Le «genti che l’Anglia vendé». Diagnosi della crisi ionica tra Foscolo e Mustoxidi.

This article presents a detailed analysis of the different reactions expressed by Ugo Foscolo and Andrea Mustoxidi with regard to the Ionian crisis and the dramatic effects it had on the small town of Parga following the end of Napoleonic supremacy on the European continent. Foscolo’s article On Parga and his subsequently abandoned work on the vicissitudes of the residents of Parga are both examined, together with Mustoxidi’s unsigned Exposé, which too was written as the events were unfolding and as Mustoxidi became closer and closer to Giovanni Capodistria, the future first president of Greece. Despite the differences articulated in their works, the positions held by Foscolo and Mustoxidi actually converge on one key element, the concept of ius gentium; in fact, in On Parga Foscolo offers a broader reflection on this theme than he did ten years earlier in the oration he gave at Pavia entitled Sull’origine e i limiti della giustizia [On the origins and limits of justice]. Its historical perspective is here more clearly defined, taking into account the international balance of power and the elusive aim for the happiness of populations.