Teresa Mattei
Italian partisan and politician (1921–2013)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Teresa "Teresita" Mattei (1 February 1921 – 12 March 2013) was an Italian partisan and politician.
Teresa Mattei | |
|---|---|
Teresa Mattei in the 1940s | |
| Member of the Constituent Assembly | |
| In office 25 June 1946 – 31 January 1948 | |
| Constituency | Florence |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 1 February 1921 |
| Died | 12 March 2013 (aged 92) Casciana Terme Lari, Italy |
| Party | Italian Communist Party (–1957) |
| Spouses |
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| Children | 4, including Gianfranco Sanguinetti |
| University of Florence | |
| Occupation |
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| Profession | Teacher |
Early and personal life
Born in Genoa, in 1938 Mattei was expelled from all schools of the Kingdom of Italy for openly criticizing the Racial laws during class.[1][2] Graduating in philosophy at the University of Florence in 1944,[3] she joined the partisans under the nom de guerre of Partigiana Chicchi.[1][4] She took part in the murder of philosopher and Fascist minister Giovanni Gentile.[5][6]
She was briefly married to Bruno Sanguinetti, with whom she had a son, writer Gianfranco Sanguinetti.
Career
After the war, Mattei was a candidate for the Communist Party to the Constituent Assembly, in which she served as a bureau secretary. Mattei was the youngest to be elected to the Constituent Assembly and was thus called "the girl of Montecitorio".[1][4]
In 1957, Mattei was expelled from the Communist Party because of her opposition to Stalinism and to Palmiro Togliatti's politics.[4] She later became national director of the Italian Women's Union (UDI) and introduced the use of mimosa for International Women's Day (IWD)[1] at the request of Luigi Longo.[7] Mattei felt that the French symbols of IWD, violets and lilies-of-the-valley, were too scarce and expensive to be used in poor, rural Italian areas, so she proposed the mimosa as an alternative.[4][8][7]
Death
Mattei died in Lari, Tuscany, aged 92,[7] the last living female member of the Constituent Assembly of Italy.[1]