Photo of the Week: Ivory Oliphants

Ivory Oliphants, South Italian, possibly Amalfi, carved about 1100-1200,
Metropolitan Museum of Art. Photo by New York Scugnizzo

Around the Web — Servant of God Zita: A Life of Exile (Crisis Magazine with Charles Coulombe)

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Simple Pleasures: Curva Sud Matera Sticker

Just like graffiti, stickers are plastered all over Manhattan. Today, we spotted a Curva Sud Matera decal quietly asserting the Materani ultras’ presence amid the chaos of New York.

Ponderable Quote from ‘La Monarchia Tradizionale’ by Francisco Elías de Tejada

Translated from the Italian*

The Universal Christian Enterprise

The tradition of Naples is unanimously lived and expressed by the greatest writers of the kingdom, who are enemies of Luther, of Machiavelli, of Bodin, of Hobbes—in a word, of all the fathers of Europe. Against the first of these, Luther, it was a son of Gaeta, Tommaso de Vio, who opened the Catholic polemic, even though not the slightest tentacle of Lutheran heresy ever emerged in Naples, since the Waldensians had no other relation to Naples than that of a momentary stay: Juan de Valdés was from Cuenca, Bernardino Tommasini of Oca was Sienese, Pietro Carnesecchi and Pietro Martire Vermigli were Florentine, Marc’Antonio Flaminio was Venetian, Giulia Gonzaga was Lombard, and Isabel Briceno was Iberian. Nor did Machiavellianism ever gain a foothold in Naples, because the very Neapolitan school of Tacitean realism was by nature anti-Machiavellian. Among its ranks are names of the stature of Girolamo Franchetta, Fabio Frezza, Deodato Solerà, Gio. Donato Turboli, Muzio Floriati, Giambattista Vico, and many others—not to mention that one of the most formidable anti-Machiavellian polemicists known to us was born in Rocca d’Evandro, in the Terra di Lavoro: Ottavio Sammarco. Moreover, there were thinkers who did not even admit Tacitism (due to their extremely realist stance), such as Alberto Pecorelli or Giulio Cesare Capaccio, or the courageous polemicist Torquato Accetto, engaged in combatting Machiavelli from the trenches of Stoic philosophy. The absolutist mentality typical of Europe and unknown in the Spains, theorized by Jean Bodin in Les six livres de la République, was incompatible with the mentality of traditional Naples, because the latter upheld the subjection of the prince to the laws of the Kingdom, in the unanimous doctrine of Neapolitan jurisprudence, synthesized by the free subjects of Philip II in the much-forgotten yet sublime text of Giovanni Antonio Lanario, according to whom: “Potestas absoluta non potest dari in Republica politica, et bene ordinata” (“Absolute power cannot be granted in a political and well-ordered Republic”). This doctrine was developed by Alessandro Turamino in his vision of custom as an expression of the popular will; by Andrea Molfesio in his framework of legal limitations; by Domenico Tassone in his chart of institutional limitations; by Francesco Pavone in his conception of popular customs as superior to the laws of the prince; and by many others whom it is not necessary to list in order to clarify the concept of limited power characteristic of the Spains—which placed authentic Naples in a position of opposition to the Bodinian absolutism characteristic of Europe. The systematic body of Neapolitan parliamentary law developed by the Bishop of Capri, Raffaele Rastelli, in the time of Philip IV, would alone suffice to make clear the contrast between Neapolitan political law—free, with a Spanish imprint—and European political law.

* La monarchia tradizionale, Francisco Elías de Tejada, Capitolo Settimo,  La Tradizione di Napoli, 4 L’impresa universale cristiana, 1963, P.153-154, Controcorrente Edizioni, 2001, P.142-144

Random Thoughts as the Buck Moon Approaches

As the hart panteth after the fountains of water, so my soul panteth after thee, O God. ~ Psalm 41:2 DRB

This year, July’s full “Buck Moon” falls on the 10th. The name comes from the time of year when male deer start to regrow their antlers. Popularized by the Farmer’s Almanac in the 1800s, the term was reportedly adopted by the pioneers from the Native Americans. It is also known as the “Thunder Moon,” due to July’s frequent storms; the “Hay Moon” for the hay harvest; and the “Mead Moon,” marking the season when honey was traditionally gathered to brew mead, an ancient and tasty fermented honey beverage. 

Unable to find real mead in time, I thought we would instead mark the occasion with a few shots of Bärenjäger and Jägermeister, along with a little moon bathing, weather permitting. Traditionally, in Naples, moonlight bathing is believed to cure both physical and spiritual ailments.

Long fascinated by the moon and other celestial bodies, La Luna is a medieval symbol of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Just as the moon reflects the light of the sun, Mary reflects the divine light of her Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ.

The stag, on the other hand, embodies Christ and is a messenger of divine truth. Just as the stag tramples the serpent underfoot, so does Our Lord crush Satan. The shedding of antlers serves as an allegory for renewal and resurrection.

The stag bathing in springs symbolizes baptism and the Church’s role in guiding the faithful to the sacred waters of eternal life. The motif of the hunted stag pierced by arrows, as seen in the hagiographies of Sant’Eustachio Martire and Sant’Uberto di Liegi, represents both the Passion of Christ and, more broadly, the martyrdom of the saints.

With more than a few hours to kill before the astronomical event, I plan to browse my poetry books for a few poems to read to my guests after dinner. I already know I will recite Salvator Di Giacomo’s Luna Nova (New Moon) and Gabriele D’Annunzio’s Il Cervo (The Deer). Hopefully, I will find a couple more suitable for the evening.

An excerpt from D’Annunzio’s Il Cervo:

Udremo a notte le sue lunghe 

muggia, udremo la voce sua di toro; 

sorgerà il grido della sua lussuria

udremo nei silenzi della luna.

At night we will hear his long

bellows, we will hear his voice like a bull’s;

the cry of his lust will rise

we will hear it in the silences of the moon.

And from Di Giacomo’s Luna Nova:

Luna d’argiento, lass’ ‘o sunnà, 

vaselo ‘nfronte, nun ‘o sceta…

Silver moon, let him dream,

kiss his brow, do not wake him…

~ By Giovanni di Napoli, July 9th, the Feast of Santa Veronica Giuliani

"The Family: Burden or Bulwark?" On the Right’s Abdication of Cultural Power

Gianandrea de Antonellis’ Il seminarista rosso (The Red Seminarian) is a bold and piercing reflection on one of the most overlooked strategic failures of the Right: its abdication of the cultural front in the battle for the soul of modern society—particularly as it pertains to the Church, the seminaries, and the family. This work isn’t simply a lament for lost ground; it’s a sharp and historically grounded diagnosis of how the Left—with Gramsci as its prophet—waged and won a cultural war while the Right remained disorganized and politically impotent.

One of the most illuminating and provocative sections of the essay is the author’s meditation on La famiglia, peso o baluardo? (The Family: Burden or Bulwark?) and the legacy of Julius Evola, offered as a kind of anti-Gramsci—the closest figure the Right has had to a revolutionary thinker with a coherent meta-political project. Evola, ever the radical aristocrat, saw clearly the need for a new type of man—free from bourgeois sentimentality, unattached to domestic comforts, and trained for the spiritual combat of tradition in an age of decline. De Antonellis explores the Sicilian Baron’s uncompromising stance on celibacy and sexual freedom for militant traditionalists, which, while sure to scandalize mainstream conservatives, is consistent with Evola’s ruthless logic: one cannot wage metaphysical war while clinging to hearth and family life.

This reading of Evola—as someone who, like Gramsci, understood the gravity of the cultural battlefield—is perhaps the most compelling and sobering contribution of the essay. Evola’s failure, as De Antonellis points out, was not intellectual but practical: the Right never produced an “army” of Evolian men who could live sine impedimenta—unbound by work, marriage, or social conformity. The “chimera” of revolutionary struggle almost always gave way to the “siren” of love, comfort, and family—a tragic inversion of priorities for a movement that claims to uphold heroic virtue and transcendent order.

De Antonellis is not dismissive of the family—far from it. He presents it as a natural and deeply rooted good, a bastion of civilizational continuity. But he does not allow this to become an excuse for passivity or withdrawal. Rather, the essay challenges the Right to reconsider the cost of its values when confronted with revolutionary zeal. The Left was willing to send its sons into seminaries, into newspapers, into cultural warfare. The Right, by contrast, hesitated to sacrifice—not because it lacked conviction, but because it lacked coordination, imagination, and above all, a counter-cultural elite capable of forming a long-term resistance.

La famiglia, peso o baluardo? is not just a lamentation of missed opportunities—it is a call for the Right to reorient itself around strategy and sacrifice. It reminds us that culture is not an idle pastime, but the foundation of power. And in highlighting Evola’s challenge—the demand for a militant, metaphysical manhood (società di uomini, or Männerbund)—De Antonellis invites his readers to reconsider what kind of men must rise if the tide is ever to turn.

This is an essential read for any counter-revolutionary thinker who is done making excuses and ready to confront the hard truths of civilizational decline.

~ By Giovanni di Napoli, July 8th, Feast of San Procopio di Cesarea

Musical Patronage at Imperial Abbeys

Download Il Portastendardo di Civitella del Tronto from Telegram

The latest four issues of Il Portastendardo di Civitella del Tronto (Nos. 46 to 49) are now available for download via Telegram.

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Photo of the Week: Ivory Oliphant Fragment

Ivory Oliphant Fragment, South Italian, carved about 1100–1200,
Metropolitan Museum of Art. Photo by New York Scugnizzo

"Voci, suoni e cantii di briganti in Terra di Lavoro" a San Potito Sannitico

In San Potito Sannitico (CE)

Introducing "Il seminarista rosso: L'infiltrazione marxista nella Chiesa" by Gianandrea de Antonellis

Il seminarista rosso, or The Red Seminarian, is a powerful and meticulously researched exposé of the ideological infiltration that has shaped the modern Catholic Church from within. Tracing the furtive paths of Marxist and modernist influences, Gianandrea de Antonellis presents a bold and provocative account of the post-conciliar Church, while maintaining focus on the profound spiritual and cultural ramifications at hand. Supported by extensive footnotes and documentation, the author draws upon a wide array of ecclesiastical, political, and philosophical sources.

Though lengthy, the following quotations are essential for understanding the full scope of the author’s argument.

“In the case of the 'revolution in the Church'—that is, the Second Vatican Council—it did not arise out of nowhere, but was carefully prepared in the decades preceding it. Its promoters were, on one hand, the modernists, who had been exposed but not eradicated by Pascendi; [1] on the other hand, the new anti-Christian forces of Marxist origin. Both modernists and communists were united in the project of destroying the traditional Church from within rather than from without, as had been attempted previously (to cite only the main cases of the last millennium) by the Albigensians, Protestants, advocates of national churches (gallicani, giuseppinisti, etc.), [2] Enlightenment thinkers, Jacobins, jurisdictionalists, liberals (Kulturkampf, desamortización, guarentigie), [3] and, in the last century, Spanish anarcho-socialists and German National Socialists.

“A precedent for this ‘struggle from within’ can be found in the ‘underground’ movement of Jansenism (17th century), which in Italy found its most significant expression in the Synod of Pistoia (1786). [4] The movement, which takes its name from the Bishop of Ypres, Cornelius Otto Jansen (Latinized as Jansen or Giansenio, 1585–1638), sought to implement a semi-Calvinist reform while never formally leaving the bosom of the Church, attempting instead to infect it from within. Because of its elitist character, however, it remained relatively isolated: its ‘coming to light’ at the Synod of Pistoia even provoked a popular uprising, as it sought to abolish certain devotions deeply cherished by the faithful.”

With a seamless blend of theological critique and historical analysis, de Antonellis reveals recurring patterns of subversion and doctrinal compromise. 

“Iconoclasm and the abolition of side altars, the use of the vernacular language in the liturgy, and episcopalism or conciliarism (that is, considering the bishops’ conference as the head of the national Church while leaving to the pope the simple role of unus inter pares), [5] proposed by the Synod of Pistoia and immediately condemned, were triumphantly accepted with the Council and its ‘spirit.’

“The disruptive force of the neo-modernist mentality nonetheless comes from elements of extra-ecclesial formation: namely the Marxist infiltrators who, in the wake of Stalin’s consolidation of power in the USSR and the subjugation of the Orthodox Church, were tasked with weakening the Catholic Church, undertaking a long-term effort that offered promising prospects and—eighty years later—an almost unexpected success.

“In the 1930s, the secret services of the Soviet Union employed every kind of stratagem, even the most Machiavellian, in order to ‘plant the seed of ideological counteroffensive in the very heart of Western democracies and even within the fascist states themselves, beginning with Mussolini’s Italy, where they could serve in the dual role of fifth columns within the Catholic Church and agents of political espionage with an anti-capitalist and anti-bourgeois orientation.’ [6]

“This infiltration naturally continued after the Second World War: during the years of the Cold War, a significant number of Soviet secret service members—Italians, French, Germans, and so on, all young people of proven Marxist-Leninist conviction—skillfully infiltrated not only the vital organs of civil society in Western countries (newspapers, publishing houses, courts, labor unions), but also the ranks of the Catholic Church, starting at the level of priestly formation—that is, in seminaries and novitiates—with the specific mandate to subtly implant communist ideas into the mentality and practice of the clergy.”

He gives particular attention to the role of the Jesuit order, liberation theology, and the cultural upheavals that followed the Second Vatican Council. 

“A privileged instrument in this infiltration project has been the Society of Jesus. Whereas in the past the Jesuits were the arch-enemies of Freemasonry (which even succeeded in having them suppressed by the Holy See), they have now become its preferred tool, ‘with the precise aim of achieving a ‘normalization’ of relations with Freemasonry.’ With the ascent of a Jesuit to the papal throne, it is fair to ask: ‘What use will be made, by the religious order by far the most powerful, the richest, the most learned, the most adaptable, the most adventurous, the most cunning in political and diplomatic experience, the best connected with the secular world, with other religions, and with Freemasonry itself, as well as with international high finance, of its immense power?’ [7]

“In truth, the Jesuit order has long been only outwardly the same as it was in past centuries: already by the mid-twentieth century, certain members of the order—such as Teilhard de Chardin—stirred polemics and controversy with their bold theological positions; others, like Karl Rahner, openly advocated for a radical reform of the Church, and vigorously promoted this agenda, even within the halls of the Second Vatican Council.

“That very Council has been interpreted, by more than one observer, as an attempt to implement the comprehensive reform envisioned by Rahner and others—a trend that was then developed and deepened under the influence of liberation theology, which also arose—not coincidentally—in Latin American Jesuit circles.

“The Council was followed by the so-called 'spirit of the Council,' that is, the broad interpretation of the deliberately ambiguous conciliar documents. This is why, from a Novus Ordo (the modern Mass) that was originally intended to stand alongside the traditional liturgy, there emerged a practical suppression of the latter.”

I found de Antonellis’ take on the failure of the counter-revolution to be especially compelling. Once more, I quote at length—though not without cause.

“Why did the infiltration of seminaries occur through members or sympathizers of the Communist Party, and not through elements of the Right? Why was there no right-wing response to the hegemonic Marxist strategy? Why—to broaden the discussion—were leftist publishing houses not met with a corresponding network of right-wing publishers, essayists, novelists, or journalists? In reality, attempts were made, but what was lacking—even more than substantial funding like the so-called ‘Moscow gold’—was coordination among the various forces at play.

“In a single phrase, the reason for the overwhelming cultural victory of the Left can be summed up by saying that what the Right lacked was a figure like Gramsci: a thinker who understood the fundamental role of culture, and a Party that recognized this role as primary (regardless of Gramsci’s personal life or his relationship with the Party’s leader, Togliatti).

“But this does not mean that the Right has lacked significant thinkers. On the contrary: I won’t list them—it would be too long—because, ultimately, from Homer to the mid-twentieth century, the greatest writers, philosophers, and poets have essentially been on the Right, meaning religious, monarchist, meritocratic, aristocratic, and anti-democratic (just consider how Homer, in the Iliad, encapsulates the democratic spirit in the figure of Thersites…). [8] What has been entirely lacking, however, is a great man of culture who was recognized and valued as such: ‘When I hear the word culture, I reach for my revolver’—a now-famous phrase from a virtually unknown author, often casually attributed to various right-wing political figures, from Göring to Goebbels, Codreanu, or Primo de Rivera.

“Culture has always been regarded as the pastime of the idle (in the etymological sense, from otium): only those with a stable economic position can afford it. It was therefore unthinkable to make political journalism or literature a profession. The consequence is that—with a few numerically insignificant exceptions—those who wished to combine a cultural vocation with the need to earn a living had to either join a leftist newspaper, magazine, or publishing house, or else find a day job and, in their free time, dedicate themselves to writing not as professionals, but as amateurs. The result has been the dispersion of right-wing culture into a thousand insignificant rivulets.

“Just as there has been no ability to channel the cultural potential of the Right, so too has there been no ability to direct its political potential. It would therefore be inconceivable to ask a group of young people to choose the ‘cloistered path’ for a long-term project to stop the revolution in the Church from within. Certainly, there will be young people with vocations (who, today, will find modernist seminaries with modernist teachers and, once ordained, will celebrate modernist rites under the watchful eye of modernist bishops), but they will be a tiny minority. Why not then consider the entrance of traditionalists into seminaries to counter the revolution in the Church?

“In addition to the lack of an organization encouraging young militants to enter the seminary, this idea of sacrifice (which should not, in fact, be seen as such) clashes with the deep attachment of the Right-wing man to the value of the family, the fundamental nucleus of society: generally, he finds it difficult to renounce family life, even for a prestigious career. He will instead try to reconcile public and private life, work and family—perhaps sacrificing the latter to the former, but never entirely abandoning it, except in rare cases.”

Far from being a mere denunciation, Il seminarista rosso is an unflinching and intellectually rigorous call to vigilance. It compels readers to confront uncomfortable truths about the Church’s modern decline and to recover a restored obedience to tradition, spiritual authority, and metaphysical truth.

A vital contribution to the contemporary Catholic discourse, Gianandrea de Antonellis’ essay deserves a wide readership among all who care about the fate of Catholic tradition in the twenty-first century.

A PDF copy of Il seminarista rosso: L'infiltrazione marxista nella Chiesa can be downloaded at www.altaterradilavoro.com

~ By Giovanni di Napoli, Feast of the Madonna Immacolata

Translation and footnotes are my own unless otherwise indicated.

Notes

[1] Pascendi refers to Pascendi Dominici Gregis, a papal encyclical issued by Pope Pius X on September 8, 1907. It is one of the most important documents of the Catholic Church’s condemnation of Modernism.

[2] Gallicani (Gallicanism) was a political-religious movement that emerged primarily in France, especially during the 17th and 18th centuries, with earlier roots in the Middle Ages. It sought to limit the authority of the pope, particularly in temporal and national matters, and to increase the power of the national church and the monarchy. 

Giuseppinisti (Josephinism) was a policy initiated by Emperor Joseph II of Austria (reigned 1765–1790), aimed at subordinating the Catholic Church to the Austrian state and promoting enlightened absolutism. It extended beyond Austria into other Habsburg-controlled territories like Northern Italy.

[3] Kulturkampf is a German term meaning “culture struggle”, and it refers to a period of conflict in the 1870s between the German imperial government, led by Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, and the Catholic Church, particularly in Prussia and other German states.

Desamortización refers to a series of state-led confiscations and sales of Church and communal property carried out primarily in Spain during the 19th century, under various liberal governments. The term comes from the Spanish verb desamortizar, meaning “to disentail” or “to release from mortmain” (i.e., from inalienable ownership, especially by the Church).

Guarentigie refers to the “Law of Guarantees” (Legge delle Guarentigie) enacted by the Italian Kingdom in 1871 after the capture of Rome. It was a unilateral law intended to define the relationship between the newly unified Italian state and the Papacy, following the end of the Papal States.

[4] The Synod of Pistoia was a diocesan synod convened in 1786 in the town of Pistoia, Tuscany, by Bishop Scipione de’ Ricci, under the protection of Grand Duke Leopold of Tuscany (later Emperor Leopold II). It is one of the most important events in the history of Jansenist and proto-modernist reform movements within the Catholic Church in Italy.

[5] Unus inter pares is Latin for “one among equals,” referring to a view that denies the pope’s supreme authority over the bishops.

[6] Francesco Lamendola, Quanti preti di sinistra sono massoni ed ex agenti sovietici infiltrati nei seminari? il Corriere delle Regioni, Quaderni culturali: Giornale Web e www.ariannaeditrice.it [31.1.2017, pagina non più esistente] (Source: original essay by Gianandrea de Antonellis)

[7] Francesco Lamendola, I gesuiti hanno preso il timone della Chiesa, ma per condurla dove?, http://www.ariannaeditrice.it/articolo.php?id_articolo=53779 [7.02.2017]. (Source: original essay by Gianandrea de Antonellis)

[8] Thersites is a character from Homer’s Iliad. He serves as a literary embodiment of ugly, disorderly, and rebellious democratic sentiment, especially when contrasted with the heroic aristocratic ideals of the Greek epic tradition.

A Prayer for Texas

San Medardo, ora pro nobis

We offer prayers for the victims of the deadly storms and flash flooding that swept through Central Texas on Friday night. The loss of life, the suffering, and the destruction grieve us deeply. May San Medardo, San Cesareo di Terracina, Sant’Antonio di Padua, Venerable Antonio Margil de Jesús, and Our Lady of Guadalupe protect and watch over you.

Prayer to St. Medard

Saint Medard, patron saint for protection against bad storms, we ask you to intercede for us during the storms of our lives as well as the storms in nature. Protect our families and our homes. We pray for assistance for the victims of hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, and other natural disasters. Loving God, send in more helpers, and multiply resources and supplies for the aid of those in need. You calmed the storm on the Sea of Galilee; deliver us from the storms that are raging around us now. Amen

Simple Pleasures: A Return to the Studio

We had the pleasure of visiting our friend David DiPasquale’s atelier once again. The space has only grown more vibrant and full of life since our last visit. In the time that has passed, he has been hard at work, fully immersed in painting and drawing with tireless dedication. We were fortunate to catch a glimpse of some of his latest charcoal drawings—a small but powerful selection that revealed both refinement and a spirit of experimentation.

18 de julio en Asturias — Santa Misa y comida de hermandad

El próximo viernes 18 de julio, a las 12:00 h (mediodía, D.m.), se celebrará la Santa Misa en la capilla de Nuestra Señora del Carmen (Posada, 121A, Siero).

La Misa se ofrecerá por el eterno descanso de S.M.C. Don Carlos VII y por el de los muertos en la Cruzada de 1936-1939.

A continuación, tendrá lugar una comida de hermandad en un restaurante cercano.

Es imprescindible reservar con antelación, contactando con los organizadores por teléfono o escribiendo a: tradicionastur@yahoo.es

Southern Italy as a Civilizational Bastion: On Massimo Pacilio’s Interview with Edizioni di Ar

The recent interview Meridionalismo e tradizione with Professor Massimo Pacilio, published by Edizioni di Ar, offers a compelling and timely contribution to the ongoing reevaluation of Southern Italy’s history, culture, and political destiny. Far from indulging in a nostalgic lament for a lost kingdom, Pacilio elevates the discourse surrounding Meridionalismo beyond economic grievance or regionalist rhetoric. Instead, he articulates a vision in which Southern identity is rooted in tradition, monarchy, and a metaphysical worldview that remains untainted by the modern cult of progress.

What sets this interview apart is its ability to weave together cultural criticism, historical revisionism, and philosophical depth. Pacilio’s interpretation of Southern Italy as a “morphology of a nation” rather than a sociological anomaly serves as an evocative and necessary corrective to the prevailing narratives of the Risorgimento. He makes a convincing case that the so-called “unification” of Italy was less a historical inevitability than a Masonic-liberal project that uprooted legitimate political and spiritual orders. By restoring the South to its rightful place as a bearer of kultur, not merely a casualty of history, Pacilio opens the door to a fuller understanding of Italian—and indeed European—identity.

The interview is particularly strong in its treatment of tradition, drawing on the thought of Evola and Guénon to contrast traditionalist metaphysics with the deracinated ideologies of modernity. Pacilio’s articulation of the “third dimension of history,” following Evola, reintroduces a forgotten depth to historical interpretation—one that accounts for hidden forces, spiritual decay, and the perennial conflict between rooted order and revolutionary chaos. His insights into the ideological character of so-called “scientific” historiography are especially relevant in an age where technocratic “neutrality” often masks deeper ideological commitments.

Perhaps the most impressive aspect is the clarity with which Pacilio navigates complex geopolitical and philosophical themes. He draws a subtle yet decisive distinction between individualistic liberalism and the legitimate self-determination of rooted peoples. His argument compellingly favors a vision of conservative renewal over the leveling forces of globalization, while also exposing the limits of a geopolitical realism that remains tethered to Enlightenment assumptions (secularism, universalism, etc.).

In sum, this interview is not only a valuable resource for those interested in the intellectual legacy of the Two Sicilies or the critique of the Risorgimento mythos—it is also a lucid expression of Traditionalist thought in the 21st century. Pacilio challenges us to rethink the South not as a passive victim but as a spiritual and civilizational bastion—one that still carries within it the seed of resistance to the liberal-modern world.

~ By Giovanni di Napoli, July 2nd, Feast of the Madonna delle Grazie

A Note of Thanks: Bringing the Sanfedisti to Light

Embarking on the journey to write a short history of Cardinal Fabrizio Ruffo and the Sanfedisti has been both challenging and deeply rewarding. Like any meaningful historical work, it demands time, focus, and the right sources. What has made this endeavor especially fulfilling is the support I’ve received from friends who believe in the value of bringing this often-overlooked chapter of Duosiciliano history to light in English.

Recently, several of you gifted me rare, insightful, and highly relevant books for my research. These were far more than simple gestures—they were acts of trust, intellectual solidarity, and quiet affirmations that this story is worth telling.

Cardinal Ruffo’s campaign was more than just a military episode; it was a deeply human story of faith, loyalty, resistance, and redemption. Knowing that others also recognize its significance has given me the encouragement to press on.

So thank you—not only for the books, but for your belief, your support, and your quiet motivation to keep moving forward. History, like friendship, flourishes through such gestures.

An Unexpected Look at the Constitutional Citizen’s Manual of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies

A friend recently shared with us his latest acquisition, a document that immediately piqued our interest, the MANUALE DEL CITTADINO COSTITUZIONALE OVVERO La Costituzione politica del Regno corredata delle vigenti leggi Elettorale, e sulla Guardia Nazionale, or CONSTITUTIONAL CITIZEN’S MANUAL, or The Political Constitution of the Kingdom, Accompanied by the Current Electoral Laws and those Concerning the National Guard.

This rare and intriguing document captures a brief but significant moment in the political history of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. On June 25, 1860, amid rising internal unrest and the looming threat of invasion by Giuseppe Garibaldi and his red-clad band of marauding freebooters, King Francis II made the consequential decision to restore the constitution originally granted during the Revolutions of 1848. The restoration was a belated and ultimately ill-fated attempt to appease liberal and revolutionary factions within the kingdom and to rally broader support in defense of the Bourbon monarchy.

The move failed to achieve the desired effect. The sudden return to constitutionalism was widely seen as a desperate concession rather than a true reform. Garibaldi’s forces continued their advance, and within months the Bourbon regime collapsed, bringing an end to centuries of sovereign rule.

Although I personally do not favor constitutionalism, I still recognize the historical significance of the document. It serves as an insightful artifact of liberal nationalist ideology and a utopian experiment during the political upheavals of the modern era, offering a valuable glimpse into the institutional and legal structure of the kingdom in its final days.

Napoli 2500: "Il Ducato Bizantino e Napoli Medievale"

In Napoli

The 1° Reggimento Re at the Historical Procession of the Royal Colony of San Leucio, Caserta

Photos courtesy of Angela Cuccillato

Happy National U.S. Postage Stamp Day!

In celebration of National U.S. Postage Stamp Day, I thought it would be fun to share a pic of my Lord of the Rings Presentation Pack, issued in the UK in 2004 in commemoration of the 50th Anniversary of J.R.R. Tolkien's fantasy masterpiece. Pictured from left to right are: a map showing Middle Earth, Forest of Lothlórien in Spring, Dust-jacket for The Fellowship of the Ring, Rivendell, The Hall at Bag End, Orthanc, Doors of Durin, Barad-dûr, Minas Tirith, and Fangorn Forest.