If Italy were to return to the monarchy, it will not have a king but a queen. And she will be the “rock princess” Vittoria Cristina Chiara Adelaide Maria (in the pic), niece of Vittorio Emanuele di Savoia, son of the last king of Italy, Umberto II, forced into exile after the institutional referendum which in 1946 sanctioned the end of the monarchy in Italy.

The news is not very new, given that the historic decision to change – later thousand years – the royal chain was taken in 2019 when Vittorio Emanuele, with a formal decree, amended a medieval law it had for centuries limited the succession in its royal line to male heirs. A gift for 16 years of the niece, “the best he could do”, the girl had commented. But the story is back in the limelight these days thanks to an article in the New York Times (which you can read in full here:  Paris Teenager’s New Gig: Would-Be Queen of Italy. A Nation Shrugs.) which highlights the aspirations of Vittoria, now 17 years old and  triving Instagram influencer (she has 38 thousand followers), from her Paris home, and the family “squabbles” that his investiture caused. A “totally illegitimate” act, in fact, he defined it Prince Aimone of Savoy – Aosta, cousin and rival pretender to the throne, who works as an executive for the “Pirelli” tire company in Moscow.

It is true that “by now” (for 75 years) Italy is a Republic, but “never say never”, says Vittoria’s father, Emanuele Filiberto (in the pic below), now former heir to the throne, who claims the title of Prince of Venice, the name he used for his restaurant in Los Angeles. He has no children males. Emanuele, and the family needed a boss to run his own historical orders. Many of the remaining monarchs in Europe are women, he noted, a begin with Queen Elizabeth in Great Britain. Their royal homes have one much better story of women’s emancipation than the Italian Parliament, where women are notoriously underrepresented, he said.

And, as for emancipation, Vittoria – daughter of Emanuele and the French actress Clotilde Courau – already seems to know a lot: a month ago, she posted a defense on Instagram of the rights of students of French private schools addressed to the president of the France, Emmanuel Macron (the video is here: https://www.instagram.com/tv/COKlpNbIZbw/). The speech, viewed nearly 300,000 times, was her public debut. “Rock ‘n’ roll princess”, calls her father who is interested more to show business (he is often on tv) than to politics: he says he can’t wait to leave everything, abdicating and going around the world. “Once my daughter is ready”, he says. To become the Queen, obviously.

The pic at the top is from Vittoria’s Instagram profile