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Education and Politics in Piedmont, 1796–1814

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Dorinda Outram
Dorinda Outram
Affiliation:
University of Reading
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Extract

In 1820 many of the leading figures in the governments of the Italian states were men who had already been prominent before 1796, and had collaborated with the French during the period of the Empire. Vittorio Fossombroni and Neri Corsini in Tuscany and Prospero Balbo in Piedmont are the outstanding examples in the years immediately following the Vienna settlement. The political survival of these men into a Europe dominated by violent reaction against the events of the preceding twenty years poses interesting questions. How had the pre-revolutionary Italian ruling aristocracies reacted to the experience of Napoleonic government, and how did this experience affect their attitude to the events of the succeeding decade?

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Articles
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The Historical Journal , Volume 19 , Issue 3 , September 1976 , pp. 611 - 633
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1976

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References

1 For Fossombroni (1754–1844) and Corsini (1771–1845) see Carraresi, A., ‘La politica interna di Vittorio Fossombroni nella Restaurazione’, Archivio Storico Italiano, cxxix (1971), 267–355.Google Scholar

2 Balbo (1762–1837) was left fatherless in 1765, and adopted by his maternal grandfather, Count Lorenzo Bogino, minister of the Interior. He studied law at the University of Turin, and graduated in 1780. In 1782 he helped to found the Patria Società Letteraria and became one of the Decurioni or municipal officials of Turin. In 1788 he became Secretary of the Accademia delle Scienze. Between 1796 and 1799 he was Sardinian ambassador in Paris. After Piedmont was invaded by France in 1798, he accompanied the exiled sovereign to Sardinia and Tuscany. He accepted employment under the Austrian regime in Turin in 1800, but resigned his position after a few weeks. In 1802 he returned to Turin, and refused several offers from the French of employment on the Conseil d'Etat in Paris. In 1805, however, he accepted the comparatively modest position of Rector of the University of Turin. In 1816 he was made ambassador to Madrid, and in 1818 placed at the head of the Magistrato della Riforma, or general administration of education in Piedmont. In 1819, he combined this position with that of minister of the Interior, a post which he lost in the aftermath of the revolution of 1821. His critics asserted that these disturbances originated in the liberal tendencies which he had fostered in the University of Turin, and in the dangerous diffusion of knowledge among the lower classes caused by his enthusiasm for the spread of primary education. His last years were spent in scholarly retirement. There is no adequate biography of Balbo, who has been overshadowed by the renown of his second son Cesare. The best modern account is that of Sirugo, F. in Dizionario degli Itaiiani (Rome 1963), vol. v.Google Scholar Detailed examination of the events of 1821 is contained in Egidi, P., I moti studenteschi di Torino nel gennaio 1821 (Turin, 1923)Google Scholar. Material relating to his career as Rector of the University is lengthily misinterpreted along nationalist lines by Passamonti, E., ‘Prospero Balbo e la rivoluzione del 1821’, Biblioteca di Storia recente, vol. XII, ed. Rossi, and De, Magistris (Turin, 1926), 190–347.Google Scholar

3 There are surprisingly few studies of the Italians who collaborated with the French regime. This deficiency is especially marked in the case of territories outside the Regno d'ltalia. Little advance has in fact been made since the study of Corsini, Tommaso, ‘Di alcuni cooperatori di Napoleone I’, in Ritratti e studi moderni (Milan, 1914), 397–459.Google Scholar See also the appeal for more detailed biographical study of these men in Roberts, J. M., Francesco Melzi d'Eril, an Italian Statesman (1796–1806) (unpublished Oxford D.Phil, thesis, 1954).Google Scholar

4 Martin-Michel-Charles Gaudin, Gaëte, due de, Mémoires, Souvenirs, Opinions et Ecrits (2 vols. Paris, 1826), I, 170–1.Google Scholar

5 Gaffarel, P., Bonaparte et les Républiques italiennes, 1796–1799 (Paris, 1895), p. 29Google Scholar and note, quoting Bonaparte's famous letter to the Directory of 28 Dec. 1796, ‘il y a en ce moment en Lombardie trois partis: I. celui qui se laisse conduire par les Français; 2. celui qui voudrait la liberté et montre même son désir avec quelque impatience; 3. le parti ami des Autrichiens et ennemi des Français. Je soutiens et j'encourage le premier, je contiens le second, et je réprime le troisième.’

6 Among the teaching staff of the University, the position was rather different. Salaries, ans, never generous (around 2,000 fr. p.a. for a professor) declined in value as the economic situation worsened. Nevertheless, prospects were no brighter in any other kind of employment, and the dissolution in 1809 of the religious orders, to which many teachers belonged, even further increased their dependence on their university salaries. University administrators and university teachers, proceeding from very different economic bases, were thus lies, faced with very different financial problems.

7 For Balbo's thought on the situation of Piedmont in 1799, see Passamonti, E., ‘Una memoriale inedita di Prospero Balbo nel dicembre 1799’, Accademia delle Scienze di Torino, Atti, XLIX (1913–1914), 914–51.Google Scholar J. M. Roberts has argued, in relation to the Austrian subject lcuni territories in Italy, that a strong tradition of the acceptance of de facto governments made it easier for the Lombard nobility to collaborate with the French. (Francesco Melzi d'Eril §I). However, these considerations obviously do not apply to Piedmont, ruled by a native dynasty.

8 See the social analysis contained in Vaccarino, Giorgio, ‘L'inchiestà del 1799 sui Giacobini in Piemonte’, Rivista Storica Italiana, LXXVII (1965), 27–77.Google Scholar

9 Jourdan's regime lasted from 1800 to 1802. There is no adequate account of his career, or of the military republican opposition to Napoleon. For Jourdan's disapproval of the coup of brumaire, see Correspondance de Napoléon I…pvbliée par ordre de I'Empereur Napoléon III (32 vols. Paris 1859–), vi, p. 14Google Scholar, no. 4397. Some additional information on military republicanism can be obtained from Auréas, H., Un Général de Napoléon: Miollis (Paris, 1961)Google Scholar. Miollis was governor-general of the Roman départements from 1809 to 1814.

10 The only biography of Botta is still that of Dionisotti (Turin, 1867). Some effort towards a complete listing of his known correspondence was made by Bersano, Arturo, Carlo Frati and Carlo Salsotto, in, respectively, Accademia delle Scienze di Torino, Atti, XXXVI (1900–1901), 969–96;Google Scholar XLVI (1910–11), 12–28; LI (1915–16), 717–48.

11 Boyer, F., ‘Carlo Bossi et le Piémont’, Rassegna Storica del Risorgimento,LIX(1969), 44–57. There is no biographical study of Carlo Giulio, professor of medicine at the University of Turin, who became Prefect of the Stura in 1804, and died in 1814.Google Scholar

12 Archives Nationales, Paris, F. 17. 1603, Organisation…, report of 77 pp. dated ‘Premier jour complémentaire, an IX’. All documents cited in this paper are to be found in Thi the Archives Nationales unless otherwise stated. Little information on La Boulinière is available. He seems to have left no printed works. He was dismissed from his post of Secretary of the French administration of Piedmont when Jourdan was recalled in 1802, to reappear in 1804 as professor of geography and history in the University of Turin. I have been unable to discover any information after that date.

13 The importance of issues concerning the University of Turin and its staff in determining the crisis of 1802 has never been fully realised. Boyer, F., ‘Les institutions universitaires en Piémont de 1800 à 1802’, Revue d'Histoire moderne et contemporaine, XVII (1970), 913–17,CrossRefGoogle Scholar is an extremely brief summary of the main events.

14 Report quoted, p. 41. Antoine Chaptal (1756–1832) was minister of the Interior from 1800 to 1804. See Pigeire, J., La vie et I'oeuvre de Chaptal (Paris, 1932)Google Scholar; for his educational thought, Tressé, R., ‘J. A. Chaptal et l'enseignement technique de 1800 à 1819’, Revue de l'histoire des Sciences, x (1957), 167–74.Google Scholar

15 Williams, L. P., ‘Science, education and the French Revolution’, lsis, XLIV (1953), 311–30Google Scholar. For Fourcroy, see Kersaint, G., ‘Antoine-François de Fourcroy, 1755–1809’, Mémoires du Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle, série D, I (1966), 1–296Google Scholar. In his lifetime it was widely believed that he had betrayed his master, Lavoisier, to the guillotine. Hahn, R., ‘Fourcroy advocate of Lavoisier?’, Archives Internationales d'Histoire des Sciences, XII (1959), 285–8.Google Scholar

16 Report quoted, pp. 2, 10, 14.

17 F. 17. 1603, Organisation…fo. 2, 15 vendémiaire an X; fo. 4, 4 frimaire an X; fos. 14–16, n.d.; fo. 26, 9 brumaire an X; fo. 30, n.d.

18 Decree of 21 frimaire, an IX.

19 F. 17. 1603. Organisation…fo. 45, 15 vendémiaire an XI.

20 Alexis Charbonnière (1778–1819) began his career as a cavalry officer under the old regime. In 1802 he was appointed secretary-general per interim to the French administration in Piedmont, and in 1806 was rewarded for his services by a post in the Imperial guard of honour. He was also the author of several forgotten plays and poems. Contemporary opinion on his political work in Piedmont is contained in Vaccarino, Giorgio, ‘La classe politica piemontese dopo Marengo, nelle note segrete di Augusto Hus’, Bollettino storicobibliografico subalpino, LV (1953), 5–74.Google Scholar

21 Report of Charbonnière, F. IE 78, 13 nivôse, an XI.

22 Reports in F. 17. 1606, Personnel et Affaires diverses. See also Brayda, , Giraud, Botta et, Vicissitudes de l'Instruction Publique en Piémont depuis l'an VII jusqu'au mois de ventôse an XI (Turin, 1803).Google Scholar

23 See Baudisson, I. M., Orationes pro Comite Prospero Balbo…(Turin, 1780)Google Scholar. Baudisson, a professor of canon law, had lost his chair in the reorganization of the University by the Conseil d’instruction publique.

24 F. 17. 1603, Correspondance… an XI. No study exists of Menou's Italian career. Of aristocratic origins, he was a loyal supporter of Napoleon, and accompanied him on the Egyptian campaign. After the assassination of Kléber, and the departure of Napoleon, he became commander-in-chief of the army of the Orient. In 1808 he was made governor of the newty annexed Tuscan departments, and in 1810 governor of Venetia. He died in 1812. Marmottan's, PaulLe Général Menou en Toscane (Paris, 1904)Google Scholar briefly sketches a few of the more lurid episodes of his career. His extensive correspondence with Eugène Beauharnais, Governor of the Regno d'ltalia, is preserved in Princeton University Library.

25 F. 17. 1603, Correspondance… an XI, ‘Délibération du Conseil-Général du Département du Pô, 6 floréal, an XIII…sur la proposition du C. Baudisson, de demander…la conservation de l'Université de Turin’. For Saluzzo's comments, see F. 17. 1607, Personnel; for the comments of the Inspectors Villars and Lefèvre-Ginau, see F. 17.1611, Lycée, report of 25 frimaire an XII.

26 Marion, Marcel, Hisloire Financière de la France depuis 1715 (6 vols. Paris, 1927), vol. iv, ch. 6, 8–9.Google Scholar

27 Correspondance… XVIII, 89, no. 14503; F. 17. 1602, fo. 233, doss. 4.

28 Financial difficulties forced Balbo to suspend the opening of the departments of art, pharmacy, and veterinary medicine. No salaries could be paid to the professors of music, the keeper of the botanical gardens, or to the staff of the Museum of Natural History. It was impossible to open a new anatomy theatre, establish an extra chair of medicine, or a new student hostel, all of which improvements had been envisaged by the ‘reorganisation’ of 1802. Salaries of teaching staff were paid at least three, and often nine, months in arrears. F. 17. 1605, letter of 24 Apr. 1807; F. 17. 1603, report of 28 Apr. 1811.

29 F. 17. 1607, Personnel et notes diverses, Saluzzo to Fourcroy, 12 messidor an XI.

30 Correspondance… VIII, 278, no. 6593; IX, 651, no. 8008. F. 17. 1607, ibid, minister of the Interior to minister of Finance, 13 prairial XIII; F. 17. 1603, fo. 36, 18 germinal XI.

31 F. 17. 1609, Ecole de Médicine, procès-verbal of 29 brumaire XIV; F. 17. 1607, letter of 12 May 1807.

32 F. 17. 1613, Domaines, letter of 1 June 1813.

33 Ibid, note of Coiffier to Cuvier, 30 Aug. 1813. See also F. 17. 1605, procès-verbal of 11 July 1811, para 51. ‘Le Directeur du Domaine du Pô à force de subterfuges et de prétextes évasifs a réussi jusqu'à présent à contraver et rendre inutile toute espèce de démarche’.

34 For Cigna's contribution to the theory of combustion, see Fric, R. (ed.) Oeuvres de Lavoisier… Correspondance (3 vols. Paris, 1953), II, 432–3, 461.Google Scholar

35 Torcellan, G., ‘La Società Agraria di Torino’, Rivista Storica Italiana, LXXVI (1964), 530–52Google Scholar; Cochrane, E. W., Tradition and Enlightenment in the Tuscan Academies, 1690–1800 (Rome, 1961)Google Scholar; Hahn, Roger, The Anatomy of a Scientific Institution: the Paris Academy of Sciences, 1666–1803 (Berkeley, California, 1971)Google Scholar.

36 Baker, K. M., ‘Les débuts de Condorcet au Secrétariat de l'Académie Royale des Sciences, 1773—1776’, Revue d'Histoire des Sciences, xx (1967), 229–80Google Scholar. For the continuing acceptance of this idea in Italy, see Magasin Encyclopédique, XL (1801), 96,Google Scholar ‘Le C. Cagnoli, Président de la Société Italienne des Sciences au C. Delambre, Secrétaire de l'lnstitut National à Paris, Lyon, 3 pluviôse an X’.

37 Rendu, E., A. Rendu et l'Université de France (Paris, 1861), p. 42Google Scholar; Viara, M., ‘Gli ordinamend della Università di Torino nel secolo XVIII’, Bollettino Storico-Bibliographico Subalpino, XLV (1942), 42–54.Google Scholar For Bogino's policy towards the University of Cagliari, see Venturi, F., ‘II conte Bogino, il Dottor [sic] Cossu, e i Monti Frumentari’, Rivista Storica Italiana, LXXVI (1964), 470–506Google Scholar. For earlier policy towards educational reform in Piedmont, (64), see Quazza, G., Le riforme in Piemonte nella prima metà del settecento (2 vols. Modena, 1957) II, ch. x.Google Scholar

38 Most of these details are to be found in Prospero Balbo, Lezione accademiche… intorno alia storia delta Universitá di Torino (6 vols. Turin, 1825) n, I94ff.Google Scholar Contemporary scientific des work in the University is described in A. Pace, Benjamin Franklin and Italy (Philadelphia, 1958). ch. ‘Erupuit Caelo Fulmen’.

39 E.g. Darnton, R., Mesmerism and the End of the Enlightenment in France (Cambridge, Mass., 1968).Google Scholar

40 Bianchi, N., Storia della Monarchia Piemontese dal 1779 sino al 1861 (4 vols. Rome-Florence-Turin, 1877), III, 339Google Scholar; F. 17. 1607, Faculté des Sciences, Etats de service.

41 F. 17. 1607, Ecole de Droit, Balbo to Champagny, 2 Apr. 1807.

42 Bersano, A., ‘Un conformista: Gaspare Antonio de'Gregori’, Bollettino Storico-Bibliografico Subalpino, LXVI (1968), 523–40.Google Scholar

43 d'Hauterive, E., La Police secrète du premier Empire: Bulletins quotidiens addressés par Fouché à l'Empereur: d'après les documents originaux inédits déposés aux Archives Nationales (4 vols. Paris, 1922).Google Scholar

44 For statements of the policy of representing all shades of political opinion in the filling of positions, see Corresportdance…vi, p. 152, no. 5528; VIII p. 389, no. 6735; x, p. 451, 8663.

45 d'Entrèves, E. Passerin, La giovinezza di Cesare Balbo (Rome, 1940), p. 9Google Scholar; Gentile, G., ‘L'eredità di Vittorio Alfieri’, Opere Complete (Florence, 1963), vol. XVIIGoogle Scholar; Cian, V., Gli alfieriani-foscoliani piemontesi ed il romanticismo lombardo-piemontese del primo risorgimento (Rome, 1934)Google Scholar. After 1802 the official language of Piedmont was French. This made the political significance of the language question much greater in the former kingdom than it was in areas such as Tuscany, where Italian was kept as the language of official transactions. It seems likely that Balbo would have used both languages in the domestic circle, especially as his second wife, Madeleine des Isnards, widow of the Comte de Séguin, was French.

46 Significantly, Botta ascribed his failure to gain the Rectorship himself to the fears of the French ‘de déplaire à la noblesse piémontaise’ Bersano, A., ‘II fondo Rigoletti dell'epistolario Botta’, Bollettino storko-bibliografico subalpino, LVI (1958), 351–79Google Scholar; no. 221. See also Neri, A., ‘Una lettera apologetica di Carlo Botta', Archivio Storico Italiano, 5 ser., ix (1892), 76–87.Google Scholar

47 Tulard, J., (ed.) Cambacérès: Lettres inédites à Napoléon (2 vols. Paris, 1974).Google Scholar

48 Bianchi, Storia…iv, 369.

49 Quoted in Passamonti, E., ‘Prospero Balbo e la Rivoluzione…; pp. 206–9.Google Scholar Another version of this letter, in French, is printed in Alberti, M. degli, Lettere inedite di Emanuele IV…ed altre, 1814–1824 (Turin, 1900), pp. 30–8.Google Scholar

50 For the Commission des Poids et Mesures, see Crosland, M. P., Science in France in the Revolutionary Era, described by T. Bugge (Cambridge, Mass., 1969)Google Scholar. Bugge was the Danish g delegate to the Commission.

51 Louis Lefévre-Ginau (1751–1829), mathematician and engineer, member of the Institut in 1795, Inspector-General of Public Instruction in 1802. In 1807 he became a member of the Corps Législatif.

52 Similar remarks could be made about the composition of the administration of metropolitan France. Both Gaudin and Lebrun, the financial expert, Third Consul and Architrésorier of the Empire, for example, had already achieved distinction in the government of the old regime before 1792. Exploration of this neglected topic would tell us much about the continuities between Napoleonic and royal France. For the rest of the information mine in the preceding paragraphs, see F. 17. 1607, Personnel, fo. 98, 8 Jan. 1814, para, 1; F. 17. 1611, Lycée report of 9 Apr. 1811; F. 17. 1604, Personnel, fo. 84; F. 17. 1605, 18 July 1811; F. 17. 1611, Lycée, letter of 13 Feb. 1813.

53 For the theology faculty, see E. Passamonti, Prospero Balbo e la rivoluzume…, p. 205; F. 17. 1605, Balbo to Champagny, 22 Apr. 1807. For the library, see F. 17. 1613, budget for 1809. This library probably provided much material for the Lezioni Accademiche.

54 For Fourcroy, and the warnings of the Inspector-General Sédillez, see F. 17. 1703, letters of 21 June 1809, 2 Nov. 1809; For Saluzzo, see F. 17. 1606, letter of 31 Jan. 1812.

55 Such examples could be extended. See Aulard, A., Napoléon l et le Monopole Universitaire (Paris, 1911)Google Scholar; Jeannin, P., ‘Une lettre d'Augustin Périer, sur la suppression del'Ecole Normale’, Revue d'histoire moderne et contemporaine, xv (1968), 466–70CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Arnault, A., Souvenirs d'un Sexagénaire (4 vols. Paris, 1835), III, 292Google Scholar; Reynal, P. de, Les correspondants de Joubert (Paris, 1883), p. 77Google Scholar; Wilson, A., Fontanes, essai biographique et littéraire, 1757–1821 (Paris, 1928)Google Scholar.

56 Ch. Schmidt, , La réforme de l'Université Impériale en 1811 (Paris, 1905)Google Scholar. For Fontanes' hostility to Fouché, see Madelin, L., Fouché, 1759–1820 (2 vols. Paris, 1901)Google Scholar Fouché had been one of the terrorists sent out in 1793 to quell the rebellion in Lyons, Fontanes' native city.

57 The French also made misguided attempts to fix the loyalties of the Italian nobility by a form of educational conscription. The children of noble families were drafted willy-nilly into military schools in the interior of France, or made to accept subordinate positions on the Conseil d'Etat in Paris, as a preparation for office in the administration of the Empire. Naturally, this policy produced precisely the contrary to the desired result in the families concerned. Balbo himself suffered badly. His eldest son, Ferdinand, was forcibly drafted into the army after a spell at St Cyr, and killed on die retreat from Moscow. His second Paris, son, Cesare, was pushed into a subordinate position in the French administration in Rome. For the revulsion with which his duties inspired him after the fall of the Papacy, see his Sommario delta Storia d'Italia…con autobiografia dell'autore (Lausanne, 1846).

58 F. 17. 1606, 31 Jan. 1812. Bianchi, Storia… III, 99, 331; F. 17. 1607, Personnel et; city. Affaires, Etat de Services de J-B Balbis; ibid, letter of 6 Aug. 1809.

59 For Buniva and Balbis, see ‘Studi Pinerolesi’, Biblioteca delta Societá Storica Subalpina, ed. B. Vesme et al. 1 (1899), 305–77; Bianchi, Storia… III, 94; F. 17. 1609, Ecole de may Médecine, Personnel, Etats de Service. For Rizzetti, ibid, letter of 20 Aug. 1809.

60 AF. iv 1025, ‘Mission du Citoyen Laumond dans la 27e Division Militaire…27 frimaire an XI, p. 17, ‘Esprit Publique’. For Laumond, see Godechot, J., Les Commissaires aux Armées sous la Directoire: Contribution è l'Etude des Rapports entre les Pouvoirs civils et militaires (2 vols. Paris, 1937), II, 344.Google Scholar

61 F. 17. 1609, Ecole de Médecine, Sédillez to Fourcroy, 8 Sept. 1807.

62 Bonvicino's pamphlet is in F. 17. 1609, Organisation, Affaire de M. Bonvoisin (sic) from which the preceding paragraph is also drawn. Balbo's rejoinder of 1807 is in the Wellcome Museum of the History of Medicine, London, MS. 1040. The prominence of doctors in the politics of the revolutionary period has yet to be satisfactorily explained. The great advances in medical science in this perod, in the work of such pioneers as Xavier Bichat, de may have encouraged an awareness of new ideas and an openness to change, particularly changes emanating from France. More specifically, a strong connection is observable between the theories of perception which underlay the new medicine, and the high value ires placed on individual interpretation of the visible world, unconstrained by tradition and religion. See Moravia, S., ‘Philosophic et médicine en France à la fin du XVIIIe. siécle’, Studies in Voltaire and the eighteenth century, LXXXIX (1972), 1089–1151.Google Scholar

63 P. Egidi, I. Moti…; O'Boyle, Lenore, ‘The problem of an excess of educated men in Western Europe, 1800–1850’, Journal of Modern History, IV (1970), 471–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

64 Most of the appointments made in the Universities by Napoleon were maintained by the restored monarchies. This surprising degree of continuity also helped to keep in being the attitudes towards education and politics generated by experience of the Imperial regime. For the careers of Benjamino Sproni at Pisa and Daniele Berlinghieri at Siena, see Zobi, A., Storia Civile delta Toscana dal MDCCXXXVII al MDCCCXLVIII (5 vols. Florence, 1850–2), vol. ivGoogle Scholar and Appendix. For Gerolamo Serra at Genoa, see Boudard, R., L'organisation del'Université…dans l'Académie Impériale de Gênes entre 1805 et 1814(Paris-The Hague, 1962)Google Scholar. Appointments in the former Dutch departments of the Empire showed the same degree of continuity. See Schama, S., ‘Schools and Politics in the Netherlands, 1796–1814’, Historical Journal, XIII (1970), 589–610.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

65 E.g. Romani, G. T., The Neapolitan Revolution of 1820–1821 (Evanston, 1950)Google Scholar

66 Carranza, N., ‘L'Università di Pisa e la formazione culturale del ceto dirigente toscano del settecento’, Bollettino storico pisano, XXXIII–XXXV (1964–66), 469–537; Cochrane, Tradition de- and Enlightenment….Google Scholar