Abstract

Through the biography of Giovanni Vincenti, actor, shopkeeper, Mediterranean traveller, and conspirator, captured and sentenced to death by Austria, the article aims to shed light on little- known aspects of secret societies and political opposition in Restoration Italy. The author investigates Vincenti’s political life, which took place in Lombardy-Venetia, Tuscany, Naples, the Mediterranean and Switzerland, analysing the papers of the institutions that tried him. In this way, an original mental geography is traced, passing from the world of revolution to religious heterodoxy, from the sphere of affection to the construction of memory, which carried out during the years of Fascism.