In the context of the long-standing cultural diversity of Sicily, the Spanish Inquisition imposed a Catholic monoculture, while literacy and other markers for social welfare plummeted.Īs the historians Louis Mendola and Jacqueline Alio write of this time: These so-called Catholic Monarchs of what is now Spain brought the Inquisition to Sicily. Eventually, Ferdinand II controlled both “Kingdoms of Sicily.” That subjugation traces in part to Columbus’ sponsors, Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand II, who possessed Sicily during Columbus’ lifetime, with Ferdinand’s cousin, Ferdinand I, controlling the southern mainland. With unification, Italy’s rulers attempted to forge a new national identity among disparate peoples, with different experiences of brutal colonialism.īy the 19th century, Southern Italians were leaving Italy in large numbers to escape the entrenched poverty wrought by political and economic subjugation. In a 1924 letter to The New York Times defending immigration restrictions against Italians and other Southern Europeans, the eugenicist Henry Fairfield Osborn took care to exclude the so-called discoverer of America from the tainted races: “ Columbus from his portraits and his busts, whether authentic or not, was clearly Nordic.”Ĭolumbus died long before the unification of Italy in the 19th century, but he came to be its mythologized representative. MPI/Getty ImagesĪmid racist theories marking the period, President Harrison’s proclamation signaled distinctions between glorious European figures, like Columbus, and destitute Sicilians, whose appearance was unwelcome and whose lynchings were met with approval in the press. Original Artwork: Engraving by Nathaniel Currier. were widely regarded with contempt.Ĭhristopher Columbus landing in America. As such, Mediterranean immigrants in the U.S. Southern Italians, along with other Southern Europeans, North Africans and Middle Easterners, were viewed by many white Protestant Europeans as an inferior Mediterranean race. That message reached a ready audience shaped by late 19th and early 20th centuries’ notions of “scientific racism”, the pseudoscientific belief that empirical evidence exists to support racism or racial superiority. Instead, American citizens were encouraged to observe the anniversary of “the discovery of America … as shall impress upon our youth the patriotic duties of American citizenship.” Scientific racism Harrison’s proclamation did not mention Italy or Italian immigrants. The following year, President Benjamin Harrison announced a one-time national observance of the 400-year anniversary of Columbus’ voyage. This media coverage contributed to political tensions between the U.S. Many of the nation’s papers, including The New York Times, applauded the lynching. The killings were defended as vengeance for the murder of a police chief by unidentified assailants. But it holds the distinction of being one of the largest mass lynchings in the nation’s history. This was not the first or last lynching of Italian immigrants in the United States. In 1891, 11 Southern Italian immigrants were murdered by a mob in New Orleans. A mass lynchingĪ mass lynching remains the professed political reason for first associating Columbus with Italian Americans. Given Italian history, descendants of Italian immigrants have reason to stand in solidarity with indigenous groups as they reclaim histories that were previously expunged.
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