In the 1840s, post-Napoleonic Italy was 'a geographical expression'--not a country, but a patchwork of states.
The north (Savoy/Piedmont, and Venice ) was ruled by Austria-Hungary, and most of the minor central states were more or less clients of Austria.
From Naples, a Spanish-descended Bourbon monarchy ruled the south--'the Two Sicilies.
' The European 'Year of Revolutions', 1848, saw popular uprisings against the regimes all over the peninsula.
These were eventually crushed (First War of.
Osprey Publishing (uk) Armies of the italian wars of unification 1848-70 (1): piedmont and the two sicilies, paperback/gabriele esposito
