Italian Unification

How was Italy restored in 1815 by the congress of Vienna? What were the obstacles preventing unification?

In 1815 a congress was held in Vienna it was a meeting of the main leaders on Western Europe. The idea of the conference was set up with the idea to sort out on going disputes (and disputes that had ended but needed resolving) in central Europe.

The congress was held in Austria one of the largest powers in Europe at the time. Being in Austria, the meeting was chaired by the Austrian chancellor Klemens Wenzel von Metternich (often known as just Metternich). The main Negotiations were between the ‘Big Four’ these countries being the most powerful countries in Europe at the time. The Big Four consisted of Austria, Russia, Prussia and Great Britain. France were present at the negotiations but were originally supposed to attend the lees important negations. Specifically not the negotiations concerning the future of France itself. But some clever tactics by French foreign minister Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord lead to France being placed on the top table and essentially becoming the fifth major power in presence at the conference. This meant that they were punished much less harshly than they would have been had they not been involved in the negotiations. In fact they were not really punished at all.

Italy was one of the main points discussed at the congress. There were many different opinions on what to do with it. The chair of the meeting Metternich strongly believed that it should be split up into separated states as it had been before Napoleon and his forces invaded and united Italy under his French dictatorship and was very outspoken in his view during the talks. In the final Act of the conference they declared a multitude of things the main points were: Russia gained the Duchy of Warsaw (A huge part of modern day Poland), The German confederation was created from the 360 states of the Holy Roman Empire (this was governed by the Austrians),...