Raffaello Carboni's perception of Australia

Raffaello Carbonils role both as participant in and chronicler of the Ballarat uprising has been the subject of some controversy. Although the disagreement regarding the veracity of Carboni's account has long been settled (see below), Green, Serle and others who have commented on his work have tended to relegate it to the status of a mere chronicle, without considering that The Eureka Stockade also presents broader themes and perspectives on Australia and Australian society, which Carboni later pursued in his subsequent Italian works displaying an Australian content. This article examines the perceptions of Australia presented in both The Eureka Stockade and Carboni's Italian works, with a view to determining the author's views of Australia and an emerging Australian identity, and the way this is projected for an Italian audience. What is revealed by this investigation is that The Eureka Stockade, being more than a mere chronicle, does in fact provide a partial, albeit idiosyncratic view, of mid-nineteenth century Australia from a non-Anglo-Celtic perspective that is subsequently transported to an Italian context.