AHC/WI - Italy gains / retains Nice, Savoy and Corsica during unification

My understanding is that the native language of Savoy is neither French nor Occitan but Franco-Provençal, a collection of related dialects predominating in east-central France and western Switzerland. It is true that speakers of Franco-Provençal do not seem to have identified themselves as speaking regional dialects of this language, of Franco-Provençal as such existing; they defaulted to French. The only remaining territory where Franco-Provençal has not been mostly replaced by France is the Italian Aosta Valley, where Franco-Provençal persists as a vernacular alongside French and Italian as official languages.

The traditional language of the County of Nice was a local dialect of Occitan, but Italian was apparently widely spoken. Had it remained Italian, probably Nice would have become an Italophone city with Occitan persisting further away, if at all.

Can Italy keep Savoy and Nice and gain Corsica? Much depends on how Italy unifies, frankly. If Italian unification does not get the support of France, then somehow Italy will need to gain patronage from some country, somewhere. What could this country be? I doubt it would be an Austria deeply invested in the status quo, for one.

One distant possibility might be an Italy that remains closely allied with Prussia and Germany after 1866, to the point of joining Prussia as an ally in the Franco-Prussian War in the hopes of regaining "Italian" territories. Questions about the military capacity of 1870 Italy aside, the country's interests were focused on regaining Rome, a city and a territory much more central to Italian interests than a border city ceded a decade ago and an island lost a century ago and mountain regions never populated by anyone who spoke Italian.
Italy doesn't need patronage to unify northern Italy, they just Austria to crumble between Hungary, Italy and Prussia going ham unchecked, I guess you could call that Prussian patronage but not exactly as Italians would be the ones fighting on the ground alone.
 
Wait a second, who wrote the OP?

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Italy doesn't need patronage to unify northern Italy, they just Austria to crumble between Hungary, Italy and Prussia going ham unchecked, I guess you could call that Prussian patronage but not exactly as Italians would be the ones fighting on the ground alone.

Austria is unlikely to be allowed to crumble, especially be Prussia (humble sure, but crumble), moreover you forget, that Austria often was more than capable to defend against Sardinia, that the latter tended to need French help. As for Hungary, sure that would be huge distraction for Austria, so losing Lombardy-Venetia and other Habsburg led Italian States, but getting Hungary back in the fold could be trade-off.
Besides Prussia was not unwilling to let Austria keep the Balkans as an area to expand their influence, they trusted Russia less, and the Ottomans maybe even less so. So no, Prussia wanted to be recognized as the dominant German power, but Austria was still a significant power, moreover Austria was culturally closely related to Savoy.
 
Austria is unlikely to be allowed to crumble, especially be Prussia (humble sure, but crumble), moreover you forget, that Austria often was more than capable to defend against Sardinia, that the latter tended to need French help. As for Hungary, sure that would be huge distraction for Austria, so losing Lombardy-Venetia and other Habsburg led Italian States, but getting Hungary back in the fold could be trade-off.
Besides Prussia was not unwilling to let Austria keep the Balkans as an area to expand their influence, they trusted Russia less, and the Ottomans maybe even less so. So no, Prussia wanted to be recognized as the dominant German power, but Austria was still a significant power, moreover Austria was culturally closely related to Savoy.
OTL yes, but it's not a given, Austria could have very well collapsed in 1848 without Russian intervention and Prussia would have benefitted from it.
Prussia cares way more about hegemony over Germany than the Balkans in some decades.

I'm not sure what your point is, but mine is just that in 1848 there was nothing stopping Austria from crumbling and Habsburg Italy being annexed by Savoy.
 
OTL yes, but it's not a given, Austria could have very well collapsed in 1848 without Russian intervention and Prussia would have benefitted from it.
Prussia cares way more about hegemony over Germany than the Balkans in some decades.

I'm not sure what your point is, but mine is just that in 1848 there was nothing stopping Austria from crumbling and Habsburg Italy being annexed by Savoy.

As I said Habsburg Italy might very well be lost to save the rest. Besides what would replace Austria in that region? Both Prussia and Russia very likely would prefer Austria, which wasn't totally falling apart either.
 
As I said Habsburg Italy might very well be lost to save the rest. Besides what would replace Austria in that region? Both Prussia and Russia very likely would prefer Austria, which wasn't totally falling apart either.
That's really not the case, Russia and Prussia both had motives to want a weak Austria, OTL Russia helped Austria with the hope of salvaging some kind of support in the future and to prevent more nationalist uprising, but if Russia is distracted there is no reason for them to not let Hungary be free.
Austria WAS totally falling apart, most of the kingdom of Hungary was in control of the rebels as was most of Austrian Italy at the start. Russia put 200k men in the region to quell the rebellion, nothing to scoff at.


I still don't get why you think somehow Austria is vital for either Prussia and Russia, when the first literally was at odds with this country in this exact time period(1849-1851) over unification of Germany. From one side you say Prussia wants a counterbalance to Russia and on the other you say Russia prefers Austria over weaker Hungary, ???
 
It’s because Austria was crumbling for the wrong reasons for the other members of the Holy Alliance. OTL there was a reason, why they aided Austria in crushing those rebellions/revolutions. IMHO it doesn’t mean, Austria can’t lose territories, but they wouldn’t let a fellow monarchy, Austria, fall in favour of ‘revolutionary’ regimes.
 
It’s because Austria was crumbling for the wrong reasons for the other members of the Holy Alliance. OTL there was a reason, why they aided Austria in crushing those rebellions/revolutions. IMHO it doesn’t mean, Austria can’t lose territories, but they wouldn’t let a fellow monarchy, Austria, fall in favour of ‘revolutionary’ regimes.
Prussia literally took advantage of the rebellions to unify Germany in 1849/1850 so at least for them they would let fall.
 
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