The Ships of Brawling Battleships Steel: Italy Battleship Dante Aligieri

Laid down on June 6, 1909, launched on August 20, 1910 and commissioned on January 15, 1913, Dante Alighieri carried a main armament of twelve 12 inch main guns mounted three per turret; one centerline forward, one centerline aft and two centerline amidships that could fire to both sides. Dante Alighieri was the only ship in its battleship class and was the first Italian dreadnought. She was designed by Vittorio Cuniberti, an early advocate of the all-big-gun battleship. This turret layout was used as the Italians distrusted superfiring arrangements and it kept the center of gravity low. The triple turret arrangement had been invented by Italy’s putative opponent, Austria-Hungary. A number of Russian classes later copied this unusual "Cuniberti" turret arrangement. Considered very fast for a battleship, the Dante Alighieri acquired her speed at the cost of armor protection, a design decision that persisted in later Italian capital ships. She was powered by turbines with coal-fired boilers and supplementary oil burners. The name honored the great Italian poet (1265–1321 famous for the "Divina Commedia," which defined the Italian language. During World War One, she primarily kept an eye on the Austrian Fleet and her only action was a bombardment of Durazzo on October 2, 1918. Converted to oil-fired boilers in 1923, she was deleted and scrapped in 1928.

See other battleships: Viribus Unitis, Gangut, Andrea Doria