Luigi, Count Cibrario was an Italian

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 statesman

Statesman

A statesman is usually a politician or other notable public figure who has had a long and respected career in politics or government at the national and international level. As a term of respect, it is usually left to supporters or commentators to use the term...

 and historian

Historian

A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is...

.

Biography

Born in Usseglio

Usseglio

Usseglio is a comune in the Province of Turin in the Italian region Piedmont, located about 40 km northwest of Turin, on the border with France....

, in what is now the province of Turin

Province of Turin

The Province of Turin is a province in the Piedmont region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Turin.It has an area of 6,830 km², and a total population of 2,277,686 . There are 315 comuni in the province – the most of any province in Italy...

, Cibrario was descended from a noble but impoverished Piedmont

Piedmont

Piedmont is one of the 20 regions of Italy. It has an area of 25,402 square kilometres and a population of about 4.4 million. The capital of Piedmont is Turin. The main local language is Piedmontese. Occitan is also spoken by a minority in the Occitan Valleys situated in the Provinces of...

ese family. He won a scholarship at the age of sixteen, and was teaching literature at eighteen. His verses to future king Charles Albert

Charles Albert of Sardinia

Charles Albert was the King of Piedmont-Sardinia from 1831 to 1849. He succeeded his distant cousin Charles Felix, and his name is bound with the first Italian statute and the First War of Independence...

, then prince of Savoy-Carignano

Savoy-Carignano

The Savoy-Carignano family , was a junior line of the House of Savoy. It was founded by Thomas Francis of Savoy, Prince di Carignano 21 December 1596 - 22 January 1656), an Italian military commander...

, on the birth of his son Victor Emmanuel

Victor Emmanuel II of Italy

Victor Emanuel II was king of Sardinia from 1849 and, on 17 March 1861, he assumed the title King of Italy to become the first king of a united Italy since the 6th century, a title he held until his death in 1878...

, attracted the prince's attention and proved the beginning of a long intimacy.

He entered the Sardinia

Kingdom of Sardinia

The Kingdom of Sardinia consisted of the island of Sardinia first as a part of the Crown of Aragon and subsequently the Spanish Empire , and second as a part of the composite state of the House of Savoy . Its capital was originally Cagliari, in the south of the island, and later Turin, on the...

n civil service, and in 1824 was appointed lecturer on canon

Canon law

Canon law is the body of laws & regulations made or adopted by ecclesiastical authority, for the government of the Christian organization and its members. It is the internal ecclesiastical law governing the Catholic Church , the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox churches, and the Anglican Communion of...

 and civil law

Civil law (legal system)

Civil law is a legal system inspired by Roman law and whose primary feature is that laws are codified into collections, as compared to common law systems that gives great precedential weight to common law on the principle that it is unfair to treat similar facts differently on different...

. His chief interest was the study of ancient documents, and he was sent to search the archives of Switzerland

Switzerland

Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

, France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 and Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 for charters relating to the history of Savoy

Savoy

Savoy is a region of France. It comprises roughly the territory of the Western Alps situated between Lake Geneva in the north and Monaco and the Mediterranean coast in the south....

.

During the Revolutions of 1848

Revolutions of 1848

The European Revolutions of 1848, known in some countries as the Spring of Nations, Springtime of the Peoples or the Year of Revolution, were a series of political upheavals throughout Europe in 1848. It was the first Europe-wide collapse of traditional authority, but within a year reactionary...

, after the expulsion of the Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

ns from Venice

Venice

Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...

, Cibrario was sent to that city with Colli to negotiate its union with Piedmont. But the proposal fell through when news arrived of the armistice between King Charles Albert and Austria, and the two delegates were made the objects of a hostile demonstration. In October 1848 Cibrario was made senator

Italian Senate

The Senate of the Republic is the upper house of the Italian Parliament. It was established in its current form on 8 May 1948, but previously existed during the Kingdom of Italy as Senato del Regno , itself a continuation of the Senato Subalpino of Sardinia-Piedmont established on 8 May 1848...

, and after the Battle of Novara

Battle of Novara (1849)

The Battle of Novara or Battle of Bicocca was one of the battles fought between the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Sardinia during the First Italian War of Independence, within the era of Italian unification...

 (March 1849), when Charles Albert abdicated and retired to a monastery near Porto

Porto

Porto , also known as Oporto in English, is the second largest city in Portugal and one of the major urban areas in the Iberian Peninsula. Its administrative limits include a population of 237,559 inhabitants distributed within 15 civil parishes...

, Cibrario and Count Giacinto di Collegno were sent as representatives of the Senate to express the sympathy of that body with the fallen king. He reached Oporto on May 28, and after staying there for a month returned to Turin, which he reached just before the news of Charles Albert's death.

In May 1852 he became minister of finance in the reconstructed d'Azeglio

Massimo Taparelli, marquis d'Azeglio

Massimo Taparelli, marquis d'Azeglio was an Italian statesman, novelist and painter.-Biography:Marquis d'Azeglio was born in Turin, descended from an ancient and noble Piedmontese family...

 cabinet, and was later minister of education in that of Cavour. In the same year he was appointed secretary to the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus

Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus

The Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus is an order of chivalry awarded by the House of Savoy, the heads of which were formerly Kings of Italy...

. It was he who in 1853 dictated the vigorous memorandum of protest against the confiscation by Austria of the property of Lombard

Lombardy

Lombardy is one of the 20 regions of Italy. The capital is Milan. One-sixth of Italy's population lives in Lombardy and about one fifth of Italy's GDP is produced in this region, making it the most populous and richest region in the country and one of the richest in the whole of Europe...

 exiles who had been naturalized in Piedmont. He strongly supported Cavour's Crimea

Crimea

Crimea , or the Autonomous Republic of Crimea , is a sub-national unit, an autonomous republic, of Ukraine. It is located on the northern coast of the Black Sea, occupying a peninsula of the same name...

n policy (1855), and when General la Marmora

Alfonso Ferrero La Marmora

Alfonso Ferrero, Cavaliere La Màrmora was an Italian general and statesman. His brother Alessandro La Marmora founded the branch of the Italian army now called the Bersaglieri.-Biography:...

 departed in command of the expeditionary force and Cavour took the war office, Cibrario was made Minister for Foreign Affairs. He conducted the business of the department with great skill, and ably seconded Cavour in bringing about the admission of Piedmont to the Congress of Paris

Treaty of Paris (1856)

The Treaty of Paris of 1856 settled the Crimean War between Russia and an alliance of the Ottoman Empire, the British Empire, Second French Empire, and the Kingdom of Sardinia. The treaty, signed on March 30, 1856 at the Congress of Paris, made the Black Sea neutral territory, closing it to all...

 on an equal footing with the great powers.

On retiring from the foreign office Cibrario was created count. In 1860 he acted as mediator between Victor Emmanuel's government and the republic of San Marino

San Marino

San Marino, officially the Republic of San Marino , is a state situated on the Italian Peninsula on the eastern side of the Apennine Mountains. It is an enclave surrounded by Italy. Its size is just over with an estimated population of over 30,000. Its capital is the City of San Marino...

, and arranged a treaty by which the latter's liberties were guaranteed. After the war of 1866

Austro-Prussian War

The Austro-Prussian War was a war fought in 1866 between the German Confederation under the leadership of the Austrian Empire and its German allies on one side and the Kingdom of Prussia with its German allies and Italy on the...

 by which Austria lost Venetia, Cibrario negotiated with that government for the restitution of state papers and art treasures removed by it from Lombardy and Venetia to Vienna.

Count Cibrario died near Salò

Salò

Salò is a town and commune in the Province of Brescia in the region of Lombardy on the banks of Lake Garda. The city was the capital of Italian Social Republic from 1943 to 1945, with the ISR often being called the "Republic of Salò" .-History:Salò was founded in the Roman period as Pagus...

 on Lake Garda

Lake Garda

Lake Garda is the largest lake in Italy. It is located in Northern Italy, about half-way between Brescia and Verona, and between Venice and Milan. Glaciers formed this alpine region at the end of the last ice age...

 in the fall of 1870.

Works

As a writer and historian, his most important work during his lifetime was his Economia politica del medio evo (Turin, 1839), which enjoyed great popularity at the time, but is now of little value. His Della schiavitù e del servaggio (Milan, 1868–1869) gave an account of the development and abolition of slavery and serfdom. His historical writings include:

• Delle artiglierie dal 1300 al 1700 (1847)
• Origini e progresso della monarchia di Savoia (1854)
• Degli ordini cavallereschi (1846)
• Degli ordini religiosi (1845)
• Memorie segrete of Charles Albert, written by order of Victor Emmanuel but afterwards withdrawn.