ABSTRACT
As in the case of a journalist attempting to extrapolate the sentiments of the American electorate by interviewing passersby at an airport, discerning the backgrounds of Italian terrorists from Giangiacomo Feltrinelli, Renato Curcio et. al., is inappropriate. There were several thousand Italians who planned, aided or committed acts of political terrorism during the 1970s and 80s. After reviewing some of the evidence, one historian concluded that terrorists appear to have been drawn from all sorts of family backgrounds and social milieu. Located somewhere in the middle of the discussions is the body of evidence concerning who the modern terrorists are and where they came from. In terms of central tendency, pluralities of the terrorists were born in industrialized northern Italy and in big cities as well. Industrialists, business managers and aristocrats are to be found along with professional criminals, prostitutes and other "subpro-letarians".
