Map of the Trentino, part of "Italia Irredenta," unredeemed Italy: Venezia Tridentina (Trentino and Alto Adige)
Venezia Tridentina (Trentino and Alto Adige)Confine del Regno d'ItaliaConf.[ine] Geografico d'ItaliaConfine fra Trentino e Alto AdigeFerrovieTramvieIst. Geogr. De Agostini-Novara - Riproduzione InterdettaVenezia Tridentina (Trentino and South Tyrol)Border of the Kingdom of ItalyGeographic boundary of ItalyBorder between Trentino and Alto AdigeRailwaysTramwaysGeographic Institute of Agostini-Novara - Reproduction prohibitedReverse:Message dated December 14, 1917
"The sky is overcast, grey and low. Mist is rising from the valley and cutting off the two peaks, ours and the one we are to attack. If we are going to die, we shall die cut off from the world and with a sense that no one is really interested. Once one is resigned to the thought of sacrificing oneself, one would like to think that it might happen in front of an audience. To die in the sun, in full view, on the open stage that is the world—that is how one imagines dying for one's country: but the way it is here is more like a condemned man being strangled secretly."
Excerpt from the journal of Paolo Monelli, a soldier in an Italian Alpine regiment, northeast of Trento, on the Italian-Austrian Trentino front. Monelli was writing on October 19, 1916.
The Beauty and the Sorrow: An Intimate History of the First World War by Peter Englund, page 310, copyright © 2009 by Peter England, publisher: Vintage Books, publication date: 2012
1916-10-19, 1916, October, Trentino, Monte Cauriol
