The criminal authorities of Sicily in the 19th century were sure that everything can be achieved with a kind word, if you hold a gun in your hands. Evil irony reflects the essence of the ugly phenomenon that arose on the island after long, bringing the inhabitants of the island to poverty by robberies and robberies by their neighbors. True, organized groups became only after the conquest of Italy by Napoleon, when the feudal nobility left the island and transferred their estates to managers, whose main task was to collect taxes from peasants and collect debts.
In order for the management of estates to be effective, the ministers organized their small punitive detachments that did not shun blackmail. Peculiar organized associations were also created by peasant families trying to defend themselves against the crazy gangsters who were at the time teeming with Sicily, located in the heart of the Mediterranean trade routes. The situation was about the same as in the nineties in our country, when the criminal authorities of Moscow demanded payment for not being robbed, as well as for returning the loot to you.
The situation was so complicated that the governors of Napoleon did not even try to intervene in it, and therefore lost their influence, losing power to only one thousand associates of Garibaldi. The unification of Italy did not bring relief to the inhabitants of the island, since the new authorities were interested in developing industry concentrated in the northern part of the country, and the agrarian south survived on its own. It was difficult for large and medium landowners of Sicily to maintain property in such conditions, therefore, local criminal authorities became their best assistants, although not always desired or chosen of their own free will.
Such defenders were quickly fed up with the payment established by the contract and began to demand a share in the property, gradually taking all the property into their own hands. We saw something similar in those days when the criminal authorities of Russia tried to “protect” the entire business and did not miss a single outlet.
Sicilian power associations became more and more organized, traditions were born in them and began to be inherited, aimed at maintaining the criminal structure. Strong personalities cared for the security of the created system and the protection of their interests. Therefore, criminal authorities began to unite all members of their organizations with mutual responsibility and solve all competition issues by means of vendetta — vendetta, administering justice according to its own rules.
The scope of their activities is becoming so wide that no one remains indifferent. Directly or indirectly, but every resident of the island becomes associated with some kind of grouping. Gradually, criminal authorities take control of state officials as well, distributing posts and interesting them in attractive contracts. The expansion of influence went so rapidly that prosperous mafia families began to feel a shortage of manpower, and therefore began to expand through marriage and christening. At the same time, the head of one clan - the godfather - was entrusted with several families of godchildren, whom he kept under control.
Only in the twentieth century, the criminal authorities of Sicily received the first strongest blow, knocking them out for as many as fifteen years when the fascist dictator B. Mussolini came to power. He had his own army, formed of bandits, and he did not need the services of the old mafia clans.
