Liebespfand fürs Vaterland

18 December 1935 was the date of what was almost certainly the Italian Fascist regime's most elaborate act of self-dramatization. In the course of an unprecedented donation campaign to finance the war in Ethiopia, millions of Italian couples traded in their wedding rings for worthless metal replicas. The study is the first to cast light on the background to this remarkable event. In it, the collective sacrifice of wedding rings is foregrounded as a key factor in the understanding of fundamental aspects of Fascism - notably the central significance of militarism as an instrument of political mobilization on the domestic front.