Curated category
Military history of the Mediterranean
- French conquest of CorsicaThe island of Corsica had been ruled by the Republic of Genoa since 1284. In the 18th century, Corsicans started to develop their own nationalism and seek…
- Unification of ItalyThe Unification of Italy, known in Italian as the Risorgimento, a word meaning "rising again", produced a nation from a peninsula that had been divided for…
- Gothic War (535–554)The Gothic War of 535 to 554 began with a death and ended with a continent changed beyond recovery. When Amalasuntha, regent of the Ostrogothic Kingdom of…
- History of Islam in southern ItalyThe year 827 marked the beginning of a seventy-five-year struggle for control over Sicily. A Byzantine commander named Euphemius fled to Africa after being…
- French invasion of Egypt and SyriaNapoleon Bonaparte departed from Toulon in May 1798 with a fleet of around 36,000 troops. His goal was to undermine British trade routes and expand French…
- Hundred Years' WarThe Hundred Years' War lasted 116 years, from 1337 to 1453, which makes its tidy name a small lie. It was never one continuous fight.
- Vandalic WarThe Vandalic War of 533-534 ended a century of lost Roman territory in a single year. In two decisive battles fought just months apart, the Byzantine general…
- Afrika KorpsThe Afrika Korps was born on the 11th of January 1941, not from a grand strategic vision, but from a crisis. Italian forces in North Africa had just been…
- Regia MarinaThe Regia Marina, Italy's Royal Navy, was born on the 17th of March 1861 from the wreckage of rival kingdoms. It entered its first major battle just five…
- Maritime republicsIn the year 849, a coalition of Italian coastal cities sailed out to the port of Ostia and shattered a Saracen invasion fleet.
- Yugoslav WarsThe Yugoslav Wars began on the 26th of June 1991, when the Yugoslav People's Army moved against Slovenia just one day after that republic declared its…
- Italian invasion of AlbaniaThe Italian invasion of Albania lasted only days in April 1939, yet its consequences rippled through the Second World War and reshaped the political map of…
- Fall of the Republic of VeniceThe Fall of the Republic of Venice ended on the morning of the 12th of May 1797, when a quorum-less gathering of terrified patricians voted to dissolve a…