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In ancient Rome a love story blossoms between Fabiola, daughter of a senator, and Rhual, a Gallic gladiator. After Fabiola's father is killed, the Romans blame the Christians and the persecution begins. Rhual confesses to being a Christian, is accused of the murder and sentenced to fight to the death in the arena.

Treacherous Roman senator Lucius Quintilius plans a secret journey into Thrace to recover a legendary treasure. He is accompanied by his daughter Livia posing as a Christian slave girl, his cruel henchman Commodio, and Terenzius, an ex-gladiator and Nero look-alike who fools the local Thracians into believing he is the real Emperor. But Lucius's plans are thwarted by Spartacus and his band of rebels who succeed in capturing the treasure for Thrace. When news arrives from Rome that the real Nero has died, local Roman governor Consul Metellus joins forces with Spartacus to defeat the traitors.

Turn-of-the-century Naples. Salvatore Ruotolo and his wife are murdered and their bodies are found in different locations. Since the evidence points to a crime by the Neapolitan crime organization, the Camorra, fear and corruption cause serious hindrances to the investigation by police authorities. In charge is a young and courageous judge who, using evidence discovered by chance, tries to reconstruct the story of the double murder. The plot that the judge must unravel is very complicated. Many people are questioned, even those apparently above suspicion. Deciding to get to the bottom of the matter, the judge keeps all the suspects under arrest, causing a backlash of public opinion. But in the face of passive resistance which he finds everywhere, even from his own colleagues and family, he begins to feel discouraged and is about to give up the investigation when a new piece of evidence comes to light. The information causes the death of an innocent man, but it revives in the judge the conscience of his own responsibility. He carries on with the case regardless, even if it means placing under house arrest the entire city.

A group of men of differing circumstances and personalities gather at a monastery to undergo a course of spiritual reappraisal. They comprise of a candle-maker, a politician, an ex-prisoner, a novelist and a petty thief trying to elude the police. All have their own spiritual problems to solve, except the thief. The politician, a former partisan leader, suffers the remorse of causing the deaths of three innocent men on a sabotage mission; he is set for the priesthood. The prisoner, a sick and possibly dying man, lacks the courage to visit his wife who is now happily remarried; his padre has advised him to leave her alone. The novelist bears the moral responsibility for offences committed by young people led astray by his writings; he earns a lot for his work, but is too demoralized to continue. Then the candle-maker - miserly, smooth-talking and bigoted - is unlikely to receive any benefit from his retreat to the monastery. Interwoven with the stories of these men is the drama of a priest who, overwhelmed by doubt, still finds the inner force to go forward. In the end the thief repents and leaves the monastery after making an offering to the Madonna of his stolen goods.

Paolo Silvestri, grandson of a retired admiral, and Massimo Falchetti, son of a rich shipping magnate, are studying at Leghorn Academy. The two friends both love the sea, but whilst Paolo has the Navy in his blood, Massimo hates military discipline. By chance Massimo meets Doris, a film actress, whom he begins to court. Paolo also gets to know Doris, and although he is engaged to Fioretta, a good and honest girl, he too falls in love with the film star. However, she advises him to return to Leghorn where he boards the Vespucci for the family's annual cruise. Massimo leaves his college course and decides to abandon any military career. Banished by his father, he obtains a job as cabin boy on a Spanish cargo ship. During the cruise on the Vespucci the crew stop off at the port of Algiers where Massimo's vessel is also docked. Paolo goes to look for his friend, but poor Massimo, having discovered that the Spanish crew are smugglers, has been clapped in irons. The shore patrol come to the rescue, and after a violent struggle Massimo is freed and the smugglers arrested. Massimo re-enters Leghorn Academy, and Paolo returns to his grandfather and a reconciliation with Fioretta.

Tarsus, in the Roman province of Cilicia, AD 120. Two Carthaginian sisters, Lea and Esther, are bought as slave girls by Roman tribune Marcus Valerius, who gives them as a present to proud Julia Martia, daughter of the proconsul. Ambitious, greedy and vindictive, Julia is betrothed to the cynical Flavius Metellus, a member of the Senate, but in fact she is in love with Marcus. However, he prefers the simple sweetness of Lea, which drives Julia to cruelty and revenge. The proconsul is murdered by Flavius Metellus who becomes his successor. Believing the Christians were responsible for her father's death, Julia, now the new proconsul's wife, orders the persecutions to begin. Marcus is ordered to carry out the campaign, but faced with the courage and faith of the Christians he realizes they are innocent. He is arrested after being betrayed by a shepherd and joins the two sisters in the dungeons. Lea is tortured and blinded after refusing to divulge the hiding place of the remaining Christians. Marcus and the others are sentenced to death, but his men free him in time to prevent the Christians being burned alive. In the bloody battle that follows Julia and her husband are killed and the Christians are liberated. Marcus, now also a Christian, is proclaimed the new proconsul and takes Lea as his wife. Although blind she will lead her husband with the sweetness of her soul and the light of faith that has saved her.

Matthew, a rich nationalist Jew and a contemporary of Jesus, regards the latter as an obstacle in this struggle to free their people from the Roman yoke by means of revolt. He incites the people against Jesus and prevents his own wife, a true Christian in her heart, from offering the Redeemer a drink of water at his crucifixion on Golgotha. For this act Matthew is condemned to wander eternally on the earth with every rest denied to him, even that of the grave. We go forward to Paris in 1940. Matthew, miraculously still alive, is now the young banker Matthew Blumenthal. Rich and powerful, it would be easy to escape from Nazi persecution, but he chooses not to do so. He wishes to share the lot of his fellow Jews and, with many others, is despatched to Germany and detained in a concentration camp where everyone is brutally ill-treated. Being young, robust and full of energy, he does not resign himself to the situation, but succeeds in organizing a rebellion and flees with several comrades. He manages to reach safety, but when he learns that a hundred hostages will be killed if he does not return to captivity, he surrenders voluntarily and undergoes martyrdom, whereupon the curse of the Wandering Jew is finally lifted.

Despite the disagreement of their mother, the sons of old Taras Bulba are taken to the Dnieper camp on their return from a Kiev seminary, to teach them how to become real Cossacks.

In 6 AD Emperor Tiberius is warned by the Senate in Rome of the threat posed by the Germanic tribes revolting in the northern province of Pannonia. Tribune Marcus Venditius is entrusted with the insignia of the 7th Legion and ordered by Governor Messala to subdue the rebellion. Magdus, the aging leader of the Pannonian tribes, is angry with Batone because he has compromised the peace terms with Rome, but Batone is a much younger warrior who has lost his reason and lusts for blood.

The story of Giuseppe Garibaldi's 1849 campaign to free Italy from Austrian domination. Although the defence of Rome has become impossible, Garibaldi declares his intent to continue the struggle for republican liberty and a unified Italy. With a following of four thousand men he begins a march across the Apennines with the aim of reaching Venice which is under siege but still resisting. However, the Bourbons and the Austrians pursue the volunteers who have in their ranks Frattini, a traitor secretly working to disunite the small but brave force. Many in fact desert and even the most loyal officer, Bueno, gives in to Frattini's proposals to impose summary justice. Anita Garibaldi, whom her husband had left behind in Rome because she was expecting a baby, rejoins him, and her influence, courage and vivacity succeed in restoring unity. San Marino gives refuge to the surviving force and the Austrians offer a cease-fire. But the terms of surrender proposed by the Austrians are so severe that Garibaldi prefers to disband his men, and during the night leaves for Venice with a few faithful. Many Garibaldi supporters are shot and Anita also dies. Garibaldi and Bueno manage to escape with the help of local peasants.

In 1941 an Italian regiment known as the Savoy Cavalry is sent by Mussolini to Russia to assist the German invasion. After crossing an extensive area of Soviet territory the men arrive at a village that seems deserted. A patrol sent on reconnaissance comes under machine-gun fire from the top of a bell-tower. During the fighting that follows a young woman named Kalina is captured by the Italians, but in order to win favour with the local people she is spared. A peaceful rapport then builds up between Italian soldiers and Russian villagers, and a special fondness grows between Kalina and Captain Valli, the colonel's godson. Suddenly, the men receive orders to depart and make their way to the front line which is under Russian siege. However, the German commander does not believe the Italian presence will be effective, so on a point of honour the Savoy Cavalry decide to demonstrate their worth. Moving to the front they charge into the enemy batteries and eventually overwhelm them. Sadly, few survive the heroic charge.

The story is set during the time of the Five Days War of 1848 between Italy and Austria. Clara, daughter of a rich Milan trader who deals with the Austrian army, is in love with Enrico, a devoted member of the Carbonaro revolutionary organization. Unfortunately, her father wants her to marry Count Severi, a young aristocrat who is dissolute, penniless and pro-Austrian. Denounced by Count Severi for his political activities, Enrico is forced to flee, but while crossing the Ticino river he is hit by an Austrian bullet. Hearing that he is dead, Clara in despair marries Count Severi, but the marriage does not turn out to be a happy one. The Count believes his wife to be an adventuress with a lover, and so he decides to poison her and thereby gain the considerable property that she has had bestowed by her father. Then Enrico, who is not dead, returns to Milan and tries to find Clara. He learns that she died the day before and sadly goes to pay his respects at the chapel where her body lies. Amazingly, Clara is not dead but in a state of catalepsy. Enrico abducts her and takes her to a convent to attempt a cure. Suddenly, the Five Days War breaks out and the Count, in an effort to exonerate himself, joins up and is killed. Enrico, after fighting on the barricades, leaves for the front. Eventually, after serving his fatherland, he is able to fulfil his dream by marrying Clara.

It is 1917, the period of the First World War when Italy is fighting Austria-Hungary. Lucilla di Torrebruna leaves high school and returns to her father, a colonel in the cavalry, who lives at San Donà di Piave. He tells her that his next wife is going to be Helène, a foreign lady. Lucilla takes the news calmly, pleased that her father has found happiness, although she receives a somewhat cold indifference from her new stepmother. Franco, a young man from Trieste and an old college friend of Lucilla with whom he shares a mutual affection, gets through the Austrian lines and enrols with crack Italian corps, the bersaglieri. After the Battle of Caporetto, San Donà is occupied by the enemy and the Torrebruna villa becomes the Austrian headquarters. Now Helène reveals her true colours - she is an Austrian spy. Franco and the colonel organize counter-espionage operations. The colonel, disguised as a peasant, goes to gather information while Franco swims across the River Piave with the famous caimani unit (named after the South American alligator) and reports back to Italian headquarters. In one of his reconnaissances the colonel is mortally wounded. Lucilla, helped by a young crippled peasant, carries on with the dangerous mission. In the end the young peasant is killed, and Lucilla is captured by the Austrians and sentenced to death. At the eleventh hour she is rescued by the Italian cavalry.

1017 AD. The Republic of Pisa is organizing a fleet to drive out the Saracens who are infesting the Mediterranean. While the forces are away "The Gorgon," the young daughter of a Pisan nobleman who has been heroically killed, comes to be solemnly invested as the figurehead virgin who will maintain a lantern to celebrate the men's victorious return. In charge of the home guard is an ambitious young Florentine who feels deprived of the forthcoming honour and glory, and who seeks revenge by violating the sacred person of the virgin. He gains access to her well guarded quarters, but when the Gorgon falls helplessly in love with him, his desire for vengeance falls away. His plot exposed, he commits suicide rather than invoke the wrath of the Pisans. The Gorgon too takes her life by throwing herself from a high tower. Meanwhile, the victorious Pisan vessels return.

A story from the historic uprising of 1282 known as the War of the Sicilian Vespers (since it began during the evening prayer service of vespers on Easter Monday of that year). Sicily is in a state of unrest under the French rule of Charles of Anjou. Elena di Paterno is betrothed to Salerno gentleman Giovanni da Procida, but she is being forced by the wishes of King Charles to marry the Governor of Palermo. Giovanni returns from exile and from behind the scenes plans a revolt. Pursued by the Governor's men-at-arms under the command of Captain Droet, Giovanni takes refuge in the home of Tommaso, a miller. Captain Droet, meanwhile, meets Laura, the miller's beautiful daughter, with whom he falls in love. But Laura intends to marry a local fisherman, so with the help of both the Abbott of the Church of the Holy Ghost and the Governor's wife, she seeks to hasten the wedding. To thwart her plans Droet lays a trap for the miller who is arrested as a rebel. Tommaso is then fatally wounded in a battle between the French and the rebels. During the marriage celebrations for Laura and the fisherman, Droet attempts to seize the bride by force, but the groom rushes in to stop him. This is the spark that ignites the fire of revolt and all the people rise up. Giovanni comes down from the mountain with his men. The Governor tries to flee, but Elena calls on the people to smite him, though she herself is struck down with her detested husband. Laura is re-united with her beloved, and Sicily is liberated. By the end of the uprising some eight thousand Frenchmen have been put to death.

Drama set in Milan in 1858. Dr. Antonio Ansperti from Como, implicated in the clandestine activities of the Young Italy revolutionary movement, is arrested by the Austrian authorities. After a trial he is sentenced to death and executed, in spite of efforts by his countryman Count Lamberti to intervene on his behalf with the Governor of Milan. The martyr entrusts Lamberti with the task of continuing his work, and the Count decides that this can best be achieved by accepting from the Governor a position of high office. The move is misinterpreted by his wife Countess Anna, a fervent patriot, and she distances herself from her husband. She forms a strong attachment to the Governor's young assistant, an exiled Pole, and decides to elope with him. But Ansperti's widow, Giuditta, realizing that the Countess has misunderstood the situation, persuades her to cancel her plans. As a reprisal for his disappointment the assistant denounces the Count to the authorities. In an effort to suppress the scandal the Governor offers Count Lamberti safe passage to Turin. Lamberti pretends to accept, but then hands over the safe passage to his nephew Giacomino. Seriously compromised, the Count gives himself up to the police.

In regional Sicily, Jana tries to repair her sister's marriage by going to a sorceress who makes up a love potion that will bring about the couple's happiness. But the spell only works on Jana herself..