ABSTRACT
There are four great constants in the conflict between the Napoleonic empire and the Catholic Church during the epoca francese: the two protagonists in the struggle were the political forces of the Napoleonic regime and the postTridentine Church; the geography, both physical and human, in which they struggled was composed of the centre and periphery of the states of the Italian ancien régime, which the Napoleonic empire overthrew and annexed, and over which the Church had exerted a powerful influence. The next chapter seeks to analyse the role of geography as applied to the conflict between Church and state; the present chapter attempts to outline the characters of the protagonists in that conflict.
