In May 2006, the unexpected happened: Giorgio Napolitano was elected president of Italy. In some way, the history of pre- and post-unification Italy was to come full circle.

The Quirinale – originally built as a summer residence by Pope Gregory XIII – became the residence of approximately 30 popes, four kings of a united Italy and all the presidents of the Italian Republic. In the 19th century, it hosted a handful of papal conclaves.

Now, it was to be the residence of Italy’s first “Communist” president – though a conventional communist, he was certainly not.

Born in Naples in 1925 to a liberal father and an aristocratic mother of Piedmontese origin, Napolitano’s political career spanned the vast majority of Italy’s First Republic and helped to shape much of the Second Republic.

The current president, Sergio Mattarella, described his life as mirroring “a large part of history in the second half of the 20th century, with its dramas, complexities, goals and hopes”.

Indeed, his remarks were prescient. As a jurisprudence student in Naples, Napolitano was enrolled with the Gruppo Universitario Fascista. During this period, however, several friends formed a Neapolitan Communist grouping. He formally joined the party in 1945.

First elected to the Chamber of Deputies in 1953, except for one legislature he remained in parliament until 1996 when he entered the Senate. His first years as a member of the Partito Comunista Italiano (PCI) would haunt him later in life.

In 1956, he vigorously defended the Soviet invasion of Hungary and argued vociferously with his comrades who opposed this illegal action. At the time, he argued that the Soviet invasion prevented Hungary from descending into chaos and revolution, thus safeguarding world peace.

Fifty years later – as president – he was to mark the 50th anniversary of this brutal invasion. In quasi-Marxist self-criticism mode, he berated himself for his earlier position. He stated that he had already rescinded his earlier stance back in 1968 when he had opposed – in an equally vigorous manner – the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia.

There is some discernible evolution in his thought. Following the death of Palmiro Togliatti in 1964, Napolitano emerged as one of the more moderate politicians of the PCI, often clashing with more hard-line elements and constantly arguing for reform and, to some extent, greater engagement with social democracy.

This evolution was gradual. For example, he took an ambivalent stance towards Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. He disagreed with the author, described his political judgements as “abhorrent”, and accused him of trying to undermine the Soviet Union. He also counselled against engaging with his arguments. However, he believed Solzhenitsyn should be “tolerated” and did not pronounce himself over his eventual exile from the USSR.

However, only a couple of years later, in 1981, he would clash with Enrico Berlinguer over the “crisis of Eurocommunism”. He wrote a much-cited article in L’Unità warning Berlinguer that he risked dragging the PCI into greater sectarianism and parliamentary isolation. He argued for keeping the lines of communication open and did not exclude the possibility of convergence with other socialist groupings.

He believed this could keep socialism alive despite the radically different positions both parties adopted. Internally, he championed the PCI’s transition into its more democratic orientation.

He brought about some incredible changes in the foreign policy orientation of the PCI. He became a passionate advocate of European integration and served in the European Parliament for two terms.

He was invited numerous times to the US on lecture tours and Henry Kissinger would describe him as his “favourite communist” – a compliment not to be taken lightly from the pioneer of détente.

Napolitano provided some stability when it was much needed- André DeBattista

In Italy, he slowly began to earn a name for himself as a man of the institutions. Elected president of the Chamber of Deputies in 1992, Napolitano was to preside over this house at the height of the Tangentopoli scandal, which shook Italian institutions to the core.

In 1996, Romano Prodi would nominate him as minister of the interior. He did not execute this role without controversy. In 1997, he ordered a naval blockade at the Otranto Channel and responded to critics by saying it was a mere patrol to convince migrants to change routes.

In 2005, he was nominated Senator for Life and in 2006 he was elected as the 11th president of the Italian Republic.

While occupying this high office, he made the definite transition from Compagno Giorgio to Il Re Giorgio – a nickname given to him by The New York Times for his vigorous defence of the institutions.

The first two years of his presidency went by relatively quietly. Then the clashes began.

The first came in early 2009 when Napolitano refused to sign an emergency decree by the Berlusconi government annulling a court sentence allowing the suspension of nutrition to coma patient Eluana Englaro. Three days later, Eluana died.

Then there was the 2011 political crisis, during which the Berlusconi government resigned and Mario Monti was appointed first as Senator for Life and then as head of a technocratic government.

Napolitano received widespread support for this move. The New York Times saw it as a carefully orchestrated manoeuvre that preserved stability. He became a power broker and “anti-Berlusconi” – a symbol of stability in contrast to Berlusconi’s more exuberant personality.

Criticism came from both left and right. Giulio Tremonti described the 2011 move as a way to save German and French banks overexposed in Greece and Spain with the help of Italian taxpayer money. On the left, Jurgen Habermas described it as a “gentle coup d’état”.

Nonetheless, Napolitano provided some stability when it was much needed. Indeed, he was elected to a then-unprecedented second term, leaving office in January 2015, aged 89.

Beyond the political controversies and shortcomings – of which there were many – Napolitano epitomised the gentleman-politician of another era. He was profoundly cultured and had a keen interest in the theatre and literature. He exhibited an incredibly natural and sincere courtesy.

One episode demonstrates this. In the final days of his papacy, Pope Benedict received Napolitano at the Apostolic Palace. The then pontiff thanked him for finding the time to come and visit.

Napolitano quickly replied, “No, è lei che mi ha dato l’opportunità di rivederla”. (No, it is you who have given me the opportunity to see you again.)

For much of the 20th century, such an exchange would have been unthinkable. To a certain extent, the divisions of the past had been healed.

With his death, aged 98, Italy lost the least communist of the communists and one with a deep passion for maintaining the institutions other communist leaders sought to undermine.