Kingdom of the Two Sicilies
The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies (Italian: Regno delle Due Sicilie) was a kingdom in Southern Italy from 1816 to 1861 under the control of a cadet branch of the Spanish Bourbons. The kingdom was the largest sovereign state by population and size in Italy before Italian unification, comprising Sicily and most of the area of today's Mezzogiorno (southern Italy) in covering all of the Italian Peninsula south of the Papal States.
Kingdom of the Two Sicilies | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1816–1861 | |||||||||||
Coat of arms
| |||||||||||
| Anthem: Inno al Re "Hymn to the King" | |||||||||||
The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies in 1839 | |||||||||||
| Capital | Palermo (1816–1817) Naples (1817–1861) | ||||||||||
| Common languages | Administrative: Latin and Italian In use: Neapolitan and Sicilian | ||||||||||
| Religion | Catholic Church | ||||||||||
| Demonym(s) | Sicilian, Neapolitan | ||||||||||
| Government |
| ||||||||||
| King | |||||||||||
• 1816–1825 | Ferdinand I | ||||||||||
• 1825–1830 | Francis I | ||||||||||
• 1830–1859 | Ferdinand II | ||||||||||
• 1859–1861 | Francis II | ||||||||||
| History | |||||||||||
• Founded | 1816 | ||||||||||
• Treaty of Casalanza | 1815 | ||||||||||
| 1860 | |||||||||||
• Annexed by the Kingdom of Italy | 20 March 1861 | ||||||||||
| Currency | Two Sicilies ducat | ||||||||||
| |||||||||||
| Today part of | Italy, Croatia | ||||||||||
The kingdom was formed when the Kingdom of Sicily merged with the Kingdom of Naples, which was officially also known as the Kingdom of Sicily. Since both kingdoms were named Sicily, they were collectively known as the "Two Sicilies" (Utraque Sicilia, literally "both Sicilies"), and the unified kingdom adopted this name. The king of the Two Sicilies was overthrown by Giuseppe Garibaldi in 1860, after which the people voted in a plebiscite to join the Kingdom of Sardinia. The annexation of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies completed the first phase of Italian unification, and the new Kingdom of Italy was proclaimed in 1861.
The Two Sicilies were heavily agricultural, like other Italian states.