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Ettore Tolomei (born 16 August 1865 in Rovereto (then part of Austria-Hungary, today of Italy) - died 25 May 1952 in Rome) was an Italian nationalist and fascist. He is denigrated as "the undertaker of South Tyrol" by the majoritarian German community of the area.

Since the late 19th century, Tolomei promoted the idea of an expansion of Italy (Italia irredenta) to the north up to the main water divide of the Alps near Resia Pass and Brenner Pass, even though few Italians lived in this traditionally German-speaking area of the Austrian Empire. To support this, he searched for ancient Italian toponyms of places and translated the German names into Italian ones when there was no one to find.

In 1904, Tolomei climbed the 2911m high Klockerkarkopf [1], the northern-most mountain of the Italian Peninsula, in South Tyrol. Even though Fritz Kögl had climbed it in 1895 and reported about it in the Austrian Alpine Club magazine, Tolomei claimed to be the first climber, and baptized the peak Vetta d'Italia - the Summit of Italy. Italian maps soon used this name, and it is said that this made Woodrow Wilson believe that South Tyrol actually belonged to Italians. Tolomei was styled "Conte della Vetta" (Count of the Summit) in 1938.

When Italy joined World War I (against her former allies in the Triple Alliance) after having been promised in the London Pact by United Kingdom, France and Russia the annexion of the desired area, Tolomei was made the head of a commission with the task of creating a list of toponyms called Prontuario dei nomi locali dell'Alto Adige. Shortly after Italian troops had occupied South Tyrol in the wake of the Austrian-Italian Armistice of Villa Giusti in November 1918 (which was confirmed by the Treaty of St. Germain in 1919), Tolomei was appointed to a cultural office in the main city of South Tyrol, Bozen (Bolzano).

On 2 October 1922, Tolomei led a group of Blackshirts when they occupied the town hall of Bolzano and managed to persuade the Civil commissioner Luigi Credaro to depose the mayor; the following day they moved to Trento and, using similar tactics, obtained the suppression of the administrative Provincial assembly and, after Credaro's and minister Salandra's dimissions, that of the entire Central office for the new provinces. It was 'de facto' the end of all democratic policies in the area of Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol between the wars: supported by Mussolini, Tolomei enforced his policy of Italianization from 1923 onwards. Not only the names of towns were changed, but also people were forced to change names and to learn Italian. His program totalled 32 points, of which some of the most salient were:

• prohibition of the name "Tirol", and any variation of the same;
• closure of German-language schools:
• dissolution of parties specific to the German-speaking community;
• imposition of Italian as the only official language;
• closure of German-language press.

In 1939, his work led to the Option in South Tyrol that forced people to choose between remaining in Italy or emigrating to the Third Reich, the so called "Option für Deutschland". In 1943 he was seized by Nazi forces and deported, first to the Dachau concentration camp then to a sanatorium in Thuringia.

• (German) Works by and about Ettore Tolomei in the German National Library catalogue
• (German) [2]
• http://www.summitpost.org/mountain/rock/154477/klockerkarkopf-vetta-d-italia.html

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