This is the story of the Cosa Nostra: from its origins in Sicily in 1863, through the great wave of Italian immigration to America, to prohibition and the formation of the first mafia families, and to the harsh realities of fascism and the postwar years in Italy where the Cosa Nostra thrived.

The image of the mafioso as a "man of honor"-good to the weak, above the laws of the state but subject to a precise code-was firmly rooted in the collective imagination until the 1980s when light was shed on the structure of the vast organization, its unsavory objectives, and the cold-blooded strategies behind its actions.

Culled from thousands of archival images, more than 250 photographs and detailed captions tell the story not only of the criminals who have entered popular legend but also of the people who have been victims of the mafia: the judges, police officers, and private citizens who fought back.