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Any history of the French Revolution under the Directory must first be placed in the European context in which the Republic chose to maneuver. Indeed, the influence of a French revolutionary republicanism is particularly visible in the Cisalpine Republic (1797-1799) in northern Italy, whose leaders tried to establish a new republican order modeled on the French Constitution of the year III. Evidence of this influence can be found in the debates of the Grand Council, one of the two Assemblies of the legislative power created by the constitution approved in 1797. While proposing to form a revolutionary government founded on the French experience, the political personnel of this council labored to independently execute republican practices to deal with the social, economic and political issues typical of the Italian context. This interpretation of French politics by the Cisalpine Legislative Council, however, provoked fear among the main figures of the French civil authority, especially among the men of the “extreme center” who judged as dangerous the policy of the Great Council, a policy, it was feared, that could lead to the reintroduction in France of Jacobin and counter-revolutionary factions.