[1] See Giesebrecht, _De litterarum studiis apud Italos primis
mediaevi saeculis_ (Berlin, 1845.)
[2] See Gaspary, _Die sicilianische Dichterschule des 13ten
Jahrhunderts_ (Berlin, 1878).
[3] _Storia della repubblica di Firenze_ (Florence, 1876).
ITALIAN WARS (1848-1870), a generic name for the series of wars for
Italian unity which began with the Milan insurrection of the 18th of
March 1848 and closed with the capture of Rome by the Italians on the
20th of September 1870. For their Italian political interest see ITALY:
_History_. The present article deals with certain campaigns of
distinctively military importance, viz. 1848-49, 1859 and 1866, in the
first and third of which the centre of gravity of the nationalist
movement was the Piedmontese regular army, and in the second the French
army commanded by Napoleon III. On the other side the Austrian army was
throughout the basis of the established order of things, settled at the
Congress of Vienna on the theory that Italy was "a geographical
expression." Side by side with these regular armies, each of which was a
special type, there fought national levies of widely varying kinds, and
thus practically every known form of military service, except the fully
organized "nation in arms" (then peculiar to Prussia) made its
appearance in the field. Further, these wars constitute the greater part
of European military history between Waterloo and Koniggratz--a
bridge--if a broken one--between Napoleon and Moltke. They therefore
present a considerable technical interest, wholly apart from their
historical importance and romantic interest.