Crema, Lombardy
By the 1859 Treaty of Zurich which ended the Austro-Sardinian War, Austria ceded Lombardy, including Crema, to France, who then immediately ceded it to Sardinia. This formed part of the "Risorgimento", which saw Sardinia become the Kingdom of Italy in 1861. In 1946, the Kingdom became the modern Italian Republic.
Sardinian nationalism
Sardism, which had long been confined to the island's intellectuals, made its political debut for the first time in the occasion of Ireland's independence (1921) with the Sardinian Action Party or PSd'Az (one of the oldest parties in Europe advocating for regional self-determination,), which got 36% of the popular vote in 1921 regional election. Sardinian nationalism thus established itself as the most important mass movement in Sardinia, and the Psd'Az a political force that Mussolini had to reckon with and eventually ban in 1926; some Sardists, like Emilio Lussu, were forced into hiding and participated in the main European fronts of anti-fascism (like Dino Giacobbe and Giuseppe Zuddas in the Spanish Civil War), while others decided to join the Fascist Party, hoping that by adhering to the regime Sardinia would get autonomy in exchange (a demand facing an immediate rejection) or at least some attention from the Mainland (which they eventually got through some moderate funding concentrated in Cagliari for the local infrastructures). Overall, rural Sardinia showed little interest in the Fascist state, let alone consent, while the bourgeois segments from the urban settlements were among the staunchest supporters of the regime on the island. Following the Second World War, the Psd'Az, already weakened by the loss of many of its key members during the conflict, suffered a first split between the moderate wing and a much more radical one, led by Sebastiano Pirisi, which developed into another party ("Lega Sarda", "Sardinian League") but ultimately got poor results in the 1946 Italian general election.