Elementary School Inspectors in Northern Italy before Unification (1780–1860): The Establishment of a Key Figure

The origin of school inspectors as state officials is closely connected with the birth of a state school system, which was first fully enforced in Italy in Habsburg Lombardy, when Felbiger’s pedagogy and the Allgemeine Schulordnung were introduced by Joseph II. The task of supervising elementary school teachers was given to a chief school director, normally a priest. The Napoleonic governments backed the Normalmethode and the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy introduced the position of three state chief inspectors (secular university professors), although everyday local control remained in the hands of city school directors, who were priests. During the Restoration, the Politische Schulverfassung was applied by decree in 1818 throughout the Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia, creating the role of two chief inspectors of elementary schools for Lombardy and the Venetian region. These had to be clergymen. We can reconstruct the work of these inspectors and trace the gradual affirmation of their role through the imposition of the Normalmethode but also through confrontations with the city council or government authorities, in which they defended the need to open new schools, pay teachers better, and protect poor children.