in the way of this as well. And so, in 1866, Prussia declared war on Austria. Italy joined in. The Italian army and navy were defeated everywhere, but they tied down Austrian forces. Prussia did not betray Italy. Italy gained Veneto. The Italians also attempted to conquer the Papal State. However, Napoleon III prevented them from doing so with his soldiers. Victor Emmanuel was excommunicated by the Pope.

But Prussia was also hindered by France. And so Napoleon III's days were numbered. France was crushed and withdrew its troops from Rome. Italy annexed the Papal State and Rome became the Italian capital.

Until now, I have only displayed my own coins. Now I will make an exception.

The reverse side of coins became considerably simpler after 1861. But I don't own this coin. So I helped myself with a copied image. It's quite surprising that even though I collect quite different coins, I still have so many examples from the Latin Monetary Union. This is already my eighth article on the subject of coins from this union.

And I don't think this will be the last article. For me, a coin is not just a piece of metal. I see a story behind almost every one of them. I have just shared one of those stories.

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This article was written with the help of Deepl.com translator.