Operation: March on Rome

The date of October 28, 1922 is reportedly the date of the march on Rome. Some sources describe twenty-six thousand armed fascists, stationed in the Roman countryside, ready to burst into the capital. Others limit the number of blackshirts to only fourteen, fifteen or sixteen thousand. Regardless of how many they were, what matters is the symbolic value of the action of marching on Rome: the militiamen of the National Fascist Party aimed at putting pressure on the ruling class. A revolutionary coup? A coup in the name of the “real” Italian Nation?