The class was a pair of

torpedo cruiser A torpedo cruiser is a type of warship that is armed primarily with torpedoes. The major navies began building torpedo cruisers shortly after the invention of the locomotive Whitehead torpedo in the 1860s. The development of the torpedo gave rise ...

s built for the Italian (Royal Navy) in the 1880s. The two ships— and —were designed by

Benedetto Brin Benedetto Brin (17 May 1833 in Turin, Piedmont24 May 1898 in Rome, Lazio) was an Italian naval administrator and politician. He played a major role in modernizing and expanding the Italian (Royal Navy) from the 1870s to the 1890s, designing se ...

during a period of experimentation with the theories of the in the 1880s. The vessels were armed with three

torpedo tube A torpedo tube is a cylindrical device for launching torpedoes. There are two main types of torpedo tube: underwater tubes fitted to submarines and some surface ships, and deck-mounted units (also referred to as torpedo launchers) installed aboa ...

s, and they had a top speed of . Both ships' careers were uneventful, and they spent most of their time in service conducting training exercises. was seriously damaged in a collision in 1889, and was thereafter reduced to reserve status, as the damage could not be completely repaired. She was eventually sold for

scrapping Scrap consists of recyclable materials, usually metals, left over from product manufacturing and consumption, such as parts of vehicles, building supplies, and surplus materials. Unlike waste, scrap has monetary value, especially recovered me ...

in 1900, while served as a gunnery

training ship A training ship is a ship used to train students as sailors. The term is mostly used to describe ships employed by navies to train future officers. Essentially there are two types: those used for training at sea and old hulks used to house classr ...

from 1897 to 1908, when she too was dismantled.

Design

and were designed by

; Brin had previously designed several classes of very large ironclad battleships, including the and es, but by the 1880s, he had begun to embrace the ideas of the , which emphasized small, fast, torpedo-armed vessels that could damage or destroy the much larger battleships at a fraction of the cost. After the two s, which were rated as (torpedo-

aviso An ''aviso'' was originally a kind of dispatch boat or "advice boat", carrying orders before the development of effective remote communication. The term, derived from the Portuguese and Spanish word for "advice", "notice" or "warning", an '' ...

s), the eight ships of the were laid down, continuing Brin's ideas at the time.

Characteristics

The ships of the class were

long overall __NOTOC__ Length overall (LOA, o/a, o.a. or oa) is the maximum length of a vessel's hull measured parallel to the waterline. This length is important while docking the ship. It is the most commonly used way of expressing the size of a ship, and ...

and had a

beam Beam may refer to: Streams of particles or energy *Light beam, or beam of light, a directional projection of light energy **Laser beam *Particle beam, a stream of charged or neutral particles **Charged particle beam, a spatially localized grou ...

of . displaced normally, while displaced . had an average

draft Draft, The Draft, or Draught may refer to: Watercraft dimensions * Draft (hull), the distance from waterline to keel of a vessel * Draft (sail), degree of curvature in a sail * Air draft, distance from waterline to the highest point on a vessel ...

of , while sat slightly lower in the water as a result of her greater displacement, with a draft of . Their hulls were constructed from steel and featured a pronounced

ram bow A ram was a weapon fitted to varied types of ships, dating back to antiquity. The weapon comprised an underwater prolongation of the bow of the ship to form an armoured beak, usually between 2 and 4 meters (6–12 ft) in length. This would be dri ...

. The ships had a crew of between 57 and 70 that varied in size over the course of their careers. Her propulsion system consisted of a pair of horizontal double-expansion

steam engine A steam engine is a heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid. The steam engine uses the force produced by steam pressure to push a piston back and forth inside a cylinder. This pushing force can be trans ...

s manufactured by Hawthorn Leslie and Co., each driving a single

screw propeller A propeller (colloquially often called a screw if on a ship or an airscrew if on an aircraft) is a device with a rotating hub and radiating blades that are set at a pitch to form a helical spiral which, when rotated, exerts linear thrust upon ...

. Steam for the engines was supplied by four coal-fired

locomotive boiler A fire-tube boiler is a type of boiler in which hot gases pass from a fire through one or more tubes running through a sealed container of water. The heat of the gases is transferred through the walls of the tubes by thermal conduction, heating t ...

s that were trunked into a single

funnel A funnel is a tube or pipe that is wide at the top and narrow at the bottom, used for guiding liquid or powder into a small opening. Funnels are usually made of stainless steel, aluminium, glass, or plastic. The material used in its construct ...

amidships This glossary of nautical terms is an alphabetical listing of terms and expressions connected with ships, shipping, seamanship and navigation on water (mostly though not necessarily on the sea). Some remain current, while many date from the 17th t ...

. In 1892, was re-boilered with oil-fired models for experimentation purposes. could steam at a speed of from , while reached the same speed from . The ships had a coal storage capacity of . The primary armament for the class was three

s. They also carried a small gun armament for defense against

torpedo boat A torpedo boat is a relatively small and fast naval ship designed to carry torpedoes into battle. The first designs were steam-powered craft dedicated to ramming enemy ships with explosive spar torpedoes. Later evolutions launched variants of se ...

s, consisting of two 43-

caliber In guns, particularly firearms, caliber (or calibre; sometimes abbreviated as "cal") is the specified nominal internal diameter of the gun barrel Gauge (firearms) , bore – regardless of how or where the bore is measured and whether the f ...

(cal.) guns, two guns and four 25-cal. guns, all mounted singly. The ships carried no armor protection.

Ships

Service history

After entering service, both vessels were assigned to the main Italian fleet. They were primarily occupied with annual training exercises, along with occasional

fleet review A fleet review or naval review is an event where a gathering of ships from a particular navy is paraded and reviewed by an incumbent head of state and/or other official civilian and military dignitaries. A number of national navies continue to ...

s for monarchs, including one for the King of Italy,

Umberto I Umberto I ( it, Umberto Rainerio Carlo Emanuele Giovanni Maria Ferdinando Eugenio di Savoia; 14 March 1844 – 29 July 1900) was King of Italy from 9 January 1878 until his assassination on 29 July 1900. Umberto's reign saw Italy attempt colo ...

in 1887 and German Emperor

Wilhelm II Wilhelm II (Friedrich Wilhelm Viktor Albert; 27 January 18594 June 1941) was the last German Emperor (german: Kaiser) and King of Prussia, reigning from 15 June 1888 until his abdication on 9 November 1918. Despite strengthening the German Empir ...

in 1888. In 1889, was badly damaged in a collision with the

protected cruiser Protected cruisers, a type of naval cruiser of the late-19th century, gained their description because an armoured deck offered protection for vital machine-spaces from fragments caused by shells exploding above them. Protected cruisers re ...

and could not be repaired to her original condition. As a result, she spent most of the rest of her career in reserve. For much of the 1890s, was frequently reduced to reserve, in part to reduce maintenance on the vessel. made a temporary return to active service in 1895, when she joined for the annual maneuvers. In 1897, she was withdrawn from front-line service and employed with the gunnery school; her gun armament was accordingly increased in 1902 to provide a variety of weapons for gunnery trainees to practice operating. In the meantime, was stricken from the

naval register A Navy Directory, formerly the Navy List or Naval Register is an official list of naval officers, their ranks and seniority, the ships which they command or to which they are appointed, etc., that is published by the government or naval author ...

in 1900 and

broken up Ship-breaking (also known as ship recycling, ship demolition, ship dismantling, or ship cracking) is a type of ship disposal involving the breaking up of ships for either a source of parts, which can be sold for re-use, or for the extraction ...

for scrap. continued in her service with the gunnery school until 1908, when she too was broken up.

Notes

References

* * * * * * * * {{Italian torpedo cruisers