After the French began to build capital ships again in the mid 1930's, the Italians followed suit. These "Italian Renowns" had the largest guns of any Italian ship at the time and led to the successful Littorio and Impero Romano classes.

Cristoforo Colombo was heavily damaged at Taranto and sat in port repairing while sister ship Leonardo da Vinci and what was left of the Italian Fleet escorted the first contingent of the Afrika Korps toward Libya. The Fleet was intercepted by a roughly equal British fleet and a huge melee began. Da Vinci sank a cruiser but was chased down and sunk by 20" shells from Superb. Colombo severely damaged the American battlecruiser Constitution in another combined Axis sortie near Mallorca. Colombo was finally sunk by HMS Tiger in yet another fleet engagement.