1. Gaetano Salvemini (1853–1957). In the 1920s Salvemini was Chaired Professor of Modern History at the University of Florence but resigned his position rather than take a loyalty oath to the Fascist regime. Forced into exile in Paris, he was a founder of the anti-fascist movement Giustizia e Libertà, of which Emilio Lussu was also a leading member. From Paris he moved on to England and then to the United States, where he taught at Harvard and became a citizen in 1940. After WWII he returned to his teaching position in Florence and began his first lecture with the words, “As I was saying.…”
2. Lussu has fictionalized the numbers of the regiments here. The Sassari Brigade was actually composed of the 151st and 152nd Infantry Regiments.
3. The Carso (or Karst) is a limestone plateau region extending between southwestern Slovenia and northeastern Italy.
4. Quel mazzolin’ di fiori is one of the songs made famous by the Alpini, the Italian mountain infantry corps, 125,000 of whom were killed in WWI. After the war, veterans (“veci”) formed choirs in their hometowns and sang about the hardships of what they called “the war of snow and ice.” A choral version of the song can be heard at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPaB7vOoBMM.
5. The Asiago plateau, also known as the plateau of the Seven Communes, is an area of about 200 square miles situated in the southern Alps between Trento on the northwest and Vicenza on the south. First settled by Germanic tribes in Roman times, the seven towns located on the plateau formed an autonomous federation in the early 1300s, which lasted until Napoleon’s invasion of Italy in 1796. Asiago is also famous as the setting for novels and stories by Emilio Lussu’s friend and fellow writer Mario Rigoni Stern.
6. To allow a soldier to see out of the trench or fire small arms without exposing his head, a loophole could be built into the parapet. A loophole might simply be a gap in the sandbags, or it might be fitted with a steel plate. For a good photo of a loophole in an Italian trench, see http://www.flickr.com/photos/hansderegt/5124063193/.
7. The acronym SIPE indicated the name of the company that produced them: Società Italiana Produzione Esplosivi.
8. The Alpini are an elite mountain warfare military corps of the Italian Army. Established in 1872, the Alpini are the oldest active mountain infantry in the world. During World War I the 26 peacetime Alpini battalions were increased by 62 battalions and saw heavy combat all over the alpine arch.
9. A “malga,” as Lusso explains in this passage is a grassy, treeless pasture in the Alps where dairy cows are taken to graze in the summer. But the word is also used to refer to the building where the cows’ milk is made into cheese. So Malga Lora is the pasture and the Malga is the building or cabin where the cheese is made.
10. Gelignite, or blasting gelatin, an explosive mixture of nitroglycerin, guncotton, wood pulp and potassium nitrate, was invented in 1875 by Alfred Nobel. Tubes or cylinders of gelignite were used by Italian troops to make breaches in the Austrian barbed wire entanglements, but they were seldom successful.
11. Like Casara Zebio, Casara Zebio Pastorile is a malga located slightly higher up on Mount Zebio. Casara Zebio is at altitude 1680 meters and Casara Zebio Pastorile is at 1706 meters. For photos see http://www.caiasiago.it/puntiappoggio/832app.htm#Malga%20Zebio.
12. The tune is “Marechiaro” written in 1895 by the Neapolitan poet Salvatore Di Giacomo. Marechiaro is a seaside neighbornood in the Posillipo area of Naples.
13. The Benaglia was a rodded fragmentation grenade equipped with 3 tin fins to help it fly nose first. Images and details are available at http://www.talpo.it/benaglia.html.