Leonardo versus Wodroow Wilson. La stirpe latina e il suo destino dopo la Grande Guerra

Until the first half of the twentieth century, the figure of Leonardo da Vinci was generally exhibited by Italian culture with decidedly nationalistic pride, which represented him as the leader of the national series of inventors that reaches up to Guglielmo Marconi. One of the public celebrations held in Lecce on the occasion of the fourth centenary of Leonardo's death (1919), which coincides with the period of elaboration of the Peace Treaties after the Great War, offers a significant example. In this circumstance the nationalistic tones become even more pronounced, in opposition to the attitude of the President of the USA Wilson, who in fact became the most authoritative diplomatic mediator of the post-war period. Wilson is not only accused of not recognizing Italy's sovereignty over certain territories located between its borders and the new Yugoslav state but also, and above all, of embodying the materialistic mentality of the Anglo-Saxon world as opposed to the spiritual values of "Latin virtue".