the statesman daniele manin seems to have believed in italian unification years before camillo benso of cavour, who actually unified the country with giuseppe garibaldi through diplomatic and military actions. during the 1856 congress of paris, manin talked with cavour about several plans and strategies to achieve the unification of italy; cavour clearly considered those plans vain things, and after the meeting wrote that manin had talked about ""l'unità d'italia ed altre corbellerie"" ("the unity of italy and other nonsense").