When the land reform decree, accompanied by the hoofbeats of the Carabinieri, rolled across every dirt road and every field in the Italian countryside, those villages hardened by poverty and oppression finally felt a trace of warmth, like land that had suffered through half a year of drought suddenly welcoming the first spring rain, with tender shoots of hope quietly emerging between the dry and cracked ridges.
In the south, the rural areas of Sicily were where the pain had been deepest, and where this transformation therefore brought the greatest warmth.
For generations, the farmers here had been bound to the landlords’ estates, working endlessly as tenant farmers.
Their hands had tilled every inch of soil on this land and planted crop after crop, yet they had never truly owned even a single inch of it.
All year round, they rose early and worked late, their sweat falling into the fields day after day, but when the harvest came, most of it would be hauled away by the landlords as rent, while the remaining half bag of grain had to feed the entire family and carry them through the bitter winter, often leaving them uncertain where their next meal would come from.
When a disastrous year came and the fields produced nothing, the landlords’ rent was still not reduced by a single coin, leaving the peasants with no choice but to endure hunger.
In one small village, when the Carabinieri, the land reform team from the Ministry of Agriculture, and municipal officials arrived carrying stacks of documents and loudly publicized the land reform policies, the villagers’ first reaction was not joy, but to stand frozen in place with vacant eyes, as though they had not clearly heard the words “distributing land,” feeling as if they were listening to some impossible fantasy from the Arabian Nights.
Dozens of peasants crowded beneath a tree, their emaciated bodies wrapped in coarse cloth garments covered with patch upon patch, some areas already worn through into holes that revealed their darkened skin.
At the back of the crowd, an elderly farmer with white hair, leaning on a smoothly polished jujube-wood cane, tremblingly stepped forward twice.
His back was bent like a stone arch bridge, curved into that shape by years of bending over the fields.
He opened his mouth and asked tentatively in a hoarse voice, “M…
Milord, is what you said true?
Can you really distribute land to poor people like us?” His voice was very soft, yet like a stone, it struck heavily into the hearts of all the peasants.
“For generations, we have all been tenant farmers.
The landlords’ land has always been passed down to their descendants.
How could it…
how could it possibly be distributed to us?
Isn’t this a dream?” After saying this, his emaciated hand subconsciously tightened around the cane, his knuckles turning white, and even his breathing became cautious.
The old farmer’s words expressed what everyone was thinking.
They had seen too many lies and heard too many empty promises.
Could they really trust the King and the government this time?
In the past, landlords had promised during spring plowing that “if the harvest is good, we will leave you more,” but after the autumn harvest, the same cruel exploitation continued; officials had also visited the village before and promised to “improve the people’s livelihood,” only to turn around and forget about those commoners struggling at the edge of subsistence.
They did not dare believe that the royal family would truly give away its own land, did not dare believe that the government would genuinely stand on the side of the poor, and did not dare believe that one day they could escape the fate of being tenant farmers and obtain land that truly belonged to them.
Seeing the crowd like this, the captain of the land reform team showed no impatience.
He squatted down, held the old farmer’s emaciated hand, and slowly read the land reform decree word by word, patiently explaining the land allocation plan again and again.
“Old man, it is true.
“The land donated by the royal family and the land acquired by the government will be distributed first to landless and land-poor peasants like you.” “A household of six will receive five hectares of land, while families with more than six members will receive additional portions calculated per person.
“From now on, you will not have to pay a single coin of rent, and you will permanently possess the right to use the land.
“In the future, all the grain grown on this land will belong entirely to you.” The nearby municipal official took out a sample land title document from his briefcase, pointed to the blank space marked “Land User,” and said with a smile to the peasants gathered around, “Everyone, look, it won’t be long before your own names and your family names are written right here.
“This piece of paper will be proof that the land belongs to you.” At that moment, the entire village instantly fell into deathly silence.
The wind passed through the leaves of the old locust tree, rustling softly like someone quietly sobbing; in the distant fields, the calls of several crows echoed, making the settlement seem even quieter.
A dozen seconds later, no one knew who was the first to suddenly burst into loud tears.
A middle-aged woman held in her arms a child so thin that he was almost nothing but skin and bones.
Her tears fell like broken beads onto the child’s face and her own clothes, while her hoarse cries were filled with years of grievance and sudden, uncontrollable ecstasy.
Immediately afterward, she suddenly fell to her knees and prostrated herself on the ground, tightly clutching the soil beneath her hands and shouting again and again through her sobs, “It’s true!
It’s true!
We have our own land!
We no longer have to farm for the landlords, and we no longer have to be exploited by them!
Our children will never have to go hungry again!” That cry was like a floodgate breaking open, instantly releasing the emotions that all the peasants had suppressed for many years.
The news seemed to grow wings, riding the wind across the fields and spreading to every village in Sicily, every ridge, and every dilapidated thatched cottage.
The captain said to the village chief beside him, “Let’s go, measure the land and begin the distribution.” “Let’s go, let’s measure all the land in the village.” The village chief and the crowd happily led the way, beginning from the roadside and measuring large tracts of land one by one.
The village quickly became lively; the men helped measure the land, the women took responsibility for cooking, and for several days everyone ate communal meals together.
The surrounding neighboring villages were also filled with people measuring land.
Everyone talked and laughed, forming a complete contrast with the gloom and desolation of the previous days.
Similar scenes were happening simultaneously in Campania, Apulia, and other regions.
For the first time in centuries, millions of peasants were reacting to the same policy in almost the same way, and one could easily imagine the significance of such a reform.
Unlike the “wild ecstasy and rebirth” of the southern countryside, the reaction in the northern countryside was more one of “caution and anticipation,” a restrained and careful kind of joy.
Most northern peasants owned at least a small amount of land or worked on modern small and medium-sized farms, and their living conditions were somewhat better than those of the southern tenant farmers.
They could eat their fill, possessed complete sets of clothing, and did not have to wander from place to place in search of survival.
Land concentration there was also serious, but the landowners were mostly members of the emerging bourgeoisie rather than the old-fashioned southern landlords, and they tended to value practical interests more while showing less resistance toward land reform.
However, this was also an area where various armed factions and illegal organizations had previously been active, so northern peasants felt both anticipation and worry.
They worried that the government’s promises would eventually come to nothing and that the small amount of family property they had worked so hard to accumulate might be swept away by the reform.
They worried even more that once they accepted land distributed by the government, they might offend local landlords and later face retaliation.
People had their own scales in their hearts and would make their own judgments.
However, as the land reform deepened, those worries gradually disappeared, because the government truly gave them the land and no one dared threaten them afterward.
The government’s credibility increased enormously.
While the land reform proceeded at full speed, local governments introduced agricultural machinery manufacturers, promoted the use of agricultural machinery, and worked to improve farming efficiency.
Farmers could either rent the machinery instead of purchasing it outright or buy it through loans.
In addition, the Ministry of Finance, together with several national and regional banks, formulated long-term microloan policies to help peasants who had received land overcome temporary financial difficulties and catch up with the spring sowing season.
The Ministry of Agriculture’s new agricultural tax was also released shortly afterward, requiring only one hundred lire per hectare with no other additional taxes, causing peasants in both the north and south to cheer once again.
Watching everything the government was doing, peasants throughout the country gradually saw their caution and unease replaced by growing anticipation.