Tirol

At the Peace Conference, Italy was not required to sign any treaty safeguarding the rights of minorities within her frontiers. (See MINORITIES.) Signor Tittoni, however, on December 27, 1919, declared publicly that Italy was under a moral obligation to apply the provisions of the Minorities Treaties towards her own minorities. Similar declarations were made on several occa sions by responsible Italian statesmen, and the policy of the Italian Government towards their new subjects was at first not illiberal. Unhappily, both for Italy and the German minority itself, this policy was abandoned by the Fascists in favour of one of Italianization, inaugurated in July 1923—a policy that suc ceeded only in arousing a spirit of intense resentment and irredent ism among the liberty-loving Tirolese. During Mussolini's war against Abyssinia many Tirolese fled secretly into Austria or Ger many to escape military service. In 1939, Hitler and Mussolini negotiated an agreement for the return to Germany of some of the Tirolese under Italian rule.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.-See

the great official work entitled Die oester reichisch-ungarische Monarchie in Wort und Bild, vol. xu. "Tirol" (1893) ; A. Achleit and E. Ubl, Tirol und Vorarlberg (Leipzig, 1895) ; J. Alton, Die ladinischen Idiomen in Ladinien, Groden, Fassa, Buchen

stein, Ampezzo (Innsbruck, 1879) ; E. H. Compton and W. A.

Grohman, Tyrol (1908) ; J. Egger, Geschichte Tirols (3 vols., Inns bruck, 1872-8o) ; J. Hirn, Tirols Erhebung im Jahre 1800 (Innsbruck, 1909) ; F. A. Sinnacher, Beitrage zur Geschichte der bischoft. Kirche Siiben und Brixen, really a special territorial history of Tirol, io vols. (Brixen, 1821-37) ; I. V. Zingerle, Sagen, Miirchen und Gebrauche a'us Tirol (Innsbruck, 1859) ; I. V. Zingerle and K. Th. von Inama-Sternegg, Die tirolischen Weisthiimer, 4 vols. (Vienna, 1875-88). 0. Stolz, Die Ausbreitung des Deutschtums in Siidtirol im Lichte der Urkunden, 3 vols. (1927). For the modern problem of German South Tirol see more especially P. Herre, Die Siidtiroler Frage (Munich, 1927); The Case of German South Tyrol against Italy, translated and edited by C. H. Herford (1927) ; 0. Stolz, Das Staatliche Selbstbestimmungs recht in der Geschichte Tirols (Innsbruck, 1921) ; Italian Green Book— Diplomatic Documents submitted to Italian Parliament (May 20, 1915) ; Foreign Office Historical Section, The Trentino and Alto Adige (192o) ; H. W. V. Temperley, History of Peace Conference, vol. v., pp. 278-287 (1921).