The Perfect Fusion ( it, Fusione perfetta) was the 1847 act of the Savoyard king Charles Albert of Sardinia which abolished the administrative differences between the mainland states ( Savoy and

Piedmont it, Piemontese , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , demographics1_title2 ...

) and the island of

Sardinia Sardinia ( ; it, Sardegna, label=Italian, Corsican and Tabarchino ; sc, Sardigna , sdc, Sardhigna; french: Sardaigne; sdn, Saldigna; ca, Sardenya, label=Algherese and Catalan) is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after ...

, in a fashion similar to the Nueva Planta decrees between the Crown of Castile and the realms of the

Crown of Aragon The Crown of Aragon ( , ) an, Corona d'Aragón ; ca, Corona d'Aragó, , , ; es, Corona de Aragón ; la, Corona Aragonum . was a composite monarchy ruled by one king, originated by the dynastic union of the Kingdom of Aragon and the County of ...

between 1707 and 1716 and the Acts of Union between

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It i ...

and

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

in 1800. The once Iberian

Kingdom of Sardinia The Kingdom of Sardinia,The name of the state was originally Latin: , or when the kingdom was still considered to include Corsica. In Italian it is , in French , in Sardinian , and in Piedmontese . also referred to as the Kingdom of Savoy-S ...

had become a possession of the House of Savoy in 1720, and it had continued to be ruled as during the ages of the

Spanish Empire The Spanish Empire ( es, link=no, Imperio español), also known as the Hispanic Monarchy ( es, link=no, Monarquía Hispánica) or the Catholic Monarchy ( es, link=no, Monarquía Católica) was a colonial empire governed by Spain and its prede ...

. Although the Sardinian populace had been showing hostility against the new Piedmontese rulers since the failed insurrection in 1794, the island's separate status from the Mainland became a problem for the local notables from two major cities of Cagliari and Sassari when liberal reforms began to be put in force in

Turin Turin ( , Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital from 1861 to 1865. The ...

, and some of them started to see their own legal system as a handicap more than a privilege; a minority of other Sardinian notables, like Giovanni Battista Tuveri and Federico Fenu, were not in favour of the idea, fearing that further moves toward the centralisation of the Savoy-led Kingdom might have followed thereafter. King Charles Albert eventually solved the problem by transforming all his dominions into a single,

centralized state A unitary state is a sovereign state governed as a single entity in which the central government is the supreme authority. The central government may create (or abolish) administrative divisions (sub-national units). Such units exercise only th ...

. A new legal system entered into force in Sardinia, and the last viceroy, Claudio Gabriele de Launay, left Cagliari on 4 March 1848. The island was divided into three provinces ruled by their

prefect Prefect (from the Latin ''praefectus'', substantive adjectival form of ''praeficere'': "put in front", meaning in charge) is a magisterial title of varying definition, but essentially refers to the leader of an administrative area. A prefect's ...

s, following the system already used in

since 1815. The ultimate goal of the unionist movement was assimilationist, for it set about, in the words of the Pietro Martini, "to transplant, without any reserves and obstacles, the culture and civilization of the Italian Mainland to Sardinia, and thereby form a single civil family under a Father better than a King, the great Charles Albert". Moreover, the fusion was supposed to spur commercial development in Sardinia and, by 1861, according to William S. Craig (then

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

consul-general at Cagliari), increase the Kingdom's importance; however, the kingdom's insular part lost what little autonomy it had previously had in the process, as well as its historical title of "nation", as it had been referred to for centuries, and illustrated by the Kingdom's

national anthem A national anthem is a patriotic musical composition symbolizing and evoking eulogies of the history and traditions of a country or nation. The majority of national anthems are marches or hymns in style. American, Central Asian, and Europea ...

; in this regard, the Fusion provoked a shift in terminology, with references to "Italy" replacing "Sardinia" instead. On the whole, the island became an even more marginal part of the Savoyard Kingdom, raising the so-called " Sardinian Question" pertaining to its difficult process of integration within a single national body: more specifically, Sardinians lost their former powers of taxation and autonomous representation in exchange for the Piedmontese parliament taking over legislative responsibility on the island, and some seats in the Congress. Most of the Sardinian unionists, including its leader Giovanni Siotto Pintor, would later come to regret it. The Fusion would not be able to improve the condition of the Sardinian notables, either: on the contrary, Sardinia's fusion into an Italian unitary state provoked, as a response, a marked increase in

banditry Banditry is a type of organized crime committed by outlaws typically involving the threat or use of violence. A person who engages in banditry is known as a bandit and primarily commits crimes such as extortion, robbery, and murder, either as an ...

and criminal activities against the central authorities.«L'entrata dell'isola in un grande Stato unificato non ha dato grandi vantaggi ai ceti dirigenti sardi. Anzi, ha provocato una recrudescenza delle attività delittuose e del banditismo, che affermano in maniera clamorosa - più ancora della mafia siciliana, che tutto sommato prospera su dei compromessi con il sistema statale - il rifiuto totale di entrare in dialettica con l'esterno.»

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* * * * * * * * * * * * * * {{cite book, title= La Sardegna e i sardi nel tempo, first= Omar, last= Onnis, year=2015, place=Cagliari, publisher=Arkadia History of Sardinia House of Savoy Kingdom of Sardinia 1847 in the Kingdom of Sardinia 1847 in law

See also

References

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