#49 • Italian Souvenir of the Battle of Monte Grappa Trench Art Shell with Applied Leaves and Acorns

Part of TRENCH ART & WWI Memorabilia (live auction by Bannerman Auctions)

High bid $100.00

Status: Sold

Category: Italy

Italian Souvenir of the Battle of Monte Grappa Trench Art Shell with Applied Leaves and Acorns. Applied leaves and suspiciously grenade looking acorns have been applied to a shell with a flared rim. Engraved on the shell is "Aronne / Armando / 42 Fante / Ricordo Monte Grappa," which translates to "Aronne Armando, 42nd Infantryman: A Memory of Monte Grappa."  Owing to the defeat of the Austro-German offensive on Mount Grappa, this battle marked a turning point in the war. The new front was shorter and easier to defend for the Italian army. Diaz had the opportunity to reorganize and re-equip the Regio Esercito. As a result of these efforts and increased rations and pay, morale and discipline were restored. During the winter, the Italians reinforced their positions. Austria-Hungary failed to turn Caporetto’s triumph into a final victory. In the first month of 1918, the Habsburg Empire began to suffer severe civilian hardship and deterioration of morale. After the battle of Mount Grappa, General Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf (1852-1925), Austrian chief of staff, wrote to his wife: “We can no longer count on victory in Italy”. The threat of the invasion gave a new and more concrete sense to the war in Italy. The war was now fought in a different spirit by Italian soldiers and was supported more strongly by the home front, although support for the war remained moderate among the rural population and the working class. The battaglia d’arresto on Mount Grappa rapidly became mythologized along with the new defensive war for the survival of the homeland, which unified the Italian political forces. The socialist deputy Filippo Turati (1857-1932) proclaimed in a parliamentary speech: “Grappa è la patria“.5 The image of Mount Grappa as the last bastion of the nation began to spread via propaganda and the Italian press sacralised the battaglia d’arresto with articles and images celebrating the heroic resistance of Italian battalions. The cover of the journal «Domenica del Corriere» published a drawing of an Alpine battalion that defended its position by throwing stones against the attackers because the ammunition was finished.6 In August 1918, General Emilio De Bono (1866-1944) wrote The song of the Grappa, which started with the phrase “Mount Grappa, you are my Homeland!”. Constructed on Mount Grappa in 1901, the Chapel of Mary, Redeemer of Christians, with a statue of the Madonna (seriously damaged by the Austro-German artillery in January 1918), symbolically unified the religious cult and the national myth. Following the war, in 1922 an act by the Italian government declared Mount Grappa sacred and immortal to the Fatherland. In 1935, after a dispute with the Church, the Fascist regime built a military memorial monument on Mount Grappa, turning it into a destination for patriotic pilgrimages. (Courtesy International Encyclopedia of the First World War) Estimate: $60 - $90